The Bollywood Experience

We caught an overnight train from Goa to Mumbai arriving at the now infamous CST train station. We hurried through the station to escape the touts as quickly as possible whilst at the same time looking for any evidence of the recent terrorist attacks. Everything however seemed to be back to normal and the place was frantic with people everywhere.

Being cheap we jumped onto a local government bus and along with the usual stares from every passenger, the attendant tried to rip us off by charging about 4 times the correct fare. Little did he know that we had already been in the country for almost two months and had no issue telling him that we were not paying the extorted price he had requested. After cursing us he finally charged us the correct fare.

Much to our surprise a few minutes later the taxi stopped and our fellow 'actor' ushered us out and over to the railway station

We got out only to find that we had been dropped in the wrong area anyway. We had said we wanted to go near the Taj hotel and the Indians knowing all too well that the Taj was closed due to the attacks had instead decided we wanted to go to another hotel with a similar name. Never before have we come across a bunch of people who are so sure that they know what you want and need more than you do yourself...

In the end after much arguing and shouting at drivers we got in a taxi and paid a fair price to be dropped in the tourist area of Colaba. As soon as we got out of the taxi we were immediately harrassed and followed by touts. These were more persistent and agressive than usual and followed us constantly for about 20 minutes ducking into each hotel one step in front of us so that they could claim they had bought us to the hotel - a claim that would result in us paying the hotel a hugely inflated price for the room so that in turn the tout could be paid his commission.

Given that it was only 7am and that we'd already had to argue with bus and taxi drivers we really weren't in the mood for these annoying thugs. It was at this point that I discovered that sometimes the only way to deal with these people was for me a western woman to swear and threaten them. I know it sounds horrible but after being harrassed constantly and being treated like a piece of dirt by many Indian's who worked the streets as touts, drivers, shop keepers, hoteliers etc my patience has warn thin... very thin.

Finally after strolling the streets for about an hour and a half we found a room that we were happy enough with. Mumbai by Indian standards is extremely expensive for accomodation. In the end we paid 1200 rupees per night for our room with private bathroom - the most we have ever paid in India. This price didn't include any commission either as by this stage I had warned and scared all the touts away from us - probably towards other unfortunate tourists. This hotel, called Hotel Apollo (there are two with this name, this is the cheaper of the two), was basic but comfortable and clean and we recommend staying there. Just be warned that both the manager and the room boys will demand tips when you leave the place. We didn't see how tipping them was appropriate as they hadn't cleaned our room once in three days and had constantly bugged us about buying over-inflated beer from them. Once again we were forced to tell people to rack off. We are becoming very good at this and are starting to get great pleasure out of being nasty...

We decided to head to Leopold's Cafe for breakfast. Leopold's is both famous and infamous for a number of reasons. It is frequented by Indians, expats and tourists alike. Its the largest cafe in all of Mumbai and is quite a historical place of its kind. This cafe is also well known as the place in Mumbai where all deals (mainly illegal) are made. The agreement is made inside the cafe and the goods/money exchange is done outside the cafe ensuring that nothing illegal ever occurs within Leopold's itself. And of course recently Leopold's was in the international spotlight as it was the scene of the 26/11 attacks.

We were surprised as we took our seats to see bullet holes all around us. The holes were in the front windows and in a picture advertsing Australia's fosters larger as well as other places around the cafe. The cafe has set up a donation box to raise money for the families of the staff who were murdered here. It was quite an eary feeling being in here given that such attrocities had occured less than 7 weeks before. The cafe was still as popular as ever though and it was difficult getting a seat here in the evenning. We found the food to be quite average but the inviting atmosphere made up for this. There's also a cool bar upstairs worth spending an evening or two in.

We spent the rest of the day checking out the other main sites in Mumbai such as the Taj hotel which was still being refurbished. The Taj is quite a majestic building with its early Victorian architecture. The area in front of the Taj including the gateway of India is full of touts selling balloons, photos and strangely enough blessings. Apart from this little bit of annoyance and our initial issues with finding a room we found the overall hassle level in Mumbai to be very low. In our 3 and a half days here we only encountered 2 or 3 beggars and they weren't too persistent. We also found Mumbai to be very clean compared with other places in India.

In the afternoon we headed to Malabar Hill, the most exclusive neighbourhood in Mumbai, which has great views out over the sea and the surrounding impressive mansions of the rich. We then headed down to Chowpatty beach -  a beach popular as a meeting spot and place to stroll for couples. This is a good place to get away from it all as we didn't have any one hassling us here and there were splendid views of the lit up high rise commercial buildings. We took the opportunity here to try one of the local specialities called Bhelpuri which is a mixture of puffed rice, tomato, onion, corriander and chilli - very delicious. Everyone sits on straw mats and eats this overlooking the sea.

For dinner we decided to try one of the muslim street food stalls where grilled lamb and chicken wrapped up in stretchy Indian bread were the foods of choice. This stuff was absolutely amazing - one of the best things we've eaten in India. Although its street food there are tables and chairs to seat about 100 people and even then its hard to get a seat. We ate here twice and loved every mouthful of food. This place is located between Leopold's and the Taj hotel so its easy to find.

As soon as we checked into our hotel the manager had asked us if we wanted to be extras in a Bollywood film and before we could answer he was already on the phone speaking to the agent. A few minutes later and we had agreed to spend a day on a Bollywood set in return for being fed and paid 500 rupees each ($15 Aus or 7 pounds). Obviously this isn't much money but we were more interested in doing this for the experience (we would have done it for free) and as backpackers any money is helpful.

At 9am on our second day we were greeted at our hotel by an odd looking young man named Suni who worked for the same agency and who would be taking care of us for the day.

As we left the hotel and headed outside we were looking at all of the nice cars wondering which one we would be going in. Would it be a Lexus 4wd, a BWM or a volvo we wondered??? No it ended up being a taxi. At first we were disappointed as we were looking forward to being treated to a little luxury but we thought that at least a taxi was better than trawling the busy streets on foot like we usually did. Much to our surprise a few minutes later the taxi stopped and our fellow 'actor' ushered us out and over to the railway station. So there was no luxury car and no taxi just the local filthy train. Our train journey took us about 40 minutes to reach the filming studio. Actually in hindsight we're glad we took the train as it was an interesting journey and we never would have ventured on it had it not been for our Bollywood journey.

As we got off the train we wandered the busy streets lost with our new friend. Eventually we found the studio and Gary and I looked at each other wondering whether we were in fact in the correct place or if this was some type of joke. The studio didn't look as we'd imagined. It was really shabby and when we were first taken inside we were led into a room full of what appeared to be Indian actors. Nobody spoke to us, instead as expected they all just stared. Ten minutes later and we were being ushered to our 'private' dressing room. This was a small smelly room that resembled a backyard shed. It had a dirty looking bed in it which we were told we could rest on and an 80's looking dressing table and mirror. We shared this room with our actor friend.

A few minutes later and we were escorted to the wardrobe area. I had been expecting it to be full of glamorous beaded saris. Instead it was more like a charity shop and was full of dusty ragged looking clothes from the 80's. Gary was given a ridiculous bright blue patterned silky shirt and a suit. They couldn't find him any shoes though so he had to wear my brown trainers!! I was given two dresses to choose from - a pink tattered looking thing that looked like it would fit a 6 year old or a black glittery 80's number full of sequins. I went with the glittery option and was given a matching pair of heels that were falling apart.

I didn't bother to bring any makeup or do anything with my hair as I assumed they would beautify me in the studio. How wrong was I... after we'd changed into our shabby charity clothes we were ready to go. Lucky I'd put a little foundation on back in the hotel and brought my lip gloss with me!!

We weren't told what film we were appearing as extras in or what the scene involved. The best explanation we were given was 'weddings'. By the look of things we assumed that we were to be guests at some type of wedding reception for a film about marriage. The setting looked very amature and we were shocked to see that the actors were smoking on the set and squashing their cigarette butts into the carpet.

After being seated at a table with other people the filming began and we still didn't know what was going on so we just improvised and tried to look like guests at a wedding.

After the first scene the director called us over and seated us at a table by ourselves right in front of the camera. The main stars of the show were to perform their scene next to us and we were given cups full of pretend champagne and told to pretend to sip and smile. This was what we spent the remainder of the day doing - 'sipping and smiling'. We did have to make some small talk with other extras in broken english and have a pointless discussion with the main character that was just for show.

The same scenes had to be repeated over and over again as the main actors kept fighting with each other and yelling obscure things. This made for a very long day especially given that we were at the studios filming for over 12 hours.

Towards the end of filming one of the other actors told us that we were in fact on a popular Bollywood TV show called Vivaah (similar in status to Home and Away) and not a film and that the scene was not a wedding reception but a business party. How ridiculous and typically Indian we thought that they had paid us to work on their show and yet we didn't even know anything about the scene!!!

We were also amazed at the constant grooming and application of makeup that was given to both the female and male actors. I think they thought that they were starring in a multi billion dollar Hollywood film and not a low budget Bollywood TV show that would appear on screen two days later. They definitely loved themselves way too much...

True to their word they fed us 3 decent meals and paid us 500 rupees each along with our transport costs. They even begged us to come back again the next day for another days work. We couldn't though as we had other plans. Although it was tiring work we loved the experience and the ridiculousness of it all and we would definitely recommend anyone visiting Mumbai to be a Bollywood extra if they get the chance.

On our third day we went on a tour of the Dharavi slum which is the biggest slum in Asia and the third biggest in the world being home to over one million people squeezed into a tiny 1.7 sq km's. Why you may ask did we want to visit such a place? Well the answer is simple - over 55% of Mumbai's population live in slums and are officially homeless. There is a very ethical company called Reality Tours and Travel www.realitytoursandtravel.com who run this tour and donate 80% of profits towards a charity they have established that teaches children from the slum English and computer skills. We wanted to support this worthwhile charity and also wanted to learn more about the lives of the average Mumbai slum dweller.

We chose to do the full day tour. Our first stop was to see the worlds largest open air laundry. This was a purpose built outdoor laundry that had over 700 cement basins. The workers here had a rigorous system of seperating items into the correct category and then washing, rinsing and drying them all by hand. This is where all hotels and restuarants along with most of Mumbai's personal washing was done at. We found this to be an amazing and colourful site.

Next up was a quick drive through Mumbai's red light district. Our guide explained the tradgedy of the woman and children whom work here. They have all either been kidnapped or sold by their families to work in supposed legitimate jobs such as waitressing and as shop workers. The pimps keep them here against their will and work them all day and night. The police station is actually located in the same street right next to where this atrocity is so openly occuring. Our guide provided us with the expected explanation that the police are paid very well to turn a blind eye to this sorry situation.

Finally we arrived at the Dharavi slum and spent the first hour being shown around the commercial section of the slum. This included thousands of factories making and doing all sorts of things such as plastic recyclying, block printing of fabrics, cleaning of large oil tins, making of factory machines etc. We were even surprised to learn that one of the leather factories here makes wallets on consignment for Gucci. Unfortunately at the time of our visit there was no Gucci order so we missed out on the opportunity to purchase some cheap wallets. Our guide told us that a few weeks before another group had paid about $4 per wallet (Gucci stamping and all) for what Gucci would sell for hundreds of dollars.

The conditions in the factories were very dangerous, violating every possible law that would exist in the western world. On average the people who work here earn a daily income of between 100 and 150 rupees for a 12 hour day (a maximum of 2 pounds or 4 Aus dollars). They work 7 days a week. The workers also live in these tiny factories sleep on the floor and cook in makeshift pots. They have to go to the toilet on the street and use a bucket of cold water to wash themselves. Some of the workers have their families including children living with them in the factory. Others had left their families behind in other states and visit them once a year for two weeks sending as much of their earnings home as possible.

Everyone we came accross was very welcoming and more than happy to bring us into their workplace and show us what they made. Many people in the streets greeted us with happy smiles. Not once did we see any beggars or receive any hassle.

The second half of our tour concentrated on the residential areas of the slum. This was divided into a Hindu section and a Muslim section. The houses were ridiculously small containing only one room which had a make shift kitchen inside and a tiled area at the back for washing in. The houses have no toilets. There are however a few public toilets outside that have been built by a charity but there is only one toilet per 1600 people so as you can imagine most people have to just go outside. Its so densly populated here that when you want to walk down one of the narrow lanes to move about the area only one person can walk in the lane at a time. If you see some one else coming your way one person has to duck into a doorway of a house or shop. As a result the roofs of houses accross the road from each other are joined and therefore when you're walking outside here you wouldn't be able to tell whether its day or night.

We thoroughly enjoyed this tour and recommend other tourists to do it. It supports a very worthwhile charity and also gives you a great insight into the lives of everyday Indians. Although these people are living in poverty you won't see anything too gastly here apart from the open sewers running everywhere but hey these are present all over India.

After our time in the slum we went and checked out some of Mumbai's most famous street markets, Crawford and Chor Bazzar, both of which were very colourful and ridiculously crowded with the usual assortment of animals (goats, chickens etc) milling around.

We spent our final morning in Mumbai having a closer look at the stunning architecture of Mumbai's CST train station. The best place to admire its grand beauty is from outside near the Managers office. If you smile at the guard and ask him nicely he will let you into the grounds to have a closer look and take a few photos. Strangely enough the security here was looser than at McDonald's where the guard had chased me out and tried to make me erase my picture of the sign stating 'No beef products are sold here'. They're a strange breed.

Mumbai is definately one of our favourite places in India and one not to be missed!! From here we caught a 22 hour locals overnight bus to Udaipur in Rajasthan.   Shannyn