I awoke in the attic room of the Namaste Mumbai backpackers hostel, where an army of electric fans whirred in the dark. It took a lot of motivation to get up. After the day I’d had yesterday I wanted to curl up for the next 12 hours. But I was in the middle of a brand-new city, in the middle of a brand-new country. An entire subcontinent ready to be explored. My curiosity got the better of me. I got up, and without bothering to shower I ventured out of the hostel confines and into Mumbai.
Imagine one feeling, one smell, one vibe; one area from a place you know, a shop or an alleyway, a restaurant, or even perhaps a street. Then extrapolate it a thousand-fold. Walking in Mumbai felt like walking in another universe. But it felt like a universe existing within the one I already knew. Take one feeling or idea and make that thing a world in itself.
My descriptions of Hanoi now feel like an overreach. I called it a jungle city. But when I walked through Mumbai – just one fraction of one district – I realised I should have saved such descriptions. The roads were sandier and there was much more vegetation and greenery, sometimes sprouting up on both sides of the street. And I loved it, not just because it was magical, but because there was oftentimes enough trees and plants overarching the road that the temperature genuinely seemed to drop and I was offered some respite from the onslaught of heat and humidity.
Finding somewhere to eat was difficult, there were chai stalls everywhere and occasionally stalls selling food, but I desperately needed shelter from the sun. My suncream ran out in Ho Chi Minh. I had no idea where or when I’d be able to get more.
I was deeply grateful when a small café suddenly presented itself to me. Walking inside was like going from furnace to fridge. The place was called Plush and the menu held an astonishing variety of bagels. I got one packed with ham, cream cheese, chicken and salsa, along with a latte that was served so hot it was almost boiling.
Hours later, after experiencing my first bus ride in Bombay, I came upon a train station. As I was was walking across the overpass – which displayed a great view of the train tracks and slums – a man called out to me. He wanted to know all about me. Told me his name was Rakish.
‘Tumhala bhetun chan vatala.’ I said.
When I said I spent a week blissfully doing fuck all on Cat Ba island, that wasn’t entirely true. I spent a great deal of time on language apps, trying to teach myself bits of Hindi and Marathi. There is no national language of India, but Hindi is the most widely spoken and Marathi is the regional language of Maharashtra where Mumbai is located. I figured the majority of Mumbaikars would speak Marathi. While this has turned out to be VERY incorrect, I was lucky in that Rakish is indeed a speaker of Marathi. I soon learned that Rakish works near to the Gateway of India, which is exactly where I was heading. I followed him down to the platform. Across from us the slums ran across the train tracks which people walked up and down like a suburban street.
Rakish is a seller of maps. Though with the existence of google maps he’s pretty determined to change things up a bit. Wants to start selling ladies’ hand bags. He told me about his children and advised me to see a doctor about my freckles.
Then the train arrived. We jumped on and there were no doors to close behind us; it felt like hitching a ride on a cargo train that you see in movies. People were still jumping on and off as it began to move.
Forget about any cramped conditions on the London Underground, at least when the doors open for you to get off, you can expect at least some people to stand aside for you while you step onto the platform. Alas… not so in in Mumbai. As you prepare to depart your carriage you may as well as well prepare yourself for a rugby scrum, it’s every man for himself and directly shoving people out of your way seems perfectly acceptable. Women get separate carriages to themselves though they can still travel with the men if they wish.
Not more than 20 minutes later, Rakish and I were walking along the Queen’s Necklace – otherwise called Marine Drive – looking out on the Arabian sea. It was in the heat of the early afternoon, a rusty mist faded out the buildings of central Mumbai across the bay and hung murkily over the watery horizon.
We soon made it to Oval Maidan Park where people played cricket and the Rajhabhai clock tower stood proudly above a wall of palms. Rakish told me how to say things in Marathi. Sentences that I was able to grasp after hearing them repeated two or three times, but which slunk from memory minutes later.
As I got mouthful after mouthful of new language, we journeyed onwards to the Gateway of India. Built to commemorate the landing of King George V and Queen Mary at Apollo Bandar in 1911.
After Rakish helped me get an Indian sim card we parted ways; he going to his stall to sell maps, and I entering the nearby Chhatrapati Shivaji museum.
The first exhibit to catch my attention were the sculptures on the ground floor. I quickly learned about the story of Ganesh. The Hindu god of prosperity who started out as a child beheaded by his father, later resurrected with the head of an elephant because the father had upset his wife by killing their son. This story was told to me not by the audio guide I’d purchased, but by a guy named Ashish who began talking to me as we stood looking at the sculpture of Ganesh.
Ashish started telling me more as we continued to walk through the sculpture exhibit. I soon learned that he was on a solo trip from Delhi. A 7-day solo trip to explore Mumbai. It was his first time in the city just as it was mine. We looked at various tapestries depicting the antics of Krishna, another god from Hinduism. “The blue god”.
Before I knew it, the museum was closing and we had to leave. We were both starving so we decided to stick together and find somewhere to eat. Ashish told me about a Hindi saying which goes like this:
“Phle pet Pooja, phir kam dooja”
It means:
“First you satisfy your stomach… then you go to work.”
I agreed with the saying wholeheartedly. In the meantime, we got some sugar cane juice from a nearby stall to keep our energy levels up. It was creamy, lemony and beyond sweet.
As we walked along Marine Drive, it was impossible not to notice the stares I was getting. Eyes followed me everywhere. Many people stared, but some people really stared. Others came up to me and asked if they could have a picture taken with me. It was all incredibly strange.
Ashish and I eventually entered a restaurant called Shiv Sagar. A vegetarian place. As I was soon to learn, many, many restaurants in India only serve vegetarian food. We shared a vat of Dal Makhani along with a basket of butter naan. It also came with pickled mangoes and basil and mint sauce. The basil and mint sauce was incredible with the dal.
We exited the restaurant and emerged into night. Walking back along Marine Drive after the meal, the Queen’s Necklace was busier than ever. We sat by the water. In the night, the buildings of central Mumbai on the other side of the bay were lit up and stood clearly before us in the distance. Ashish told me that this is where the richest people live. The richest man in Asia lives there he told me. A residence comprising of 60 floors.
We walked back along the water where some blokes were singing and playing the drums. I recognised one of the words in the song “swagatahe” meaning welcome. Ashish told me it was a song from a once broadcasted tv show based on the epic Indus Poem the Mahabharata.
We looked up at the Trident and the other waterside hotels of Mumbai. I could be tempted…
Ashish told me that tomorrow he is going to North Mumbai to listen to the Master. He told me that the Master is a great and popular spiritual Guru. Many different people from many different religions would be going to listen to him talk, and they would sleep together on the ground through the night. It sounded fascinating…
I asked Ashish if I could come with him…
