Crazy Mumbai

This post will be a bit strange, as I am too lazy to rewrite my post from the other day, that I foolishly forgot to put on my USB stick before setting out for a day in the city.  Anyhow, I'll include more recent events after I copy/paste my blog from the other morning. 

My experience of Bombay seems to change day by day.  Yesterday was a much better day, though a bit long, and equally exhausting.  And my lungs are even sorer today – my educated guess would be that I’ve got another two, maybe three days before it turns into a respiratory problem.  

I went out yesterday around 10AM, after finally getting to do some laundry and things, and wandered around the market that’s downstairs from Heman’s place.  The stares I got!  I stopped and bought an apple, and everybody stopped what they were doing to watch me.  Or it felt like they did, at least.  I wanted to take some photos, especially of this vendor who was selling spices in towers, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it, because the man just looked so menacing.  I eventually gave up and went to the train station.  I bought first class tickets to Churchgate (where Fort and Colaba are), which was good and bad in a way, and I hopped on the train.  

It took an hour to get to Churchgate from Kandivali on the Western line, and I stood the whole way.  The train was not too crowded, though, being after the morning rush.  Still crowded, yes, but I wasn’t suffocating, though now in the future I think I am going to carry rescue remedy with me, because there have been moments when I have to fight panic attacks just because of the pressing throng of bodies.  I hung off the side of the train for a bit for fun, until a man asked me to come back in, because people would be getting on that side of the train at the next stop, and he didn’t want me to get hurt or pushed.  I was really touched, because it was the first gesture of kindness from a stranger I’ve received so far in India.  He made a spot for me next to him in the train, by asking someone to move out of the way, and I didn’t argue it because I didn’t know how.  So I just thanked him, and stood in that spot for the rest of the way.  

I got a little bit lost trying to find Colaba; the only map I possess is the shitty one in the Lonely Planet guide, but after some aimless wandering, I figured it out.  It was a lot further of a walk from the train station than I thought it would be.  I got a bit peckish along the way, and decided to try my luck at a street vendor stand.  

In India here, people eat their food from the street vendor on little paper plates and they stand around the vendor until they are finished, and then they move on.  I did the same – and I was the talk of the entire group of people.  A foreigner, eating street food?  I got a samosa, which was far spicier than any samosa I’ve ever had before – even my eyes were watering! – and I got it with some chilli sauce which was sweet.  Don’t get me wrong, it was completely delicious, but my body is used to Thai spices, not Indian ones, and it was a crazy overload on my senses.  My nose was running, and my eyes were watering, and my mouth was burning.  But I stood there and ate it, and told the vendor what a good samosa it was.  There was a sugarcane juice stall right next to him, so I tried a glass of sugarcane juice, too.  I imagine it was probably really sweet, but my mouth was on fire, and I couldn’t really tell.  It may also have been my downfall, as I learned later to never, ever try things on the street that involve water in any form.  But I guess we’ll see.    

Colaba was an interesting experience, and I quite enjoyed it.  It’s the touristic part of town, where the art galleries and monuments, and markets and things are.  I’m such a sucker for markets.  There were stalls selling ‘antiques’, but they were gorgeous brass compasses, and sextets, and spyglasses.  I wanted one so bad...but I couldn’t reason out buying it in my head.  I was also propositioned by a ‘holy man’ who wanted to ‘bless’ me.  So now, I have an angry holy man and some string tied around my wrist.  He wanted to put a bindi on me, and I didn’t allow it, so then he gave me sugar to eat, which I didn’t eat, and then he tied string around my wrist, and ‘blessed’ me, and then asked me for money.  I told him I didn’t have any money, and he got angry with me and stormed off. 

But hey, I have a new string on my wrist.

I went to Leopold’s Café for a snack – a little maple walnut tart of some kind – more or less for the novelty of being in Leopold’s.  I’m reading this book right now called ‘Shantaram’, by Gregory David Roberts, and it takes place in Bombay in the mid-80s, and a lot of things that occur in the book revolve around Leopold’s, so I had to go check it out.  I wasn’t really expecting it to be the seedy drinking hole that they make it out to be in Shantaram, and it wasn’t, so I wasn’t disappointed, either.  It’s just a slightly pricey café filled full of tourists.  It made a good safe haven from the outside world for a bit, though.  

After that, I just browsed the shops and looked around.  I got myself a little jangly ankle bracelet – I wanted to buy more as souvenirs for friends, but the man wasn’t haggling very well, and I wasn’t willing to pay the price, so I only got the one.  I also bought a crystal pillar from one of the rock shops, from a man claiming to be a geologist.  I’ll admit he knew his shit, but he wasn’t a geologist, he just knew all the names of all his rocks, and kept selling the healing qualities of them to me.  “You need wealth?  Take this tiger’s eye.  Buy my tiger’s eye for a special price, and it bring you wealth”  ...right.  

I had practically given up on finding an internet café, when I stumbled across one by accident.  I glanced down this seedy, dark alleyway between two buildings, and just sticking out from my view was part of the word “internet” ...intrigued, I walked down and found a place that has spectacularly fast internet for 35R/hour.  That’s how I uploaded yesterday’s post – I tossed it on a USB stick before leaving the house, and then just uploaded it on the computer I was using in the internet café.  

After that, it was time to start heading back to Kandavali, because I had Heman’s keys and needed to be back before he got home from work.  It really surprises me when people are kind to me, and I’ve never been able to figure out why.  I think I sometimes feel like I don’t deserve it, but because of that, it’s positively delightful when little things happen, and it’s those little things that make traveling worthwhile for me. 

While buying a kiwi and some figs (figs, oh my god) at a fruit stand, the man selling them to me was eating some coconut, and he cut a piece of the coconut off and gave it to me, along with some little sugar balls.  He made me take a bite of the coconut and a little sugar ball at the same time, with the proclamation that it would make ‘a very good taste in my mouth’.  It was pretty tasty, and I told him so, and he cut me off another piece of coconut, and gave me a few more sugar balls, and sent me on my way.  I munched happily as I continued walking back to the train station, until I was stopped again, by a man who saw me eating lunch with the locals at the street vendor, and he wanted to talk to me.  So I stopped and talked to him, and he said he had a friend from Montréal, and then he started speaking French to me!  I was so excited that I blathered on in French with a fluency I wasn’t quite aware I possessed, and we exchanged names (his was Rahul) and he was from Rajathstan and he said I should go to Jaipur if I can.  I finally managed to pry away and start heading to the station, because at this point, I was beginning to worry that I would be late.  I spoke with one more fellow before I made it to the station, mostly because he was willing to stay in step with my long legs, and we talked for a couple of blocks until I got to the train. 

People in this country are just so curious.  It speaks to my inner child.  

On the way back, I took second class, but in the ladies compartment – for whatever reason, here in India, trains have a separate ladies section, and I had a seat the entire way, and it was much less crowded.  Hawkers jump on at stops and selling bindi dots, and cheap bangles and things, and I saw my first Indian crossdresser.  He jumped on the train at a stop and tapped us all on the head and said something in Hindi or Marathi that I didn’t understand, and some people gave him money.  I’m not really sure what it was about – but even men are attractive in saris, apparently.  

I made it back, and found out plans had changed.  I’m no longer going to Gujarat with Heman – in fact, if I was, you would not be getting this post – as Gujarat is India’s only state where drinking is illegal (this is because Gandhi was from Gujarat and he was against drinking) and apparently, this friend who is hosting the party got in a bit of trouble with the police a few days back, and is nervous to have a big house party now.  So effectively, the house party has been cancelled for all but a couple of friends, and I’m no longer invited.   

Heman and his roommate Julian were really awesome about it, though – and I am staying here now with Julian, until I can find another place to stay, or until I leave Mumbai.  They said I can stay as long as I like, and I believe them in their sincerity, but I don’t want to overextend my stay, either, so today I’m going to go to the train station and see what the sooner ticket to Delhi I can get will be, and my plans will be defined by that.  If I can’t get one before the 2^nd of January, then I think I will suffer the cost and fly there (though it is expensive this time of year – 6500R) ...but we will see today.  I’m also going to look into finding a tailor, both to get copies of my dress made, and to get a few pairs of silk selwar kameez’s made.  They are this beautiful long tunic with flowing pants (or tight pants also, I have seen) and a long scarf.  And it’s positively gorgeous.  I think I want two pairs.  

Oh, and last night after Heman left, Julian and I went out for food at an Indian restaurant – which sounds silly to say, being in India – and our food was delicious, and I tried pickled lemons, and we had roti, and dhal in fried butter, and corn palak, and Julian was super nice and we got it all mild, because my poor stomach is like “WHOA, what is all this spice?!” ...and it was actually the mildest Indian food I think I’ve ever gone for.  And so buttery...my lactose-intolerant stomach isn’t happy with me.  I think I’ll have to start carrying my lactaid around with me if food continues to be this milky.  

So yeah.  Them’s the breaks!  

I don't know why I even try to write these, sometimes.  Maybe it keeps me sane.  Everyday, I am exhausted.  I'm staying in the suburbs of Mumbai, and I have to take a train into the tourist area that takes me just over an hour.  Everything I need/want to do, however, is at least that distance away.  So I make it twice a day.  From there, Colaba (where the only internet place I can find is) is a half hour walk from the train station.  There's markets and shops and such, but it makes for a very long day.

And the smog, oh my god, the smog.  I thought Bangkok was bad, but Mumbai is so bad that when you stand on the shores of the Arabian Sea, and overlook the city...you can't see the city.  At all.  My lungs are deteriorating, and I've developed a cough.  I'm thankful to leave Mumbai tomorrow, but it is to head to Delhi, which I've heard is just as bad, or worse in terms of air pollution.  I'm more afraid of going to the doctor here than I was in Thailand.  In Thailand, the health care was amazing, they just didn't speak English.  Here, they speak English and the quality of health is rubbish.  I'm not really sure which is better or worse.  

Today is New Year's Eve, and I have no plans.  I'm sure there are big things going on in the city, but what fun is partying when you are alone?  Besides, I'm exhausted by 2PM, let alone midnight, and I can't really be bothered to do anything.  I'm stuck in a world of being woefully lonely, but at the same time, being so overwhelmed by people that I don't want anything to do with anybody by the time the sun sets.  And I miss creature comforts.

I've been showering in a bucket for the last couple of days.  There is a hot water tap, and a water tank which is filled by the city once a day, so once you use up the tank, that's it for your water for the day.  It, of course, isn't potable.  The tap on the wall fills up a bucket, and then you use a smaller bucket to pour water on yourself.  It's okay, but I don't feel properly clean without a proper shower.  But I mean, hey, at least the water is warm.  

Oh, and I finally sewed up my backpack this morning.  The strap tore open, and I was lazy, or busy, or careless, and didn't fix it for a while, and it got worse, so this morning I finally fixed it with some seam sealer and a bit of sewing.  Though, I'm hoping to call Arcteryx when I get home and get it professionally fixed, or replaced...

Every day for me is hectic, and I'm beginning to miss normality more and more.  It's hard for me, because I'm loving being in India, but at the same time, I just want to come home so badly that it consumes my thoughts during those empty spaces when I'm not being violated by some kind of chaos.  I went on a search today, that led me through streets in Mumbai that I detested so badly I wished to be anywhere else.  I was trying to find a silver jewelry bazaar, with a bad map and a poorer set of directions.  I had a rough idea which navigational direction it was, so I just started weaving through streets in the hopes of finding it (I did, after asking for directions twice) but it led me through streets that were so shockingly...dirty, that I had a hard time coping with it all.  I felt violated, to be walking down them.  There were cows on the streets, and therefore feces as well, and the sidewalks were in very bad repair, and the smell was just very bad, and the people were very dirty, and for some reason, it's totally okay in India to urinate wherever you feel like it, to spit wherever you feel like it, even if it is on another person, etc.  

Don't get me wrong - I'm enjoying India, but...only to an extent.  I keep telling myself things will get better.  You don't fall in love with a nation because you read a book about them.  There are moments, sure - when a total stranger dazzles me with a smile, or with the ubiquitious head waggle, or protects me from oncoming traffic (whether that traffic is automobiles or humans).  Individually, Indians are amazing, beautiful, helpful people.  As a nation, I've experienced, they are less than desirable.  They are very aggressive, and quick to anger, and while I'm sure it is just a difference in cultures speaking, I find them quite rude.  But that only seems to happen when you group them together.  I really have met some amazing strangers so far.  And I've met dicks.  

I do have to say though, I finally understand why they are targeted as being such poor drivers in Canada.  The way they drive at home is actually how Indians drive here.  Nine car lineups in four lane roads, and I learned yesterday that pedestrians are actually at fault if someone hits them.  If I get hit by a car here, the legal blame goes to me, not the driver.  It's nuts.  I find crossing the road very stressful, and this is with almost two months of crossing the crazy traffic in Thailand.  

I meet all kinds of random people - often not by choice - and today, someone wanted to take a photo with me.  And then all his friends wanted to as well.  It was like they had never seen a foreigner before.  Maybe they hadn't.  Yesterday, I went to tea with someone, and then his friend showed up, and I got scared and left.  Yesterday, maybe you would have gotten more detail.  Today, I can't bother.

And this has become my life.  But I miss home.