When I told friends that I was going to India for an extended period, there were several who expressed interest in visiting, but only a few who I knew that, without a doubt, would be making the trek. My friend Jes and I met in Denver in Spring 2005 when she joined our infamous Friends of the Poudre softball team. Since our days on the ball field we’ve become great friends, and I was very excited to have her come visit.
Jes arrived on Saturday night, and we navigated to the Sea View Hotel in Juhu after a, shall we say, interesting taxi ride from the airport. Happy to have arrived in one piece, we spent a small amount of time admiring the zebra-striped pillows on our furniture before my friend Chirag and his friend Hardik picked us up to go have a few drinks at H2O bar in Bandra. Jet lag be damned, Jes was ready to brave the Mumbai night life! We spent that evening catching up with a few drinks, and enjoyed a stroll on the beach the next morning and a great breakfast at a café nearby while we planned our day.
We ended up deciding to take a tour of the Dharvi Slum, which if I remember right is the largest slum in India (maybe the world--not sure here), and where some of the film Slumdog Millionaire was shot. First though, we made stops at Fab India so Jes could buy some Indian threads, and stopped at Tewari Brothers so she could try her first ever Samosa (which she loved).
Soon after we met with our young tour leader and one other tourist from Sweden and began the 2 ½ hour tour of Dharvi (this is the short version--a longer tour is nearly 5 hours; we were not allowed to take photos while on the tour, but they did email me some a few weeks later). The tour was extremely interesting, as the slum is an epicenter for all sorts of commerce--recycling centers, bakeries, tailors, etc.About 30 minutes into our tour, our guide excused himself to go get a friend who was late meeting us, so the three of us waited in a large warehouse, where a man brought us (in a plastic baggie) the hottest chai I have had since arriving. I assured Jes it was safe for her to drink--anything that hot would have killed any and all bacteria--but if you would have asked me a year ago if I would have been sitting on a stool in a warehouse in the Dharvi slum drinking chai with guys who worked there, I would have thought you mad. Better yet, if you would have asked Jes 24 hours earlier if she would be doing that, she would have REALLY thought you were crazy.
Our tour resumed and we weaved our way through narrow alleys and around goats and children, checked out pottery businesses, passed by butcher shops, schools, and yes, even a drunk man lying in the street (every town has one, Jes had remarked). Dharvi really is a city within the vast city that is Mumbai; we were both very glad we took the tour. Also, proceeds go towards an NGO run in the slum. The tour company has permission to lead the tours (and it is recommended by Lonely Planet, for those curious) and I felt it was a respectful and educational way to see daily life there; highly recommended if you have the chance/interest.
Notice that we are GLOWING, not sweating…
My favorite sign in the Reality Tours office We made our way through crazy Sunday evening traffic, stopping at the Shoe Stalls on Linking Road (again, near that 3-story KFC), but this proved to be a bit straining as it was packed, and we were not quite up for bargaining. Instead, we headed back, and dinner that night was at a very tasty restaurant called Mahesh Lunch Home, where we had a very large crab (note our waiter modeling it below) and way too much seafood. After suitably stuffing ourselves, we made our way to Vie Lounge for a few drinks. A bit posh for our style (and our price ranges, drinks in Mumbai are big-city prices at a lot of places) we called it a night after that, as the next morning we were flying to Goa.
No comments:
Post a Comment