Mumbai -a big city with lots of different faces
Arrived in Mumbai (also called Bombay) I stayed for a few days to look around before I went further north.Mumbai is a huge city with millions of people and with lots of different sides. Noise and exhaust caused by traffic pollutes the air, which is together with the heat a very exhausting mixture and can easely result in headache at the end of the day. The sidewalk are crowded with people, street hawkers, beggars and animals. I've never seen arm and rich people living so close together. This -for us big contrast- seems to be normal for the locals...of course they grow up with this big variety of different communities, but the foreigner has to get used to it! But it's anyway very interesting and there is a lot to discover. Some things you see on the first view, for other things you have to get closer.
One of the landmarks of Mumbai is the "Gateway of India" which was built during the authority of England and is a real crowd puller today!
Beside the pompous buildings there is also the other side of the with 18 million people popullated city. Mumbai has the biggest slums of Asia! During a walk in the city I came to a region where I saw people and animals together living on the poorest conditions in the street or in semi-derelict huts. Everything is durty and run-down -I saw many things in South America- but this is totally different! Also I saw here people with Lepra the first time in my life. Horrific!
Beside this there are also lots of other interesting and nicer things to see in the streets of Mumbai. Street restaurants offer different dishes, small shops try to sell what ever they can and street hawkers try to get their rupies with legal and ilegal deals. I already had some strange experiences with them. I thought I already knew how it works but I see that I have to learn again. The street hawkers are much smarter then in South America!
Just one example:
I was walking in a street and saw a guy who was pointing to my ear. What? Is there something with my ear? I stopped walking and was observing my ear which was a mistake. He used the moment to stick very smart and quick with a small bar into my ear and he took out some earwax. I was so confused about the situation that I was starring at him and was saying to myself that this haven't ever happend to my before. Then he gave me a card which said that he was the best ear cleaner in the street. During I was reading the card he was sticking in my ear again very fast -so fast that I couldn't react. This time he told me with a very serious voice that I had a "stone" in my ear, what ever this should be. I told him to stop the activity and wanted to continue my walk. I didn't want that he stuck into my ear again. It's very nasty if somebody is nuzzling in your ear and in addition you never know if he's an expert or not!
So I wanted to go my way but in this moment he gave me another card which said that he was charging me 250 Ruppies per stone (about 5 US-Dollars). While I was reading the card he was nuzzling again in my ear very very quickly and took off a so-called stone. What he showed me was a lof of earwax and inside the bulk a small stone. After that he put some "medicine" into my ear.
Of course he wanted to clean the other side also. I let him do, because it seemed like he wasn't doing it the first time...and anyway maybye it was time to have my ear cleaned again. Of course he found also on the other side a stone, so he could charge me again another 250 Ruppies. I was so taken by surprise that I couldn't resist and I gave him the money. So after that little interruption I had 500 Ruppies less but -and this is the most important thing- one experience more! Totally confused I continued my way and was thinking about the story...it's very curious that I had stones on both sides...later I knew that he fooled me!
A little bit later I saw a lot of ear cleaners in the street -it seems to be normal that everybody let his ear clean in the street. When I saw the next time an ear cleaner I stopped walking and was watching amused his work.
Now I've clean ears and can tell to every ear cleaner that I already got my ears polished!
This is just one example of all the things which can happen to you in the streets of Mumbai. I learned that I have to be careful otherwise they could take me off my money on every corner.
I wish you a good time -and watch your ears!
CU
Andy
10.02.04, Mumbai, India