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(This is something that I had written mid way through last year, the time I moved to Mumbai...)
Even as the Jet Airways flight from Bangalore to Mumbai was tearing through the clouds high up in the skies, it kept getting those sporadic convulsions. The flight had given glimpses of what was to come over the next few hours. And true indeed, the first day at Mumbai was not without its fair share of wows and what the @#%$ (four lettered, read as ‘hell’)!
On arrival at the airport, I got the first feel of Mumbai. Having been in Bangalore for some time, I was left hydrated by the heat of Mumbai in no time. My first task (after I had water...) was to look for a taxi. There was a counter offering booking facilities for prepaid taxi services. And it is but natural that on the very first visit to a new city (especially a place like Mumbai) calls for extra precaution (else I would have completed Mumbai Darshan on Day 1!). As a result, the prepaid taxi counter was my preordained destination. I was given two options: Regular taxi or Cool Cab! Of course if you were to give these options to any level-headed someone, I would say at least 8 out of 10 people would opt for the Cool Cab! And yes, I was among those eight!
The entire cab selection was something like an arranged marriage, with the subtle difference being that I hadn’t even seen the cab, forget the other details! I had to walk some distance to get to the cabs and when I got there I could see two sets of cabs – one the ISC (Indian Standard Cab – black and yellow) and the other a ‘cool blue’ colour. Like any sane homosapien, I assumed I had my booking in those Cool Cabs, the blue ones. And no marks for guessing, I got the ISC! What the @#%$?! (the same four alphabets still hold good...)
Now coming to the cab, the bride in this entire marriage affair... Well, if the rendezvous with the ISC was unexpected, shocking was the unveiling of the taxi itself! The cab was none other than the famed relic from prehistoric times – Premier Padmini! Everywhere I turned, I saw these long extinct black and yellow baby dinosaurs. The skeletons of the long buried automobiles must be incessantly turning in their graves at the thought of the immortality of this puny Padmini.
Well, the taxi driver agreed to take me to the guest house (with the promise that he would eventually figure out the way to get there). After some ‘deep delving’ and ‘soul searching’ (we needed to search for the right ‘soul’ who could guide us to our destination!), we managed to figure out the overall route.
That Padmini aroused the seeker in me. It must have borne the brunt of the pot-holed Mumbai roads for not less than 30 years and yet its engine gave the whirr of a teenaged roadster. We tore through the streets with a gusto usually reserved for the technically and commercially far superior cars! And kid me not, those drum brakes worked with such finesse (and a complementary background score/music...) that it would put the disk brakes (and the Bollywood sound editors respectively) of the future generations to shame.
I know you must be wondering why this freak in me is ranting and raving about some stupid cab somewhere. You could blame me for it, but my love for automobiles in general and weakness for outstanding illustrations of automotive engineering in particular are the reasons for this magnum opus on automobiles! I am sorry I need to go on – bear with me for this last paragraph on my metal friends.
So finally we thought that we had reached my destination. However, we were very unceremoniously told that we had over-crossed the destination by an entire street. We went back the entire street at top speed – all the way in reverse gear! Are you really sane? Vehicles were racing past us in a blur and there we were, cruising on reverse gear in a shot taken from some Hollywood flick. By the way, did I say it already? Most of the cabs here do not have the luxury/burden of a rear-view mirror! I emerged from the taxi ride mature and richer by experience and poorer by a few bucks because of the customary “Chai Paani, bhai saab”...
The first thing that struck me about Mumbai was the crowd everywhere. The other thing that fascinated me even more was that there seemed to be a bigger crowd in every successive suburb. Everything and everyone seemed to be in a hurry to ‘move on’, including the afternoon drizzle! The roads were practical examples of the highest level of difficulty in racing games. Surprisingly, there was this mutual respect and trust that I found continuously demonstrated on the roads. At times people made way for the vehicles and at times vehicles made way for people! At times the roads acted as footpaths and at times the footpaths served as fine roads!
Another thing that struck me was the spirit of the place. There were no ‘airs’ about anything – no ‘class and mass’ feeling. Everything seemed to be in sync with everyone and everyone seemed to be running everywhere. I found traders – both lungi-clad vegetable sellers and tie-clad businessmen, huddled around the local ‘chai shops’ chatting away, some waiting for their ‘cutting-tea’ and some creating a smoky halo with their tobacco rolls.
Office was a similar projection of the streets – ‘n’ number of people fighting for ‘n/2’ space! In spite of all these little distractions, work went on and life moved on. The modest dramatics of life went by and I came to the end of my first day at Mumbai. The breezy air conditioning in my guest house accommodation kept me oblivious to the heat and the late sunset outside. There was a clear binary relation running through everything. And I guess that is what makes this place what it is today...
Even as the Jet Airways flight from Bangalore to Mumbai was tearing through the clouds high up in the skies, it kept getting those sporadic convulsions. The flight had given glimpses of what was to come over the next few hours. And true indeed, the first day at Mumbai was not without its fair share of wows and what the @#%$ (four lettered, read as ‘hell’)!
On arrival at the airport, I got the first feel of Mumbai. Having been in Bangalore for some time, I was left hydrated by the heat of Mumbai in no time. My first task (after I had water...) was to look for a taxi. There was a counter offering booking facilities for prepaid taxi services. And it is but natural that on the very first visit to a new city (especially a place like Mumbai) calls for extra precaution (else I would have completed Mumbai Darshan on Day 1!). As a result, the prepaid taxi counter was my preordained destination. I was given two options: Regular taxi or Cool Cab! Of course if you were to give these options to any level-headed someone, I would say at least 8 out of 10 people would opt for the Cool Cab! And yes, I was among those eight!
The entire cab selection was something like an arranged marriage, with the subtle difference being that I hadn’t even seen the cab, forget the other details! I had to walk some distance to get to the cabs and when I got there I could see two sets of cabs – one the ISC (Indian Standard Cab – black and yellow) and the other a ‘cool blue’ colour. Like any sane homosapien, I assumed I had my booking in those Cool Cabs, the blue ones. And no marks for guessing, I got the ISC! What the @#%$?! (the same four alphabets still hold good...)
Now coming to the cab, the bride in this entire marriage affair... Well, if the rendezvous with the ISC was unexpected, shocking was the unveiling of the taxi itself! The cab was none other than the famed relic from prehistoric times – Premier Padmini! Everywhere I turned, I saw these long extinct black and yellow baby dinosaurs. The skeletons of the long buried automobiles must be incessantly turning in their graves at the thought of the immortality of this puny Padmini.
Well, the taxi driver agreed to take me to the guest house (with the promise that he would eventually figure out the way to get there). After some ‘deep delving’ and ‘soul searching’ (we needed to search for the right ‘soul’ who could guide us to our destination!), we managed to figure out the overall route.
That Padmini aroused the seeker in me. It must have borne the brunt of the pot-holed Mumbai roads for not less than 30 years and yet its engine gave the whirr of a teenaged roadster. We tore through the streets with a gusto usually reserved for the technically and commercially far superior cars! And kid me not, those drum brakes worked with such finesse (and a complementary background score/music...) that it would put the disk brakes (and the Bollywood sound editors respectively) of the future generations to shame.
I know you must be wondering why this freak in me is ranting and raving about some stupid cab somewhere. You could blame me for it, but my love for automobiles in general and weakness for outstanding illustrations of automotive engineering in particular are the reasons for this magnum opus on automobiles! I am sorry I need to go on – bear with me for this last paragraph on my metal friends.
So finally we thought that we had reached my destination. However, we were very unceremoniously told that we had over-crossed the destination by an entire street. We went back the entire street at top speed – all the way in reverse gear! Are you really sane? Vehicles were racing past us in a blur and there we were, cruising on reverse gear in a shot taken from some Hollywood flick. By the way, did I say it already? Most of the cabs here do not have the luxury/burden of a rear-view mirror! I emerged from the taxi ride mature and richer by experience and poorer by a few bucks because of the customary “Chai Paani, bhai saab”...
The first thing that struck me about Mumbai was the crowd everywhere. The other thing that fascinated me even more was that there seemed to be a bigger crowd in every successive suburb. Everything and everyone seemed to be in a hurry to ‘move on’, including the afternoon drizzle! The roads were practical examples of the highest level of difficulty in racing games. Surprisingly, there was this mutual respect and trust that I found continuously demonstrated on the roads. At times people made way for the vehicles and at times vehicles made way for people! At times the roads acted as footpaths and at times the footpaths served as fine roads!
Another thing that struck me was the spirit of the place. There were no ‘airs’ about anything – no ‘class and mass’ feeling. Everything seemed to be in sync with everyone and everyone seemed to be running everywhere. I found traders – both lungi-clad vegetable sellers and tie-clad businessmen, huddled around the local ‘chai shops’ chatting away, some waiting for their ‘cutting-tea’ and some creating a smoky halo with their tobacco rolls.
Office was a similar projection of the streets – ‘n’ number of people fighting for ‘n/2’ space! In spite of all these little distractions, work went on and life moved on. The modest dramatics of life went by and I came to the end of my first day at Mumbai. The breezy air conditioning in my guest house accommodation kept me oblivious to the heat and the late sunset outside. There was a clear binary relation running through everything. And I guess that is what makes this place what it is today...
PS: Those of you who have stayed in Mumbai for some time will clearly figure out some significant omissions about Mumbai, say for instance the overflowing trains! But trust me; what I have penned above were the facets of Mumbai that I got to see on Day 1. The others would follow as the days go by...
1 comment:
Very nicely written, Satya..."roads acted as footpaths and footpaths served as fine roads" ! :)
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