Mumbai, in many ways, is better in the rain. In the sun your senses are drawn to the filth. The piles of rubbish that gather in every gutter, every corner, and stink to high heaven. The rotting fruit and cuts of gone off chicken, the bottles, cans and plastic wrappings to name just a few of the more moderate items. In every pothole an opaque brown sludge lines the tarmac. Every wall is covered in a thick grime that comes off on your hands and clothes. Even the air is thick with pollution so that a white shirt will turn oil brown and greasy to the touch after an hour or two just walking the streets.
The sun also brings out the people. The endless seething crowds of people that push and shove and crowd you everywhere you go. There is no personal space in Mumbai. While queuing you are expected to push up as close as is possible to the person in front of you, squashed into their back. If you don't then someone will push in infront of you without a second thought until you end up squashed anyway. While walking around people will push past you in all directions. No matter where you are or how fast you are walking there is always someone in more of a hurry than you, and you are universally in their way.
The beggars are a constant hassle. They sit on every pavement edge and hassle tourists for money. Some will approach you and grab your arm, even stop your taxi to lean in through the window with grasping hands. They are everywhere and will follow you down the street saying,
"Money. Give me. Give me. You. Give me. Money. Give." until you step off the pavement and into a shop,out of their reach.
So Mumbai, in many ways, is better in the rain. The temperature drops and the air feels cleaner. The crowds dissipate slightly as a few of the many try to find cover. The beggars hide away under bus shelters and canvas sheets and the streets, for a few hours at least become walkable. So when the heavens opened this morning and gave a taste of what monsoon season really means in this part of the world, we weren't at all disappointed.
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Ewan:
For the second time in as many weeks we have completely by chance, arrived in a city on the day of a major annual festival. This is the day that would save the reputation of Mumbai from slipping into the abyss. This is the day that the people of Mumbai, whatever their situation, rise up from the filth of the city streets and show their true colours; and they did.
The view that met us as we arrived at Chowpaty Beach couldn't sum this up any more suitably. Never have I seen such a dirty beach. Miles upon miles of rubbish littered the shoreline and coated the sand. The surf breaks upon the land every time with a new wave of debris; even the water is brown! And yet, even against the sideways monsoon rain, the people of Mumbai decend upon the beach in their thousands.
They sing and they dance. Today is a day of celebration, today is Ganesh's birthday. Among the heaving body of the crowd, smaller groups hold aloft statues of their deity. The graceful elephant-headed gods are laden with candles, smoking incense sticks and petals as they are carried towards the ocean. The men, coated in pink dye from head to toe, march against the waves, Ganesh held high, until they are out of their depth. Ganesh is then submerged into the water, laid to rest beneath the waves.
Two nights prior to this festival, George and I shook hands with Tom and Dom, our lifelong friends from 'back home', at the airport. Tom has been taking advantage of time off from the RAF to grow the most facial hair he has ever had. Dom has deliberately gone the other way and cut back all his hair to comparisonly minute length. Having not seen each other for some time, it was extraordinary to reunite in a place such as Mumbai.
Now however, the four of us stand soaked and mesmirized. The locals seem as fascinated by us as we do by them and many of them pull out mobile phones to record videos and take pictures... In retaliation, we turn our lenses back on them and soon there is a broadside of photography. My Canon fires away.
A group of brightly painted children drag me over to a shrine and demand pictures. I oblige and show them the images on the camera screen. They squeal and run around in amazement at their own cheeky faces staring back at them. I zoom in for more laughter.
The other three are doing exactly the same thing and eventually we all come back together to compare images. Our cameras go away (despite the 7D being 'splashproof'), because the heavy rain had become torrentual. It made for quite an experience and I hope my videos come out.
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Dom:
Colour, drums, flowers, and figures of Ganesh filled the local streets as we walked the short walk along the prominade. People were dancing, cheering, singing and praying as we weaved our way through the festival goers. Hindu's young and old wanted to touch us, get their photo taken with us and to say hello. For a moment I felt a little like a celebrety but then I came back down to Earth, thinking less about how I felt and more about what I had been so lucky to stumble upon. Whether it was luck or good judgement the travelling film makers had managed to decend upon mumbai on the best weekend possible.
It's quite funny, the previous day I gazed into these unknown streets with worry and pity. Today however, all I see is love and a close knit community. The festival starts in each individual community , a single statue is constructed at its heart wherupon local people come to worship Ganesh in the days leading up to the drowning. On the day a flowered truck with masses of spectators tugs Ganesh through the streets. Celebrations carry on throughout the day before eventually making their way to chowpatty beach where high profile citizens carry the shrine into the sea. Bhangra music is blasted through the veins of the locals, acting as their alcohol, fueling them to dance the night away.
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George:
Ganesh's were drowning left right and centre as the horizontal, driving, pitiless rain sent wave after wave of over excited elephants straight into the brown frothing surf. Nobody seemed overly worried about getting wet but the view from the top of the beach was one of a sea of ineffective umbrellas. Families standing and watching for their own statues among the thousands present, all eyes turned seawards.
The rain was a pity for us because it meant that picture taking was rather limited. The cameras only appeared for the short spells where the torential downpour became slightly less torential, a few minutes at most. But when pictures fail, a soaking to the skin can really help to make you feel involved. Especially when people around you are so clearly not bothered as to be periodically flinging themselves into the sea.
Two large statues, several men tall, lumber past us on wheels not meant for sand. Three men stand on each daubed head to toe in red paint, desperately shouting above the wind to part the crowd in front, shouting directions to the men below on where to move the statues. Families stumble out of the way as the giant many handed elephants make their way to the water. Just like real elephants, no-one wants to get in their way but even so it takes a good 20 minutes for the first to reach the waters edge, and another 20 before they start to be submerged. We decide that if we wait any longer we might drown ourselves before Ganesh does and so it might be prudent to beat a retreat to dry land. As we turn to leave I'm struck by an amazing pun involving swimming trunks, but everyone looks a bit too soaked to care right now. Maybe later.
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Tom:
We finally made it back up the beach, having to turn down invitations to start dancing so we could find a place to eat. We found a place in quick time, Cafe Mondegra, a cheap place with western style decor and an old Gerry Rafferty hit playing out on the american style jukebox. The cricket score on the TV. Unfortunately no beer to swill down with our dinner of roast chicken today. Mumbai was a dry city because today was a holy day.
Filled up, and with a newly purchased, and what turned out to be vital, umbrella in hand we made it to the regal cinema to see what the Indian population passed off as entertainment. But as the two main titles were "Little Rascals" (Picture: Two Indian midgets), and "The Dirty Picture", we decided that the foyer of the picture theatre was far enough.
So for the third time in a day we jumped in a taxi to take us back through the crowds of ever massing people and trucks packed with happy worshipers, people even sitting on the rooves in the rain to get the best view of the occasion. By 7:30 the sun was going down and the beautiful Kamara Henru garden was the best place to witness the epic light show over Chowpatty beach.
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Ewan:
Expecting baskets and other garden things of the hanging variety, (Kamara Henru litteraly translates as the Hanging Gardens), we were instead greeted by a very picturesque maze of pathways, defined by petit shrubbery and rose arches. By this point it was indeed getting quite dark and several fruit bats had taken to the skies above us, their huge black wings standing out from the grey clouds. They weren't the only things in the sky however. Huge mobs of hawks soared above the gardens in a dazzling aerial melee. The smaller bats made sure to weave out of reach of the hawks... just in case.
If this wasn't spectacular enough, then the view from the hilltop certainly was. I cannot tell you exactly how many people there were, but it must have been well into the hundreds of thousands. We all stared down to the beach where we stood earlier that afternoon, now nightime, onto the bulging swarm of humans below. It was like a helecopter shot of the crowds at Glastonbury Festival, only this streched for the entire length of beach.
Dom: "The night had decended but the party had only just begun. As we gazed through the opening in the trees down onto the beach, millions of people flooded the skyline. A shockwave hit all four of us at once. Utterly amazing."
Tom: "Huge bats darted over the opening onto the scene below. Thousands littered the sea, spotlights sweeping across the crowds. Loud bangs followed as fireworks lit up the sky."
George: "Festival doesn't quite cover it. The sheer number of people down below is unbelieveable. I've seen the crowds that turn out in Vatican City to hear the Pope speak and even they don't compare to this. Everywhere is full. The roads, buildings, beaches; everywhere. Everywhere is absolutely and completely full to bursting and nobody cares. The city is as alive as I imagine it ever could be."
We absorbed for a good half hour more before deciding to surrender the fantastic view to the night. We decended back down the hill, dodging the many celebrating locals as we went.
Back on the train, rocking back and forth, we reflected on the sights, sounds and smells of the day. All of us conceded, with big grins on our faces, that Mumbai had just laid down a trump card. Mumbai and it's people had shown their true colours. We all agreed that had it not been for Ganesh's brithday, we'd all leave Mumbai lacking a single good word to say about it. Now, we'll remember it for the rest of our lives, not just for the bad things, but for the amazing people that shine out of the depression.
George:
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