From Mumbai to Bangalore

POSTING DELAYED

Monday May 24, 2010

Chhatrapati Shivaji Airport is beautiful. The café area looks like an installation in Ikea, actually I’m pretty sure all of this furniture is from Ikea.

So that past couple of days? Where to begin?

Apparently I’ve been to the two most exclusive clubs in India. Fun.

We’ll start with Thursday. Thursday night I met up with Ankita to go out out. This was my first taxi ride alone, but I felt pretty effing confident for some strange reason. Before I left I checked out where Ankitas Aunties house to estimate how long it would take – and to make sure that my taxi driver wasn’t going to take me on a joy ride through South Mumbai. Though…my ability to actually name ANY of the roads that we drove on is non-existent, so that was futile. It was lovely to see Mumbai at night though, the city is rather beautiful and moderately cooler (by cooler I mean 33 C compared to 40 C, needless to say I’m still sweating profusely) We got to a stop light and I saw a beggar knocking on windows a couple cars ahead. I looked around and saw about 15-20 other homeless and realized that giving this poor man money would induce unwanted company by all the others. Hoepfully the light would change first.

Nope, the light did not change and the beggar did come up and knock on my window. He started scratching at it and showing his sons hands. His son didn’t have a hand, he had a bloody nub. I had to look away, there was nothing I could do.

Eventually we pulled away and I viewed the rest of the slum life in Mumbai. Homeless children running the streets with roughly a million dogs and a million other people. When we rolled up to the apartment the man said “110 ruppees” which surprised me because earlier that day I was paying 300-400 ruppees for a cab! Yes, I was totally ripped off. Shit.

Well, it was silly to dwell on that –even though deep down inside I was unbelievable pissed off. That’s when I officially became cheap in India. I’ll just say. I get it now.

On to the night! Since Thursday is quite the party night in Pittsburgh I figured the same held true over here. Nope, the “happening” days in Mumbai are only Wednesday, Friday, Saturday. I don’t quite get the Wednesday thing, but then again there’s a lot of things I don’t get about Mumbai so I just let it go. We ended up at a pretty awesome hookah bar. The hookah was good, though ironically the music plying in the bar brought back memories of senior homecoming with trendy, early ‘00s music. When I heard soldier boy I nearly choked on my hookah. I found it strange that in hookah bars back home Arabic-eque music capitalizes in hookah bars while hookah bars over here play American music? Strange.

The next night we went out. Driving through the slums – strange strange – and pulling up to the ritzy Hyatt Resort screamed dichotomy. Regardless, like a true Mumbaikar I just drank a lot. Since I didn’t quite plan on going out any other nights, I decided that tonight I would go all out. By that paying the bare minimum and tricking some Mumbaikar to buy me a drink. I eventually got my free drink after much effort and agreeing to eat lunch the next day - I didn’t by the way. Then next think I know Ankita, myself, and our little group made friends with an overly drunk/friendly group of guys. One of them was enjoying the house music way to much, but it was sweet music and if you’re going to enjoy yourself, enjoy yourself. We later found out that he’s from Egypt and that he pretty much came here to party to. Seems like a trend.

We danced and had a great time till about 3:30 when the club closed – by the way Mumbai doesn’t really have a closing time. Clubs, and everything actually, closes anywhere between 9:00 and never. Only in Mumbai.

The next day we met up with Ankitas dad, who by the way is my new idol. He maintains good and loving relationships with his family and friends, while traveling all over the world. He has lived in more places then I can even name, and travels more then most people I have known – all the while remaining a completely down to earth and kind person. Who said you had to settle down in one place forever to have a perfect family? His lifestyle is a great model for what I hope mine to be one day.

We hung out with him during the later portion of the day – doing our girlie things as he said then having dinner and going out. I ate the infamous Chinese/Indian food, and to say that least, the food was amazing! I’ve never eaten such fresh tasting, flavorful, Chinese takeout. I could honestly eat that forever. Instead we went o Presad (sp?)

What is this Presad? I soon found out that this club is arguable to most exclusive and high end club in Mumbai. When the club opened there were only 500 memberships sold at around $60-80,000 per membership and only those people and acquaintances of them are ever allowed in. (I’ll tell you later what arrogance that rule was built off).

Somehow we – I - got in. At the young age of 21, I felt old. Literally, I’m pretty sure the average age at this club was 17. It was surreal, 16-18 year-old children were drinking Belvedere and smoking on top of “lotus – private table overtop a pound in the club – dressed in the clothing circa high school musical. I couldn’t help but laugh uncontrollable. This was ridiculous. Thankfully, the club was somehow shut down at 1:30. After, of course, me and some 15 year old took several shots of Belvederes. Apparently, every club is supposed to close down at 1:00(ish), unless of course you’ve payed off the police. Which apparently they forgot. Oops. The little children were escorted out by their body guards as the Mumbai police came in with guns and battalions. Out into the ungodly humidity we go! We ended up back at Zaffrons, the hookah bar, and ended up finding out about the truth of the Mumbai underworld until about 5:00 in the morning. Fascinating stuff, and far beyond the scope of this blog or my ability to accurately describe it. If you ever want to know the “truth” just ask, it explains why people can still live life in Mumbai even with the intense poverty and conditions in the slums and streets.

To be perfectly honest, I had exceedingly more fun watching bollywood movies and Hindi TV with Ankita then going out at night. It’s those everyday thinks of Mumbai I love…

Reading the Hindustan Times is my new favorite past time, and I will certainly miss their generalization of Americans (they think we’re overly sexed) and unbelievable accuracy in describing the every movements of Lindsey Lohan. They love Lindsey Lohan. Masala tea, what we understand as Chai tea, is the greatest drink ever created and comparitvely cheap here. On the street a cup of chai is about 5 rupeees, and a whole pot of it in a restaurant is 25 ruppees (about 55 cents). The people are fascinating, their clothes, their ability to flow through this insane town. Communicating with cab drivers is a thrill in and of itself, I’ve never learned Hindi so quickly – and utilized it so poorly. I’ve learned that stop lights are just suggestions, as well as every other traffic “law”. Crossing the street is a dream come true for me, it’s like playing a real life version of frogger. The rich are RICH and the poor are pretty poor, but those in the middle are pretty damn cool. Bartering is fun and it works! And when it works you feel pretty accomplished, though if you’re white like me, you probably still got ripped off.

Mumbai isn’t bad, it isn’t scary, it isn’t too crazy – it’s just different. It operates differently then how the west visualizes and understands a city, and just because it doesn’t run that way doesn’t make it inferior. If anything Mumbai is advanced in it’s abilities to operate under such pressure and stress. In essence, Mumbai should have probably collapsed years go from over population and pollution. Somehow it still survives and districts like Colaba, Bandra, and Juhu represent the advancements that Mumbai is making. I honestly love Mumbai because it is so alive. There is so much to discover from the millions of street stalls, clubs, alleys, temples, stores, restaurants old and new, and the great people that do exist there. I can’t wait to go back.