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Mumbai - 15 minutes of fame!
I landed in Mumbai at about 2am. Descending through the layers of smog (yes, you can actually see layers as you drop through them), I could make out the odd twinkle of lights. It wasn't until we actually landed and stopped on the runway that I realised what I'd been able to see was lights from the slum which is right next to the airport! Still sitting in the plane, I could look across and see shacks made of corrugated iron, scrap wood and metal, but what surprised me is that most of them seemed to have electricity! Where does it actually come from?
Getting out of the plane, the first thing that hits you is the musty, thick, humid, slightly rubbish-tip smell, which is not actually that unpleasant. It's just an Asia smell. The airport was surprisingly organised, definitely nothing like the horror stories I'd heard. I headed outside, found someone holding a sign saying "Claire Ritchio" (close enough), and was herded into a pretty cushy minivan. Doing well so far. I got chatting to the driver's offsider who gave me a quick crash course in healthcare, education, marriage, and driving in India - there wasn't much traffic, which apparently means you don't have to stop at red lights at night...
After being dropped at my hotel, tipping the driver and his offsider 300 rupees each (the sum suggested by the guy at the money exchange when I asked what the appropriate amount was - yep, ripped off before I even left the airport!), I crashed out on the hardest bed in the world. But at least the room had aircon and TV.
Next "morning", I headed to Colaba, the touristy bit of Mumbai. I saw the Gateway to India, took the token touristy photos of it, and staved off the advances of those offering to take the photo for me (yes, a little paranoid about someone taking off with my camera). I'd expected to be hassled a bit, but not by every single person I passed! Offering tours, to take my photo, chai, wanting me to come to their shop, taxis, and that was before I even left the square!
I wandered over to Colaba Causeway, and spent the arvo checking out market stalls, getting lost and trying to find my way back again, and ignoring stares and comments like "you're the most beautiful girl in the world who I would love to marry but you don't love me because I'm a black man" repeated over and over while following me back towards the touristy part of town! Nice to feel loved...
I headed to the Mumbai museum, and spent some time in the quiet - lots of pottery, paintings, and a natural history section full of stuffed animals. Your usual bog-standard museum, which didn't really tell me a whole lot about India itself. Heading back towards the Gateway, I sat for a while ignoring the people taking my photo on their phones (how they think you don't notice is beyond me), and got chatting to Charlie the Canadian, who had just spent 9 days up north and still has another 8 weeks to go in India. He seemed to find it pretty amusing when an entire family came up and insisted I be in their photos - they don't seem to understand the word no, and take it as an invitation to physically lift your arm to put it around their shoulders for the photos. Even though there's tourists everywhere, apparently a whitie like me is still a novelty.
I eventually lost patience and b*****ed off to Leopolds, a bar/cafe made famous by the book Shantaram. I imagined a dark, seedy bar full of expats doing deals with dodgy underworld figures. But instead, it turned out to be a bright, breezy restaurant, with waiters in polo shirts, overpriced food, and "Leopolds" t-shirts and copies of Shantaram for sale at the front counter. Sell-outs.
I left Charlie to his quest for quiet (pointed him towards an aircon cafe I'd found earlier), had at least 12 conversations along the lines of "where are you from? Ah, Australia, Ricky Ponting!" on the way to my taxi, and had an early night.
Unfortunatley my early night was ruined when I was woken up at 1am by a noise outside my room. That in itself would have been fine, except that the light above my door allowed me to see the black spot on my bed. Which turned out to be a little red bug when I turned my light on. And then I realised there was another one. And another one under the pillow. And a couple more under the mattress. And a few little tiny ones in the upholstery of the bedhead. Which led to me squashing as many as possible, then spending the rest of the night curled up inside my sleeping bag liner, with the top twisted up to prevent any of the bugs getting in! And when you're stuck in the foetal position because you're trapped inside a sleep sheet, being held hostage by bedbugs, needless to say, you don't have a very good night's sleep...
Flying out of Mumbai the next morning in the light of day, I saw slums as far as the eye could see. Apparently 60% of the population live like this, many of them by choice. Interesting.
Noisy, dirty, chaotic, pervy, intrusive - and a massive culture shock for my first day!
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