Mumbai

Dobi-wallah's hard at work doing all of Mumbai's laundry
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We arrived late into Mumbai and the airport is quite a ways outside the city so we had no choice but to organize a taxi since the rickshaws are not allowed into the city centre - which made for way less traffic by the way. So we were approached by a taxi driver as we always are and he called for his cab to come and get us since he said he was not the driver. Cab arrived, all seemed normal...then the cab rounds the corner and another guy gets in to inform us that this car is no good and we have to go in another car...he then says that the service is only prepay and that everyone pays in advance. We told him we didn't want to pay in advance and he said that every airport cab runs the same service blah blah blah. It was 450 rupees to our hotel, which is the normal price, and Mark went to pay with a 500 bill, as soon as he gave it to the guy the guy said ''oh, you only gave me 100'' "no I gave you 500" but the guy has 100 rupee bill in his hand - the freakin guy did the bait and bill switch on us! We were super pissed and I kinda started making a scene about them producing a receipt and I got out of the cab and wrote down the cab number and license plate etc. at this point since these guys already had a double payment from us we didn't really fancy another cab so we got into the 'new'"car that had come for us and we forced the guys to confirm with the new driver that we had already paid and taken their numbers. We probably should have just left the whole situation behind b/c I was worried the whole way to the hotel but the driver actually took us to the right hotel, I think the only reason we were taken to the right place was because we took down all their info. Another taxi-wallah we drove with the next day said that normally in those cases they don't take you to the right hotel, then make you pay again to get to the proper one. Then when we finally got to the hotel the guys has the nerve to ask us for a tip! Needless to say we told him to hit the road. Our hotel was ok - nice enough, but compared to the rest of India Mumbai is quite pricey. The next day we weren't really sure what we wanted to do and we were approached by a taxi driver (Barry) who offered city tours, price was ok so we went for it. There were 2 french girls doing the tour as well. Barry was actually really good and showed us alot of cool places we wouldn't have otherwise seen, and he had a very good knowledge of the city as well. We saw; the court house, cricket matches, red light district - which basically consists of girls sitting outside one room stalls while the men line up in the street. Apparently the girls see tons of customers a night since Indian men wait until marriage for sex, they are not too familiar with women and they tend to be quick. We saw street barbers and street ear cleaners, everyone is India has/or wants a job, so the fact that ear cleaners even exist is so that someone can be employed to provide the service. We saw the Jani Temple - which was very colourful and beautiful. The Jani people are all vegetarians and don't even kill bugs or anything, they cover their mouths while they are praying to ensure that they don't swallow any insects. We saw the hanging gardens, ate more delicious street food, visited Ghandi's house that he lived in for 17 years in Mumbai, which is now a museum. We saw the Dobi-wallahs hard at work. The Dobi-wallahs are the people who do laundry, all the laundry, the majority of the laundry in Mumbai. This place was huge and there were so many people working away getting everything cleaned, was pretty cool to see. Barry told us about these laughter clubs that are popular in India - a bunch of people get together and just laugh. They are called, of all things, 'laughter clubs'. We didn't get a chance to see one but he said they are becoming huge and people use them to lift their moods. We were also taken to a suit-making shop, no doubt Barry was a friend of the owners, but it was interesting to see. They could make a suit overnight for 5000 rupees, which is very fast and cheap! Our driver dropped us off in Colaba, which is a more touristy end of town, so we could view the giant gateway to India on our own, since it was a busy place we were once again being hounded for our pictures, so annoying! We had dinner at a place called Leopold's which features highly in a book called 'Shantaram' which Mark just finished reading, so he wanted to check it out. Apparently it is a very popular book b/c they were selling it in the restaurant. The place was nice and the food was very good so we were glad we went on a paperback's recommend. We then just kinda wandered the streets looking in the local shops until we were ready for bed. The next day we woke up, bought some books at a street bookshop and we had a tour booked of the Dharavi slums. These are the biggest slums in Mumbai and this was a reality tour so we could get a sense of how the people live day to day. They do the tours in small groups and no cameras are allowed, they also give 80% of their profits back to the poor communities to Mumbai. I was very surprised to find that Dharavi is the heart of the small scale industries of Mumbai. They have a 665 million annual turnover rate. They are famous for; pottery, recycling, leather goods and sewing. 1 million people live in 75 hectares of space and the slum has been there since 1840. 70% of the population work government jobs and all the kids go to school. I was also surprised to see that it was just like a little community; it had things like internet cafes and grocery stores etc. Loads of people actually want to move there so they can get jobs in one of the industries, people are not looking to leave. Recycling, as I mentioned before, is one of the major industries. People garbage pick sunflower oil cans (for example) then sell them to the recycling plants in Dharavi where they are cleaned up and then sold back to the manufacturer, which is how they make their money. The USA and China sell their garbage to India to be recycled - I didn't think countries were allowed to do this, but apparently they are. In Dharavi there is only 1 toilet for every 1500 people so as you can guess the disease rate is very high! After our eyes were opened in Dharavi we took the very crowded public train back into the city and took in a Bollywood movie! I was hoping for one with singing and dancing, but since they only show one at a time we didn't have much choice and we got a crime drama. It wasn't as hard to follow as you might think, but we were still kinda lost. On our last day in India we walked over to CST station which is supposed to be the finest example of British architecture in Mumbai. It was very big and imposing, over 2 million commuters pass through it's doors every day! We went specifically to see the Daba-wllahs hard at work. The Daba-wallahs are a group of about 1000 people, mostly related and from the same village near Pune, who deliver lunch boxes everyday. Normally a wife does not have time in the morning to make her husbands lunch b/c he has to leave so early to get to work and she needs to also take care of the kids. So he gets on the train, she gets the kids off to school, and then when things quiet down she makes his lunch and a Daba-wallah comes to pick it up and delivers it to her husband at work. The Daba-wallahs colour-code everything and the tin lunch boxes normally pass through about 6 different people before they reach their destination. They are very efficient and apparently only 1 in 6 million boxes goes missing - pretty impressive! They wear white hats and baggy trousers so they are easy to spot. We headed back to Colaba to spend our last afternoon. We were approached by a man who was a foreign model agent and he asked us if we wanted to be in a Bollywood movie - It would have been awesome, but unfortunately it was our last day and he said it take 13 hours. They are always looking for whitey's to be extras in the movies, would have been very cool. If I ever go back to India and have more time I would definitely do it. We left in India after 3 weeks of chaos and heat. India was a weird one for me, hard to qualify. One on hand it is loud, dirty, crazy and we were hounded to no end and often times got nothing but hassle from people. But then on the other hand I loved it, very interesting culture, beautiful sights and we definitely had a good time in all the places that we went to and I really felt like we experienced something quite unique. Mark and I would often say that we had a love/hate experience going with India and most things that happened could fit into one of those categories. India is India, it doesn't pander to you at all. You get it full on when you arrive and it is what it is, and you can either get on with things or go somewhere else, because life in India doesn't give any signs of changing any time soon. We decided to get on with things, which was totally worth it, and I think we had quite an adventure in the end.