Mumbai: Extreme Cricket and a Bollywood Balls Up
As mentioned, Mumbai has been a place I've been especially looking forward to, not in as much that I love exploring cosmopolitan cities but more the fact that I'd finished the 1,00 page fine print beast of a book that is Shantaram only minutes before touching down on the tarmac.
Without trying to rehash the story, the book itself centres around the city and the first few hours wandering the place felt more like a nostalgic trip rather than seeing things for the first time.
The mixture of colonial architecture combined with modern and ancient parts of the city gives it a pretty unique feel and I find myself (along with many others) feeling what a poor relation Delhi is in comparison with the place and understand why so many dislike it.
It's not all wonderful though, and like most places I've seen on this trip you're only a footstep away from another world: whether it's walking near a slum and turning the corner to face a multinational company HQ or stepping out of an up market bar or club to be faced with the scores of people who make the pavements and alleyways their home during the night.
Such a stark contrast can be difficult to take and can understand why many aren't comfortable being one of the 'haves' (as opposed to the 'have nots') in a city like this.
After being in Rajasthan which is rural by comparison, there are of course the inevitable 'city prices' that you come to expect in Mumbai which do give the wallet a bit of a pounding, but its hard to find many things that I honestly dislike about the place.
I did manage to find a unique way to overcome the exorbitant hotel prices in the city though. When people usually describe their home or area as a building site it's often an exaggeration - not in this case.
In exchange for a more favourable rate, the owners of this hotel allowed guests to stay in the semi complete building in the top floor of the block (its common to have many different hotels in one building in India) whilst the grinding, sawing, plastering and general noise making continued throughout the day until the late evening.
Despite everything being covered in a fine layer of plaster dust (despite the best attempts of a guy employed solely to eradicate this) it was actually pretty good and through the paint speckled, poorly hung door of my and beyond the bamboo scaffolding was an amazing view of the harbour that only the best rooms in town can boast.
The rest of the time here has been a mixture of ambling through the streets by day and discovering the various drinking holes by night, with only a couple of notable exceptions.
In the same way that the Indians have invented a more dangerous version of Badminton in Agra, they have also created a new, far more dangerous version of cricket. Quite some achievement in a sport where you have to wear a box, a helmet and a solid leather ball travels at 90mph.
Sunday, like that in other civilised countries that play the sport is cricket day. In England this would usually be a sedate game on a village green, overseen by local enthusiasts and those with nothing better to do.
In Australia it would be perhaps drinking in the sun and and sledging the under 12 team with a torrent of abuse, smashing my civilised country theory for six.
The dense population and limited park space in Mumbai means a different approach is required. Rather than a village green or city oval the foot traffic and general chaos more closely resembles Heathrow terminal 5 that it does a sporting venue.
In the midst of all this are DOZENS of cricket game all going on at once, all pitches with hugely overlapping boundaries and frequent trespassers in the form of dogs, stray children and those with a death wish. Never has the phrase 'having eyes in the back of your head' been more appropriate.
Whilst the cricket itself and their passion for the game was entertaining enough, it was just fascinating watching it all work together. The thought (and thankfully not the ball) struck me that whilst I was loving all this and concentrating through the viewfinder of my camera I was only about 10m from the batsmen.
A couple of enthusiastically hit boundaries meant I went for cover and let them get on with it, amazed that on surveying the ground no one anywhere was lying unconscious besides a cricket ball.
The other notable exception was a missed opportunity as much as it was an SBE. In Mumbai there are lots of thing for sale: everything is everywhere.
As most people that have been anywhere overseas will know, in order not to succumb to tourist rage or lose your sanity you develop a pre-built "no thank you" to anything on offer unless you are on a deliberate shopping spree - at which point the bargaining games begins with good intentions.
So, upon stepping out of my hotel dressed smarter than the average, ready for a night of smarter than average watering holes I had the pre-built phrases as always. offers for drugs, women and of course wooden carving were all turned down as were many others.
I was only 50m down the street en route to dinner that I actually replayed one which was along the lines of' hello sir, I'm looking for 2 western male extras for a Bollywood move tomorrow if you're interested".
This was an opportunity to a) do something cool and b) get paid. So being 100m away from the guy at this point I decided that hunger was a first priority and that I'd see him when I came out. Alas he was gone, as was the opportunity to get my gormless face on DVD for a nanosecond and secure my immortality in B Grade Bollywood.
So, my potential new career shattered and having finished with temples, forts etc. for this trip Goa is the next stop where both the agenda and the contents of my brain are to be as empty as possible. The only exception being a cheeky NYE celebration, minus the trance music.
As mentioned, Mumbai has been a place I've been especially looking forward to, not in as much that I love exploring cosmopolitan cities but more the fact that I'd finished the 1,00 page fine print beast of a book that is Shantaram only minutes before touching down on the tarmac.
Without trying to rehash the story, the book itself centres around the city and the first few hours wandering the place felt more like a nostalgic trip rather than seeing things for the first time.
The mixture of colonial architecture combined with modern and ancient parts of the city gives it a pretty unique feel and I find myself (along with many others) feeling what a poor relation Delhi is in comparison with the place and understand why so many dislike it.
It's not all wonderful though, and like most places I've seen on this trip you're only a footstep away from another world: whether it's walking near a slum and turning the corner to face a multinational company HQ or stepping out of an up market bar or club to be faced with the scores of people who make the pavements and alleyways their home during the night.
Such a stark contrast can be difficult to take and can understand why many aren't comfortable being one of the 'haves' (as opposed to the 'have nots') in a city like this.
After being in Rajasthan which is rural by comparison, there are of course the inevitable 'city prices' that you come to expect in Mumbai which do give the wallet a bit of a pounding, but its hard to find many things that I honestly dislike about the place.
I did manage to find a unique way to overcome the exorbitant hotel prices in the city though. When people usually describe their home or area as a building site it's often an exaggeration - not in this case.
In exchange for a more favourable rate, the owners of this hotel allowed guests to stay in the semi complete building in the top floor of the block (its common to have many different hotels in one building in India) whilst the grinding, sawing, plastering and general noise making continued throughout the day until the late evening.
Despite everything being covered in a fine layer of plaster dust (despite the best attempts of a guy employed solely to eradicate this) it was actually pretty good and through the paint speckled, poorly hung door of my and beyond the bamboo scaffolding was an amazing view of the harbour that only the best rooms in town can boast.
The rest of the time here has been a mixture of ambling through the streets by day and discovering the various drinking holes by night, with only a couple of notable exceptions.
In the same way that the Indians have invented a more dangerous version of Badminton in Agra, they have also created a new, far more dangerous version of cricket. Quite some achievement in a sport where you have to wear a box, a helmet and a solid leather ball travels at 90mph.
Sunday, like that in other civilised countries that play the sport is cricket day. In England this would usually be a sedate game on a village green, overseen by local enthusiasts and those with nothing better to do.
In Australia it would be perhaps drinking in the sun and and sledging the under 12 team with a torrent of abuse, smashing my civilised country theory for six.
The dense population and limited park space in Mumbai means a different approach is required. Rather than a village green or city oval the foot traffic and general chaos more closely resembles Heathrow terminal 5 that it does a sporting venue.
In the midst of all this are DOZENS of cricket game all going on at once, all pitches with hugely overlapping boundaries and frequent trespassers in the form of dogs, stray children and those with a death wish. Never has the phrase 'having eyes in the back of your head' been more appropriate.
Whilst the cricket itself and their passion for the game was entertaining enough, it was just fascinating watching it all work together. The thought (and thankfully not the ball) struck me that whilst I was loving all this and concentrating through the viewfinder of my camera I was only about 10m from the batsmen.
A couple of enthusiastically hit boundaries meant I went for cover and let them get on with it, amazed that on surveying the ground no one anywhere was lying unconscious besides a cricket ball.
The other notable exception was a missed opportunity as much as it was an SBE. In Mumbai there are lots of thing for sale: everything is everywhere.
As most people that have been anywhere overseas will know, in order not to succumb to tourist rage or lose your sanity you develop a pre-built "no thank you" to anything on offer unless you are on a deliberate shopping spree - at which point the bargaining games begins with good intentions.
So, upon stepping out of my hotel dressed smarter than the average, ready for a night of smarter than average watering holes I had the pre-built phrases as always. offers for drugs, women and of course wooden carving were all turned down as were many others.
I was only 50m down the street en route to dinner that I actually replayed one which was along the lines of' hello sir, I'm looking for 2 western male extras for a Bollywood move tomorrow if you're interested".
This was an opportunity to a) do something cool and b) get paid. So being 100m away from the guy at this point I decided that hunger was a first priority and that I'd see him when I came out. Alas he was gone, as was the opportunity to get my gormless face on DVD for a nanosecond and secure my immortality in B Grade Bollywood.
So, my potential new career shattered and having finished with temples, forts etc. for this trip Goa is the next stop where both the agenda and the contents of my brain are to be as empty as possible. The only exception being a cheeky NYE celebration, minus the trance music.
posted by aboutabwoy at 6:24 AM
