Mumbai – Page 9 – My Favourite Things

Ladies compartment, 8.47 local: Book release function and review

Posted on December 12, 2011June 15, 2012 by sudhagee

Sometime early last month, Mumbai experienced a few days of gloomy, cloudy, rather funny weather.Though this type of weather was quite uncharacteristic for Mumbai, it was typically London weather. And suddenly I was remembering and missing my days in London. On a whim, I put a status update on my Facebook wall about missing London, which elicited some responses. One of the responses I got was this:

You really miss England, don’t you? Go back, Sudha. Steep yourself in the legends and the history, touch the old walls and let them flow up your finger-tips into your heart, let the lakes and the streams and the little sudden springs soak into your soul, let the 40 shades of green fill your eyes and mind, let the cathedrals and the quaint corners whisper forgotten secrets and fervent prayers to you. Then come back home again.

As I read these beautiful lines, I did “travel” back to England, experience all that it said I should and came back “home” rejuvenated. And excited. Excited, because these lines had been written and posted by Suma Narayan, whose first book I had agreed to review. If these lines were a preview of what Suma’s writing would be like, I knew that the book would be a good read.

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Mumbai Lens: The Asiatic Library

Posted on November 30, 2011March 31, 2014 by sudhagee

This blog post was featured in the “Around the Blog” section of the DNA newspaper published on December 7, 2011 (pg.7). 🙂

The iconic building of the Asiatic Library of Mumbai, also called Town Hall, was recently in the news for a rather sad reason. Renovation work, which had begun in 2008–2009, had been stalled due to unpaid bills amounting to nearly 2 crores ! (You can read more about this here). When I had last walked by this beautiful building one August morning earlier this year, there was scaffolding on the sides, scraped and chipped paint on the ground, and blue protective sheets covering the exposed parts. Sounds of repair work could be heard even over the traffic.

asiatic library 1 — The entrance to the Asiatic Society Library

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Mumbai Lens: Bats at my bus stop

Posted on October 7, 2011March 31, 2014 by sudhagee

If you happen to be at the Punjabwadi bus stop in Deonar (Mumbai), just outside Saras Baug society, do pause for a minute. Or two. Over and above the din of the traffic, you will hear another kind of noise—lots of screeching and screaming. No, no, don’t look around for the source of this noise, look up into the trees and this is what you’ll see:

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Attitudes and Appearances

Posted on September 15, 2011October 25, 2011 by sudhagee

6.45 am. Mumbai domestic airport. The flight to Hyderabad is now delayed by 25 minutes. It is raining heavily and the passengers, most of whom are on their way to Hyderabad for a day trip on work or business, are getting restless. When some of them insist on knowing the reasons for the delay, the air hostesses roll out a standard and automatic response: “ATC has not yet given us clearance for take-off”.

The reason for the delay in take-off is finally understood at around 7.00 am, when about 15–20 new passengers enter the plane. It is quite evident from the tags on their hand baggage that they have arrived on an international flight from a gulf country and this flight to Hyderabad is a connecting flight for them. These passengers, all Indians, probably work in the gulf region and are on their way to home (Hyderabad) for the Ramadan holidays. As soon as the new passengers are in, the plane doors are shut, the air hostesses get busy closing the overhead luggage racks, remind passengers to wear their seat belts, switch off their mobile phones, etc. The captain’s announcement also comes on to welcome the passengers and give the flight details.

Soon all the passengers are seated and buckled to their seats. Except one. He is one of the new arrivals, and boarding pass in hand, he is looking for his seat, any seat, an empty seat. He is a dazed looking, middle-aged man, a little dishevelled and frayed shirt cuffs. One of the air hostesses tells him firmly, “Sir, please take your seat.”

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Mumbai Lens: Misty monsoon avatar

Posted on September 1, 2011March 31, 2014 by sudhagee

Quick ! Tell, me, what images come to your mind when you think of monsoons and rains in Mumbai? The waves lashing the Worli seaface or Marine Drive. People wading through (at least) knee-deep water. Submerged tracks. Buses and taxis still plying in spite of heavy rainfall. Victims of landslides or collapsed buildings…

I present to you here none of these images; instead, what I present here are lesser seen images, avatars, of Mumbai. Images that almost made me feel like I was somewhere else.

Mumbai monsoons 1 — View from Nehru Centre one rainy day

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Mumbai Lens: Chaos !

Posted on August 16, 2011March 31, 2014 by sudhagee

For a Mumbaikar, crowds and Mumbai are often mentioned in the same breath. But sometimes, and I must admit here that such times are very rare, the sheer crowd volume can shock even the most die-hard Mumbaikar as I found on August 14.

I had a friend visiting from Delhi and she was rather keen on seeing the Gateway of India. So, after a morning spent wandering around Ballard Estate, Kala Ghoda and the Fort area, we arrived at the Gateway of India to see this.