Hannah BW

Mumbai: Day 32

Sorry for the lengthy absence. It has been full of technical difficulties of all sorts. I am feeling better now, knock wood. Also, there are some photos up on Facebook (not all of them, yet). Do they look super-dark to you? They do to me. Maybe that's just this computer. Let me know, not that there's anything I can do about it right now. I even put captions so you know what you're looking at!

Saturday was by far the best day I've had since I got here. I went on this lengthy walk, and here, I made a map of it for you: link. I started around 10:30, by going up to Kalbadevi, where I saw lots of temples, and took some pictures of cows hanging around on the street. By noon I was near Mohammed Ali Rd, the epicenter of a Muslim neighborhood, listening to the call to prayer. On Mohammed Ali Rd I saw a taxi back over a crippled man sitting behind it, which was terrifying. Luckily the man was alright, but I was pretty shaken up (I bet he was, too). Then a different man, in the market area, yelled at me because he didn't want to have his picture taken, and I was like, "What? I didn't want to take your picture anyway, old man," and I left and wandered up a street that was full of tile and over to Chor Bazaar, also known as Thieves' Market. From there I walked all the way over to the bottom of Tardeo, where I stopped for two samosas, and then to Kemp's Corner, where I perused the cookbooks in Crossword Bookstore for a long while. Then I ate an ice cream cone (double scoop: mango and tender coconut) as I walked past the embassies on Nepean Sea Road in Malabar Hill, the swankiest neighborhood in South Mumbai. I was looking for Banganga Tank in Walkeshwar, but I didn't have a map, so I just followed my nose. Then a man asked me if I was trying to find Banganga Tank, so I said yes, and I followed him, and he showed me where it was. Then I said I wanted to take the bus back to Colaba. So he asked me, "Hotel timepass*?" To which I said "No, sorry." When I got home and took off my kurta I realized that I had a tiny, v-shaped sunburn where the neck opening was. Total distance: 7.03 mi (thanks, Google!).

*Here, "timepass" is a word that basically means "something you do to kill time." The other day, Pratidnya didi told the kids in the morning session, "When you come in, don't do timepass. Read the charts on the wall." There are lots of syntactical oddities in Indian English that I may or may not be adopting. I do know that my own grammar is not what it used to be. Anyway, I also knew what the man in Walkeshwar was getting at, and we were not on the same page. But Banganga Tank was very cool.

Okay, other things. I only have a week and a half left of work! What will I do without the rigmarole? Sit down. Stand up. Sit up straight. Listen to didi. Raise your hand. Raise your hand. Akash, sit down. Madhu, raise your hand next time. Akash, I said sit down. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Why do I still hear people talking? If mangoes cost fifteen rupees per kilo, and Praveen buys two kilos, should we add or multiply? What is a mixed number? Is seven odd or even? How do we spell photosynthesis? What do plants need to grow? Raise your hand. Sonali, don't hit her. Sanjivani, wake up. Gaurav, stop dancing. Where's your homework? No field trip for you, then.

Truthfully, this is all very entertaining, but completely exhausting. Kajal didi wants me to stay longer, and I considered it, but I have this one-way ticket to Agra and a bunch of things to see. In that vein, I have a question! If you had three weeks to travel in India, which would you want to see? The Taj Mahal doesn't count, because that's a given. And since I'm going to Agra anyway, I've reconciled myself to not seeing the south this time around. Anyway:

a. deserts
b. mountains
c. the closing of the border with Pakistan (bet you can guess how I feel about this one)
d. cities
e. ashrams
f. ancient caves
g. none of the above
h. all of the above

Finally, good news: I ate another veg cheese toast today, and no sign of physical distress.

Labels: banganga, mahatma, perverts, trains

posted by HBW @ 7:38 AM