Mumbai - Gateway to a Culture Shock
Winter 2010
If you only visit one place before you die, it must be India.
There is nowhere on earth to compare with the magic of this vast country with its blend of cultures, architecture, extreme wealth and appalling poverty, a country where religion is everything and differing doctrines live peacefully side by side.
Spring is a good time to visit as the crowds wane and the temperature rises. A visit in late March / early April will avoid the clutter of endless lines of tourists, and offer fine weather without unbearable heat. We spent four weeks in India this time last year and did not see a cloud.
Mumbai is the perfect place to start your journey. Flights to India are relatively inexpensive and India now has two excellent airlines in Kingfisher and Jet Airways with both flying regularly from London to Mumbai.
The 75-minute drive through Mumbai, from the airport in the north of the city, to the best hotels in the south, is a journey that highlights the shocking extremes of Indian wealth and poverty. Within minutes of stepping from the cocooned luxury of an airplane you are driving through streets, strewn with rubble and rubbish where mothers make their beds and cradle their tiny, naked newborn babies.
Advertising hoardings, selling mobile phones, beer and soft drinks, are nailed to corrugated iron shacks lining the road side, the homes of struggling immigrants who have moved from country to city in search of a better life, and now, aspire to afford the products their dwellings promote.
Every stop, and there are many in the endless traffic jams, gives an opportunity for children to knock on the car window and sell books, magazines and even DVDs.
"If you make eye contact they will not go away,” our guide warns, but it’s hard not to look at children, still years off their teens, as they tap incessantly on the glass by your face.
Mumbai has 52,000 taxis, black with yellow roofs, which swarm around the city night and day like a plague of wasps. The taxi drivers from outside the city sleep overnight in their cabs so the front of top hotels, such as The Taj Mahal, become parking lots. Around 6.30am they all buzz off in search of another day’s fares.
Essential places to visit include the stunning Jain Temple where tourists mingle with Jainists who go about their daily meditation and worship before heading off to make even more money in their businesses. The Jain religion might prohibit them from hurting a fly but it doesn’t seem to get in the way of making vast fortunes, as some of India’s wealthiest people are Jainists.
Another essential place to visit is the public laundry where hundreds of tourists gather to watch hundreds of locals beat and batter clothes in vats of soapy water. It is a fascinating spectacle so make sure you take your camera.
Hotel options are still led by the Taj Mahal Palace where fortunately you no longer have to hide from angry terrorists but you probably will be angry if you end up in a room in the main building as the accommodation in the Tower is much better. I was very unimpressed with our room in the main body of the hotel. Was it a Superior or a Deluxe? I don’t know, but it was very small and grubby. A much better option is the new Four Seasons, their first in India and utterly luxurious, although looking down on a shantytown from such opulence is a humbling experience.
Alternatively stay at the InterContinental and you won’t have to travel far for some of the best nightlife in Mumbai which you’ll find at Dome, The InterContinental’s rooftop bar. Probably the finest restaurant in Mumbai now has a sister in London. Trishna, located down a dark alley, serves some of the best sticky sauced seafood you’ll find anywhere. Don’t dress up because the complimentary bib is essential attire.
After you’ve cleaned up you might feel like a late night boogie, and boogie is what you’ll do at Shiro, Mumbai’s answer to the Buddha Bar, where the locals get on down to Western 80’s classics such as 12”remix of Irene Cara’s Flashdance and Madonna’s la Isla Bonita.
As a starting point or finale for your trip to India, Mumbai is perfect. It breaks you in to the culture shock which is about to hit as you traverse Rajasthan, and offers a wild but fun night out to re-adjust to Western decadence after a few weeks of rural India.
There is nowhere on earth to compare with the magic of this vast country with its blend of cultures, architecture, extreme wealth and appalling poverty, a country where religion is everything and differing doctrines live peacefully side by side.
Spring is a good time to visit as the crowds wane and the temperature rises. A visit in late March / early April will avoid the clutter of endless lines of tourists, and offer fine weather without unbearable heat. We spent four weeks in India this time last year and did not see a cloud.
Mumbai is the perfect place to start your journey. Flights to India are relatively inexpensive and India now has two excellent airlines in Kingfisher and Jet Airways with both flying regularly from London to Mumbai.
The 75-minute drive through Mumbai, from the airport in the north of the city, to the best hotels in the south, is a journey that highlights the shocking extremes of Indian wealth and poverty. Within minutes of stepping from the cocooned luxury of an airplane you are driving through streets, strewn with rubble and rubbish where mothers make their beds and cradle their tiny, naked newborn babies.
Advertising hoardings, selling mobile phones, beer and soft drinks, are nailed to corrugated iron shacks lining the road side, the homes of struggling immigrants who have moved from country to city in search of a better life, and now, aspire to afford the products their dwellings promote.
Every stop, and there are many in the endless traffic jams, gives an opportunity for children to knock on the car window and sell books, magazines and even DVDs.
"If you make eye contact they will not go away,” our guide warns, but it’s hard not to look at children, still years off their teens, as they tap incessantly on the glass by your face.
Mumbai has 52,000 taxis, black with yellow roofs, which swarm around the city night and day like a plague of wasps. The taxi drivers from outside the city sleep overnight in their cabs so the front of top hotels, such as The Taj Mahal, become parking lots. Around 6.30am they all buzz off in search of another day’s fares.
Essential places to visit include the stunning Jain Temple where tourists mingle with Jainists who go about their daily meditation and worship before heading off to make even more money in their businesses. The Jain religion might prohibit them from hurting a fly but it doesn’t seem to get in the way of making vast fortunes, as some of India’s wealthiest people are Jainists.
Another essential place to visit is the public laundry where hundreds of tourists gather to watch hundreds of locals beat and batter clothes in vats of soapy water. It is a fascinating spectacle so make sure you take your camera.
Hotel options are still led by the Taj Mahal Palace where fortunately you no longer have to hide from angry terrorists but you probably will be angry if you end up in a room in the main building as the accommodation in the Tower is much better. I was very unimpressed with our room in the main body of the hotel. Was it a Superior or a Deluxe? I don’t know, but it was very small and grubby. A much better option is the new Four Seasons, their first in India and utterly luxurious, although looking down on a shantytown from such opulence is a humbling experience.
Alternatively stay at the InterContinental and you won’t have to travel far for some of the best nightlife in Mumbai which you’ll find at Dome, The InterContinental’s rooftop bar. Probably the finest restaurant in Mumbai now has a sister in London. Trishna, located down a dark alley, serves some of the best sticky sauced seafood you’ll find anywhere. Don’t dress up because the complimentary bib is essential attire.
After you’ve cleaned up you might feel like a late night boogie, and boogie is what you’ll do at Shiro, Mumbai’s answer to the Buddha Bar, where the locals get on down to Western 80’s classics such as 12”remix of Irene Cara’s Flashdance and Madonna’s la Isla Bonita.
As a starting point or finale for your trip to India, Mumbai is perfect. It breaks you in to the culture shock which is about to hit as you traverse Rajasthan, and offers a wild but fun night out to re-adjust to Western decadence after a few weeks of rural India.
Be Frank: agree or disagree? What do you think?
