Day 118 (Thu 2 Nov) - Mumbai
Pulled into Mumbai about 6.30am. Dumped our bags in the left luggage office and then went off to search for a cup of tea.
All the places, including McDonalds was shut. Clearly Mumbai likes to wake up in a leisurely fashion.
Walked to the Maiden where we were surprised to see the park teeming with people. There was the usual joggers and walkers but we were not expecting to see loads of kids doing marching drills, about three games of informal cricket going on, the cricket nets all being used with people fully padded up and a woman's football team limbering up. The time was about 7.30am! No wonder all the flaming shops were closed. All the people were out running around the flaming park!
Sat around for a bit then walked up to Leopolds for breakfast. Found an internet cafe where we burnt some CD's and done some surfing. We were feeling a little tired especially since we knew we had to wait until 8.30 this evening to catch our onward train to Kolkata.
Left the cafe and went to the Oberoi hotel at Nariman Point. We both had two glasses of wine each and Jo dealt with her usual club sandwich.
Walked back to the station. It was so hot that we were both gasping for a drink by the time we got there. We found a place that looked promising for a beer but was told that there was no beer today. Sarb asked the doorman if any other place nearby was doing beers. The doorman said that because of a religious festival the whole of Mumbai would be dry today. This was not music to Sarb's ears.
We decided to get a cab to Leopolds but it was heaving; luckily we got to Cafe Mondegar's where we bagged a table. Sarb spotted the sign on the bar saying 'No beer today' and looked crestfallen. Luck was on his side however as the cafe owner saw the anguish in Sarb's eyes and wandered over. After making sure that we were tourists, he even examined Sarb's passport, he decided we were tourists and hence exempt from local rules and customs and served Sarb a beer. Brilliant!
Chilled out for a while and then got a taxi back to the station via McDonalds. Jo abstained but Sarb tucked into a chicken something or other.
Whilst waiting Sarb decided to try a weighing machine. You pop in a rupee and after flashing some lights your weight in kilos is spat out of the machine printed on a bit of card. This looked like fun so Jo had a go. We both examined our weights and not believing the machine went to another where we repeated the experiment. We came up with another two, totally different weights. Deciding that we should find a proper machine we gave up and headed off to our train.
Found our comfy seats and settled in for a long, long journey all the way to Kolkata.
Not surprisingly we slept very, very well.
All the places, including McDonalds was shut. Clearly Mumbai likes to wake up in a leisurely fashion.
Walked to the Maiden where we were surprised to see the park teeming with people. There was the usual joggers and walkers but we were not expecting to see loads of kids doing marching drills, about three games of informal cricket going on, the cricket nets all being used with people fully padded up and a woman's football team limbering up. The time was about 7.30am! No wonder all the flaming shops were closed. All the people were out running around the flaming park!
Sat around for a bit then walked up to Leopolds for breakfast. Found an internet cafe where we burnt some CD's and done some surfing. We were feeling a little tired especially since we knew we had to wait until 8.30 this evening to catch our onward train to Kolkata.
Left the cafe and went to the Oberoi hotel at Nariman Point. We both had two glasses of wine each and Jo dealt with her usual club sandwich.
Walked back to the station. It was so hot that we were both gasping for a drink by the time we got there. We found a place that looked promising for a beer but was told that there was no beer today. Sarb asked the doorman if any other place nearby was doing beers. The doorman said that because of a religious festival the whole of Mumbai would be dry today. This was not music to Sarb's ears.
We decided to get a cab to Leopolds but it was heaving; luckily we got to Cafe Mondegar's where we bagged a table. Sarb spotted the sign on the bar saying 'No beer today' and looked crestfallen. Luck was on his side however as the cafe owner saw the anguish in Sarb's eyes and wandered over. After making sure that we were tourists, he even examined Sarb's passport, he decided we were tourists and hence exempt from local rules and customs and served Sarb a beer. Brilliant!
Chilled out for a while and then got a taxi back to the station via McDonalds. Jo abstained but Sarb tucked into a chicken something or other.
Whilst waiting Sarb decided to try a weighing machine. You pop in a rupee and after flashing some lights your weight in kilos is spat out of the machine printed on a bit of card. This looked like fun so Jo had a go. We both examined our weights and not believing the machine went to another where we repeated the experiment. We came up with another two, totally different weights. Deciding that we should find a proper machine we gave up and headed off to our train.
Found our comfy seats and settled in for a long, long journey all the way to Kolkata.
Not surprisingly we slept very, very well.
posted by Jo and Sarb at
11/02/2006 07:34:00 am
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