Our time in India is coming to a close. We have been here for over a month now and just finished a quick trip up the southern west coast. Last stop is Mumbai (formerly Bombay in the British world).
We get into Mumbai prettty late at night. Our flight from Kochi was delayed. This really sucks because the central tourist area of Mumbai is almost an hour's drive from the airport. We stumble off the plane into the Mumbai airport already tired from having to sit around in the Kochi airport for hours. Mumbai is nuts. Baggage claim is a mass crowd of people, even though it is after midnight. Some dudes get in a heated argument in baggage claim; a crowd is gathered. There is much shouting. Not a warm welcome to Mumbai.
Chrissy and I had spent the previous couple of days trying to book a hotel in Mumbai. We heard that this was necessary because the town fills up. We called a few guest houses but couldn't reach someone that spoke English. Having given up, we are now in the airport late at night without a hotel reservation. There is a hotel desk in the bag claim area but the guy only has really expensive rooms to offer. He tells us that most places are booked and only expensive ones are left. I ask him to do us a favor and call one of the budget places that we can't communicate with (doubting he will do this because he gets paid to book the pricey places). The dude is pretty cool and calls a couple of places before finding us a room and making a reservation. We collect our bags and head out to catch a taxi. More craziness. There is a queue for taxis that is a mile long. Luckily, it moves really quick because the process is facilitated by policemen. The taxi is barely able to stop and you have to jump in with the police guys hurrying you along.
Our taxi driver didn't speak any English, not that we were expecting him to. We did, however, expect him to be able to find our hotel which we could show him the name of and point on a map. This doesn't help at all. We get to the correct part of town and then he just starts driving around. Every couple of blocks he pulls a u-turn, stops, and asks someone directions. I can understand not being able to find an individual hotel, but the particular hotel we were looking for was right next to one of the biggest tourist stops in the city. This is where we had asked to be taken. Anyway, after about an hour of driving around, we get to the hotel. Then comes the discussion of how much this crazy ride should cost. I had been monitoring the meter and was ok with paying what it indicated was the fare, even with the useless driving around. Then this guy tells me that the number on the meter isn't the fare, you pay that fare times a multiple. Yeah, a multiple. So this turns out to be a very expensive ride. Much more than what it should have been (at least double, according to what our buddy at the airport had quoted before we left). I tell this guy that I am going to ask the our hotel if it is the correct fare. He is getting angry, but follows Chrissy and I up some stairs to our hotel.
*******While Bill is arguing, this is what is going on with Chrissy*******
While Bill is up front arguing with the cabbie, I am standing at the back of the cab having just removed our backpacks. It's 3 a.m. and I am really tired and I am quite nervous that we are standing on a deserted street with our non-trusty cab driver and a group of men headed our way. As is common in India, these guys approach the vehicle and have no qualms about staring at us. Finally, one starts talking to me. The conversation goes a bit like this:
Him: Hey, where are you from?
Me: Hi. America.
Him: I work around here.
Me: That's cool. What do you do?
Him: I sell drugs - cocaine, pot, lots of stuff.
Me, not knowing quite how to react, I give him a "thumbs up" and say: Awesome!
There's not much that you can really follow up on after that. I have to say, however, that I was impressed with this guy. He didn't give a hard sell at all, just laid out the facts. I guess you're either into it (drugs) or not and we aren't, so our conversation tapered off. To this guy's further credit, we passed him on the street two days later and he walked over and shook my hand.
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The hotel people of course say its a bogus fare, we argue some more. I'll give him an "A" for persistance. I start thinking about how much this is really costing, in terms of dollars, not rupees. Chrissy and I have been traveling for over twelve hours at this point. I give in and pay the little punk. Chrissy tells him that he has just earned some bad karma.
The next morning we head out to do some sight seeing in Mumbai. Our hotel is a short walk to the Gateway to India.
The Gateway to India
The gateway is Mumbai's most famous monument. The arch was built to commemorate the visit of King George V and Queen Mary. Unfortunately, they must have had a bad project manager because it was finished years after the actual visit. It was later the site where the British handed over India back to the Indians. We spent all of about five minutes around the arch because you are constantly harrassed by touts that want to sell you a boat tour. We bugged out and headed across the street to the Taj Mahal hotel. This is a very plush hotel that was built by a rich Persian guy after he was denied entry into one of the British hotels. We walked around for a bit and marveled at the fancy resturants and the huge English bookstore. Too bad a magazine was like twenty-five bucks.
Next stop was the Victoria Train Terminus. This train station is famous for it's architecture and has been designated as a World Heritage site. We walked around the station for a bit, then caught a taxi back to our hotel.
The Victoria train terminus
Like I mentioned earlier, we are staying right near one of Mumbai's bigest tourist spots. This happens to be a resturant called Leopold's. Leopold's is famous for all the sketchy dealings that went on there in the 80's. Drug deals, prostitutes, etc. Very spicy stuff for India. This was all made famous by a book called "Shantaram". Chrissy is reading it. I haven't had the chance because she is taking forever to finish it. Anyway, Leopold's is now just a popular resturant/pub. They have good food and a large beer and wine selection, something else that is hard to find in India. Chrissy and I eat a late lunch there and pound down some beers.
We do a bit of shopping after lunch and buy tickets for a movie that evening. Then we head back to the hotel to rest and clean up prior to our night out. On the way a man stops me and inquires if I would like to be in a Bollywood movie. Chrissy and I had been hoping to score our way into a Bollywood film. For those of you not in the know, here is the low down on Bollywood:
- largest film industry in the world in terms of number of films produced, and maybe also the number of tickets sold
- Bollywood budgets are usually modest by Hollywood standards
- Bollywood films are almost always musicals
I
The one and only, Bollywood.
So this guy needs white dudes to act as Roman Soldiers in some big film. I sign up to meet a van the next morning that will take me to the set for my film debut. Unfortunately he doesn't need any women. Chrissy is kind of bummed. After changing and a quick nap we go to the theater. The movie that we are seeing isn't a Bollywood movie, but it is about India (we flaked on seeing a Bollywood film because they are like four hours long and we wanted to see some of the Mumbai nightlife afterwards). The movie was called "Namesake" and was really good, despite having the main character be the star of Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle. It helped that we were in India at the time, but I think it would be a solid movie even if you didn't know a thing about India. Highly Recommended.
After the movie we go next door to a bar. Mumbai is famous for its nightlife, which is quite the scene by Indian standards. It lived up to the hype. Chrissy and I were in this place for hours. We got fairly juiced up with a guy from England and an Indian dude that was also a Bollywood recruiter. The recruiter guy actually had a commerical that Chrissy and I could be in together the next day, but I had already committed to the soldier thing so we politely declined.
The next morning we were moving a bit slow due to the festivities from the previous evening. We get our stuff all packed up and then go downstairs to meet the Bollywood people. We are supposed to meet them in front of the McDonalds which is down the street from our hotel.
Here is a shot of the McDonald's menu. No beef.
They aren't there and we wait around for a bit and then I call the guy's cell from a pay phone. He answers and indicates that they are running a bit late but will be by to pick us up in a few minutes. We sit on our bags and wait. We are hauling all of our stuff to the movie set because after the shooting which should last all day, we are going directly to the airport for our flight to Australia. Other westerners are milling about also waiting to be picked up by movie people. Our guy eventually shows up and tells us that the shoot that day has been canceled. Big bummer. Now what? We have all our stuff, are hung over, and have no hotel. It is like 8AM. Another movie recruiter guy is in the street in front of us picking up some girls for a different movie shoot. I walk up and ask him if he needs anyone else. He doesn't but says that we can come along just to see the set. Cool. Chrissy and I pile into the back of this car and soon are being driven through Mumbai off to a movie set of some sort.
We get to the movie set and it looks pretty much like you would expect. Maybe not as glamorous, but like a movie set. Chrissy and the girls with the actual job as extras are put in a womens dressing room while I am situated in a mens room. There are about six other guys lounging around in this place. We kind of sit and stare at each other for a while and then start chit chatting. They are all actors. This particular set is for the Indian version of a soap opera. They called it a "daily". These guys are full of good advice, like where to get the best hookers in Mumbai, etc. Eventually they go off to do their shoot. I get Chrissy and we follow to watch. I am starting to get the feeling that the movie/tv business includes a lot of waiting around. We get to the set and just sit around some more. Chrissy and I eventually wander back outside to watch the girls that we came with do their shoot. It was pretty crazy actually, we we able to go where ever we wanted in this place and their were at least two independent sets that I could see.
We watch the filming of the daily with the girls for a couple of hours. I never did figure out the story. These girls were Swedish and we supposed to be the jailors of some Indian girls for some reason.
Our Swedish friends on the set, and another picture of the action
It is really hot outside and after a few hours Chrissy and I are ready to leave. Our flight is not for many hours but we are thinking we'll just hang out at the airport. Maybe see if we can get into one of the first class lounges. We take a rickshaw over to the airport which is actually close to the movie set. We lug all of our stuff up to the terminal only to be greeted by a gun toting soldier that won't let us inside. You can't enter the airport more than three hours prior to your flight. Who has ever heard of a setup like that? So now we are stuck with all of our crap and no where to go. We go to another door and tell a small lie to the soldier there about our flight and he lets us in so that we can eat at the restaurant inside the terminal. The plan is to get something to eat, kill time, and then wander through the terminal to where our flight is and hang out. This plan doesn't work out. We eat a crazy expensive meal and then find out that each section of the terminal is closed off from the others. We are now in the airport, but not in the section for our airline. These guys actually ID you on your way out of the airport. We are kind of nervious, but after we finish eating just sort of wander out back past the soldier. He stops us and we play dumb saying we went into this terminal by mistake. The dumb tourist act works.
Now what. We still have several hours till hour flight. We take a rickshaw to a mall. It's closed. We take a taxi to another mall. They make us go through metal dectors to get in, there is a crazy level of security. Guards everywhere. We spend the afternoon loitering in the food court. To make matters worse, the ATM in the mall won't take our card. So we are loitering without money in the mall, for hours.
Three hours before our flight is scheduled to leave, we catch a taxi back to the airport. I don't have any money to even pay the guy, so make he drive us to an ATM. It won't take our card either. This is the only time we have had this problem in India. All the ATMs are for local cards only, no international. We end up going to five different ATMs before one works. Meanwhile traffic has stacked up. It takes forever to get to the airport. We finally get there, the security line is crazy long. We have forgotten some Australian visa formalities that must be taken care of at the airport. After waiting all day for this flight, we almost miss it.
It has been a wonderful, wonderful, trip to India. Nevermind our last day. I do think that we will come back. They say you either love or hate India. We think that there is a lot to love.
- Bill