Advertisement
Published: November 18th 2007
Edit Blog Post
Morning Tea
Nothing like fruit jam and Chai tea to start the day After arriving in Mumbai and waiting forever for our luggage (an Indian specialty) we hooked up with a auto-rickshaw (tuktuk) and set out towards Colaba for some much needed sleep. Fortunately, we had a hotel to stay at and weren't forced to sleep on the street or on the trunk of our rickshaw (as the rest of the population seemed to be doing).
Fortunately, we had quite the entertaining ride from the airport to Colaba, for we were quick to notice that there really is no road rules in Mumbai (and later to be found out in all of India). A truck, 2 rickshaws and a motorbike side by side in a two-lane road? No problem! Hey, I got an idea, lets spice it up with people crossing the street too! Traffic lights? Only if you wanna!!
DAY 1 - Diwali Nights Awakening at around 2pm we quickly realized our original plan of visiting Elephanta island was shot, so we figured we'd take our bible (lonely planet) and see the sights of Colaba, Churchgate, and Fort (all Southern Mumbai). While polluted as hell, Mumbai does have quite a few nice sights being the Victoria Terminus Building, High Courts, Clocktower,
Victoria Terminus
Probably one of the coolest looking bus stations I've ever seen. and the Maidens where all the kids around the city come to play some cricket. I even witnessed a fight breakout after which the kids took their wickets and bat and left.
In the evening, however, there seemed to be something strange going on. Either bombs and gunfire were going off in all directions or all cars seemed to have a backfiring problem. While not necessarily worried, it was unnerving until we were told that it's November 9!! IT'S THE LAST DAY OF DIWALI (aka Hindu New Year)!!!!! And how better to celebrate the lighting fireworks off in the middle of the street in front of, behind, or even under traffic!
Day 1a: Om Shanti Om After letting off fireworks for quite some time, including a Bin Laden (Big Bang!) it was showtime... Being a huge fan of Bollywood, normally at 9am Saturday morning when I'm hungover as hell, we decided to catch a flick. We chose Om Shanti Om completely in Hindi, which at 3 hours (complete with 'interval') goes something like this:
Boy worships movie star girl in the '70s.
Dance sequence.
Boy saves girl.
Dance sequence.
Boy is hiding when he hears girl say she
Cricket in the Maidens
In front of the High Court and Clocktower is pregnant to her evil producer boyfriend. We know this because she says, "I'm pregnant".
Evil producer attempts to kill girl. Is successful, but also kills boy.
Boy is reborn in 2000's as megastar.
Dance sequence complete with ripped abs, and water shots.
Boy comes across evil producer again and has flashbacks.
Dance sequence with every Bollywood star ever.
Boy hatches plan to drive evil producer mad with girl lookalike.
Producer finds out about lookalike.
Ghost of real girl kills producer.
Dance sequence.
Best movie ever.
Day 2: Sex Monkeys At about 7am the next morn I wake up early, without Penner, to go check out this kind of Yoga I had heard about: Laughter Yoga. A bunch of elderly Indians gathered around the Gateway and proceeded to laugh. It goes something like this: Haha's would involve putting your hands in the air, and Hoho's involved slapping your knees. The teacher even included pointings ("why you little...") and funny dialogue complete with hand actions ("Hello? Yes, I'd like you to come pick me up" as they hold their hand to their head as a phone). This, apparently, was the funniest thing you could do.
On my way
Baby Diwali!
Even kids took part in lighting things on fire back to the hotel i was attacked by a 'priest' who Diwali'd me for 30 rupees. Against my better judgement I hate sugar balls from his hand, had a red mark put on my forehead, and a rope tied around my arm. I guess I didn't pay enough for the high quality dye, as for the next week, my wrist was yellow.
Penner and I then took off to Elephanta Island, took some pictures of statutes and learned a very important message. Monkeys, in all shapes and forms, are evil. Pure evil. Especially those with bright red faces that have sex with each other nonstop. And I'm not talking mating sex, I'm talking dirty german porn sex. Like nipple suckin, doggy-stylin, slap me around sex. Probably the grossest thing I've ever seen. Penner even has footage of a certain act that almost made him vomit.
For the evening we hit up Chowpatty beach which is basically a massive fair on the beach. It was a good way to wrap up the evening.
Day 3: Hangin' at the Garden With a bus in the evening, we checked out our final destinations: Gandhi's museum and the Hanging Gardens. Nothing
terribly exciting to report.
Next stop: Aurangabad, where the nearby Ellora and Ajanta cave temples await. With Elephanta behind us, this was to begin the 4 straight days of cave-templing.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.191s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 7; qc: 45; dbt: 0.1013s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Neha
non-member comment
for bombay
Hey.. that was an interesting post on ur blog.. i only laughed out wondering what would have been your reaction if you visited Bombay during the festival 'Holi' (the festival of colors - the hindu New year - Diwali doesn't mark the new year - its just linked with one of the most important occasions from the hindu mythology!) instead of Diwali.. :D