In true Indian style our 10 hours train arrived six hours late into the very grand central station of Mumbai. At around 10 am the streams of people walking to their office from the station looked like peak time commuting in London! We were quickly getting a feel for how busy Mumbai was.

Our first day in the city we headed for the big sites including Leopalds Cafe, Gateway to India and the impressive Taj Mahal hotel. Perhaps because we both really enjoyed the Shantaram book we felt nostalgic to be sitting in the place where so much of the story took place. It's now pretty touristy, although some of the charm remains, but there's no recognition to the book on the inside apart from the hyper inflated prices! From there we headed to the Gateway of India and the Taj Mahal Hotel. Olly managing to get pooped on whilst we were taking photos! This is one of the places I'd been really excited to go to after months of researching and watching lots of programs about the hotel and Mumbai. It's definitely as impressive in real life.


After managing to tick off three big attractions in an hour we headed west down marine drive managing to catch a road side city cricket match. Only in India can you find a main road lined with motorbikes all parked up for a cricket match with the ball being played into the main road! We then headed up to the hanging gardens for bit of respite from the traffic and noise. This is a really great spot to relax and watch people go buy and with a city skyline view. At this point we were both feeling pretty relaxed and after planning to see a Bollywood film we jumped in a tuk tuk and followed our map to a local Cinema. The roads started to get busier and busier and the local shops and traders were sprawled out on the streets, it didn't feel like the right place at all. We got out of the tuk tuk and immediately were accosted by a man trying to sell us something. As Olly tried to politely say no thank you, 2 men on a bicycle cycled past. I didn't pay much attention until one of them reached out and grabbed my boob. Flustered and a really annoyed we realised at that point we definitely were in the wrong place and jumped in a taxi away from the area. It was strange driving through the middle of the major city with men hauling goods around on carts and scrap yard dealers doing business on the main road ; but mumbai is place of huge diversity where old and new work alongside each other and very rich and very poor live side by side. After a busy day and a bit of stressful afternoon we called it a night.

The next day was republic day so people were off work and celebrating with family and inconveniently some of the major museums were closed. We treated ourselves to a nice breakfast in the art district. The theme was Parsi, and I had the most amazing omelette which was infused with garlic, ginger and spices. For the rest of the day we found some very cheap books for sale on the market and set about having a good read in one of the quieter parks. A very nice man started talking to us about local politics and, of course British weather. After while he got all spiritual and started on a five minute speech about life and connectivity and then handed me a summary of his speech with his email address. I haven't emailed him just yet! In the evening we had planned to see the big film of the moment Paadmaatvi which has been marred in controversy in certain regions of India that didn't agree with the depiction of the fictitious lead character. But before that we decided to chance our luck at the Taj Mahal Hotel for a cup of tea. Incredibly on one of the busiest days we managed to get a table and a pot of tea! We felt very lucky indeed.

The cinema was also an experience worth sharing. We arrived a little early and there was a large crowd on the street surrounding the cinema with guards blowing their infamous whistles at anyone they felt like (they have these on buses too, but I have no idea what they are whistling at). Initially we thought there was a problem but this was just plain crowd control. They waited for the whole cinema to empty out before the crowd were allowed in and people then starting rushing to their seats. The good thing about the cinema was that people didn't seem to eat much food whilst watching, the bad thing is that some people replaced popcorn with their mobile phones. When phones rang, instead of them turning it to silent, they would answer and just start talking! I turned to the guy behind me and pulled a confused face, he just smiled sweetly back and continued to chat. No one around him was bothered!


On the Sunday we headed out north to see Dhobi Ghat a small area where all of Mumbais laundry is done by hand and rock out in the open and left to dry. Not the normal tourist destination, but fascinating to see this going on amongst the skyline back drop. In the afternoon we went on a tour of the Dhavri slum; the setting to slum dog millionaire. Today the slum has developed into a small town, with main line electricity, municipal waste disposal, schools, businesses and Solid housing structures. It is only still a slum because those living their don't have rights to the land, however this slum has been their for 50 years and currently has 1 million people living on 2 square kilometres. Our tour firstly took us to one of the key business activists operating in the area, plastic recycling. Here they sort and shred most of mumbais plastic and sell it back in pellet form to plastic manufacturers. If this wasn't operating I dread to think how much waste there would be on mumbais streets. We also taken to a goat tannery and shown some of the bags and wallets they had made, all now embossed with the dhavri slum logo. Very enterprising! We both got a sense of how densely populated the place is when we walked through a residential area. The buildings enveloped above you blocking out light. Stairs led up to the further floors and sometimes we saw inside the one roomed homes where families watched small TVs or were eating their dinners. Although it was very hard to imagine living here you could understand why so many have refused to be relocated to small flats. There is a real sense of community and given the slums history many people have been born and raised here and are proud to call it home.

Our Sunday in the city was a leasuirly affair, visiting the price of wales museum and then heading to to see a an old kpmg collegeaue. After many years it was great to catch up and meet his wife and child and enjoy a fabulous home cooked meal!


In the next two days we escaped the Mumbai heat for hike to the hill station of Matharan. Great to feel some healthy air and get the hiking boots back on again!



Our final day in Mumbai was dedicated to the art galleries. There's a great area called Khala Ghoda which has the national galleries plus the new modern galleries side by side. As we perused some beautiful paintings I turned to Olly and started remarking about one that was very life like. Unbeknown to us, the artist was standing next to us. Thank god I was being nice !