MUMBAI: The largest and most cosmopolitan of India's cities, Mumbai typifies the country's inherent contradictions – you may love and hate it in equal measure, but you'll never remain indifferent, writes
YVONNE MORAN
IT’S GOT McDonald’s, but serves no beef. It boasts lovingly-constructed, ornate colonial buildings in the midst of a frantic, 19 million-plus metropolis. Some 60 per cent of its people live in slums – yet one of the world’s richest men, Mukesh Dhirubhai Ambani, lives in a 27-storey house with four helipads.
Mumbai typifies India’s inherent contradictions – you may love and hate it in equal measure, but you’ll never remain indifferent.
The largest and most cosmopolitan of India’s cities, renamed Mumbai from Bombay in 1995 after the Goddess Mumbadevi (the Portuguese called it Bom Bahia or good harbour,) is chock-a-block full of things to see and do.
If it’s a first visit to India, allow yourself several days to get over the shock of your senses being ceaselessly assaulted. Wandering the streets you might see nonchalant cows on patches of island greenery in the midst of traffic chaos, goats tied up outside cheek-by-jowl slums, the lucky survivors of the last of many festivals, and meandering chickens scouring broken pavement paths searching for nibbles.
On a less pastoral note, Indians love their car horns. They seem to honk for the fun of it – or in the hope of getting others to move more quickly. Pedestrians and fellow drivers, immune to the auditory onslaught (silence in all its forms is an almost impossible thing to find in a country of one billion-plus people) simply ignore the noise and continue doing what they were doing before: taking one’s life in one’s hand venturing to cross yet another road missing traffic lights, for example, or reversing in the opposite direction straight into the oncoming traffic chaos!
As you explore, you might smell the aroma of some great spicy foods being prepared, or the whiff of a lovely incense or perfume. Or you may be subjected to fumes from an open, rancid drain, or from odours emanating from the garbage-festooned streets.
Visit the city’s teeming, bustling markets and join the Indian crowds. Crawford Market, once the main venue for fruit and vegetables, is now crowded with pile-high imported food goodies, along with exotic-looking Indian produce attractively packaged for gift-giving.
Cotton, silk and synthetic cloths by the ream and metre are available in Mangaldas Market. Head to Zaveri if you’re looking for 22-carat gold jewellery with a tiny mark-up for simple (unusual in Indian design) and the more usual fancy Indian workmanship in earrings, necklaces and bangles.
Other markets seem happiest selling a hodge-podge of products. Clothes, electrical goods, toys, kitchen items and, it seems, everything in between can be found in shops and on the busy streets in the environs of Crawford Market. You never know what you’ll find in Chor Bazaar, or Thieves Market: it has antiques and “antiques”, amongst other things.
Colaba, in the south of the city, is a good home away from home base. It’s easy walking distances from the upmarket area between Colaba Causeway and Strand Road to the Modern Art and Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj museums, which are opposite each other, and to art galleries located in Kala Ghoda, the area between Colaba and Fort. (The actual fort in that area is long gone). You’ll find wonderful Raj-era colonial buildings throughout these areas, making walking here a real pleasure.
Tourist facilities such as the internet, travel agencies, money changers and shops selling high quality, Indian crafts abound, facilitating the many tourists who stay in this area of the city.
Privately-owned boats gently bop on the Arabian Sea just off Strand Road and friends and families from all across India pose in front of the iconic Gateway of India nearby for photographs. Facing Mumbai Harbour, this massive, Indo-Saracenic arch commemorates the 1911 royal visit of King George V. You’re never far away from reminders of the British Raj. The Taj Mahal Palace, Mumbai’s most famous hotel, faces the harbour and the Gateway of India.
At night, horse-drawn carriages, called Victorias, bedecked with tiny red, blue and green lights, gilded in aluminium and festooned with flowers, trod a well-worn circuit with local and foreign tourists.
IF YOU HAVE A 12-hour day to spare, head to Bollywood, where you might end up in an all-singing, all-action movie – and get paid 500 rupees (€8). Or you might just end up in an advertisement, spending hours on set, waiting to be called. The city of dreams has the world’s biggest movie industry and its stars are wealthy beyond their wildest imaginings. Many come here hoping to make it big, but only a tiny fraction succeed. It’s sometimes said Mumbai is covered with gold.
Hundreds of landless, poverty-stricken rural people also constantly descend on Mumbai with their dream to improve their lives. Many of them end up, meagre belongings in tow, sleeping on street pavements, lucky to be able to get barely enough to eat for their next meal.
En route to a tour of the Dharavi slum, women sat on a pavement adjacent to the sprawling racecourse, making chapattis for their next meal. Yet diabetes, often linked to obesity, has become epidemic, according to a recent story in a local newspaper. Garbage sorters sorted the city’s rubbish on a Colaba street beside a top-of-the-range shiny, black, BMW.
One million people live in Dharavi, Mumbai’s biggest slum (432 acres) and one of the world’s largest. There are an estimated 10,000 small businesses in the slum, the biggest being plastic recycling, leather and pottery making. There’s something going on on every narrow street and around every bend: one man was knocking copper bits off fridges for their reuse; another was dying clothes; oil cans were being cleaned for a second life and one woman was making poppadoms outside her house near a tiny shrine. The best way to visit the slum is with a reputable company such as Reality Tours. The place is full of surprises.
The Mahalaxmi Dhobi Ghat, nearby, is the world’s biggest laundry. Thousands of kilos of clothes are washed daily in the 836, open-air concrete, wash pens, plus flogging stones.
People used to go fox hunting in the forest, now gone, on Malabar Hill. Now the abode of the very wealthy, it was visible in the distance en route to the slum. “Now we say two-legged foxes live there,” said the guide.
THE SACRED AND profane are never far apart in Mumbai and a visit to Mahalaxmi Temple, which is dedicated to the Goddess of wealth, makes this one of Mumbai’s busiest Hindu temples. Shops selling all kinds of religious artifacts line the constantly busy route to the temple.
Restaurants, shops and beggars straddle the causeway to Haji Ali’s Dargah, or tomb, nearby, strikingly located at the end of a causeway in the Arabian Sea.
Hindus also visit this 19th shrine constructed on a 15th-century structure, a reflection of how tolerant Hinduism is. Friday is the best day to see the many pilgrims hoping to receive blessings from the legendary saint who gave up his possessions before going on a pilgrimage to Mecca.
“The Victoria Terminus is to the British Raj what the Taj Mahal is to the Mughal empire,” wrote historian Christopher London. He was referring to the Unesco-designated CST, or Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus. Victorian, Hindu and Islamic styles created buttresses, domes, turrets, spires and stained glass widows in what is one of the busiest stations in the country. Built in 1887 as the largest British edifice in India, it is undoubtedly one of Mumbai’s most magnificent buildings.
Mumbai, like India, is a place where you can never be bored.
Mumbai where to . . .
3 places to stay
Value:YWCA International Centre, 18 Madame Cama Road, Fort, 00-91-22-2202-5053. ywcaic.info. Slightly old-fashioned, spotlessly clean, in a quiet, central area far from the madding crowds. Rooms are air conditioned with satellite TV. Breakfast and dinner included. Singles from INR2,024 (€33), doubles from INR2,100, (€34).
Mid-market: Hotel Moti International, 10 Best Marg, Colaba, 00-91-22-2202-5714, e-mail: hotelmotiinternational @yahoo.co.in. This crumbling, colonial-era, family-owned hotel has verandahs, so guests can observe the ceaseless street activity below. The large rooms are slightly other-worldly in the fashion stakes, but are good value at INR2,700 (€44) for doubles (no singles).
Upmarket:The Taj Mahal Palace, Apollo Bunder, 00-91-22-6665-3366, tajhotels.com. The Grande Dame of Mumbai's hotels, the heritage listed building facing the harbour and Gateway of India is the place to stay – if money's no object. Rajput bay windows, Moorish and Florentine architecture comprise the external grandeur. Singles from INR21,500 (€350), doubles from INR23,000 (€374). Taxes are extra.
3 places to eat
Value: Bademiya, Tulloch Road, Apollo Bunder, Colaba, 00-91-22-2284-8038. Street food at its best: tikkas, kebab, chicken and mutton rolls ooze spice – not spicy – flavours. Weekend crowds at the nightly venue jam the streets in a feeding frenzy. Meat dishes start at INR85 (€1.40). Cross the street to Gokul opposite and enjoy a beer afterwards.
Mid-market:Zaffran, B Block, Sitaram Building, Dr D N Road, near Crawford Market, 00-91-22-2342-4693. Delicious, popular with noisy families at weekends, but you can dine upstairs, alongside Mumbai's hip, trendy, shisha smokers. The butter chicken, INR275 (€4.50), was voted one of Mumbai's best and the chenna payesh, a milk-based desert, INR55 (€0.90) is to die for. Mains start from INR200 (€3.25).
Upmarket:Trishna, Sai Baba Marg, beside Commerce House, Near Rhythm House, Kala Ghoda, Fort, 00-91-22-2261-4991, trishnalondon.com. Tip top for fish and shellfish with that just-caught taste, the pomfret fish, Hyderabadi tikka and butter, pepper, garlic crab, the most popular items, makes Trishna a worthy stop on any foodie's itinerary. Fish mains start at INR 575 (€9.19).
3 places to go
Museum:Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (formerly Prince of Wales Museum of Western India), 159-161 M G Road, Fort, 00-91-22-2284-4484. Magical, miniature 14th-19th century paintings, stone and ivory carvings like a miraculously- worked lattice jewellery box and fantastic Tibetan artifacts make it Mumbai's most important museum.
Historic:Mani Bhavan Gandhi Sangrahalaya, 19 Laburnum Road, Gamdevi, 00-91-22-2380-5864, gandhi-manibhavan.org. Mahatma Gandhi's residence from where he launched "satyagraha", the philosophy and practice of non-violent resistance, is a small, tasteful, north city museum. His bedroom is simple and photographs of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhishow him with famous temporal and spiritual leaders. Two Irish postage stamps celebrate 1969 centenary of his birth.
City tour:Dharavi Slum and Mahalaxmi Dhobi Ghat Tour, Reality Tours and Travel, 00-91-22-2283-3872, realitygives.org. This reputable company forbids photography, 80 per cent of the profits fund their slum projects and visits are with the inhabitants' consent.
Shop spots
Fabindia:fabindia.com. This high-end clothing, furniture and home decor shop is popular with wealthy Indians and tourists. There's fusion Indian/Western designed clothing in its 14 Mumbai stores.
The Bombay Store:thebombaystore.com. Jewellery, Indian crafts, bed and bathroom apparel, clothing and gift items are found in this store's six city outlets.
Markets:besides the markets mentioned above, there's also MG Road for clothes and the Causeway, in Colaba, for clothes, jewellery, knick-knacks and inexpensive gifts. Tough bargaining is required.
Get there
Etihad (etihad.com) flies from Dublin to Mumbai via Abu Dhabi. British Airways (ba. com) flies from London to Mumbai. Air France (airfrance.ie) flies from Dublin to Mumbai via Paris.