Some of the reasons why I love Bombay
Took up this tag from Broom, but have extended the list from just ten things. Of course there are many more things I could write about, I just wrote what came to mind, in no particular order. I may keep adding to it:
1. Marine Drive
2. Bhel Puri
3. Banganga
4. Carter Road
5. Linking Road chappal shops
6. Worli Sea Face
7. Strand Book Stall. Taken here as a treat every month by my mother when I was small.
8. Jehangir Art Gallery and the Samovar Cafe there
9. National Gallery of Modern Art
10. The restaurants. Mahesh Lunch Home, Trishna, Apurva, Swati Snacks…
11. Mohammad Ali Road during Eid
12. Ganesh Chaturthi, tuneless music and all
13. The Hindustani music concerts
14. The fact that so many people from all over India live there, and you hear so many languages and so many different cuisines are available. The fact that Bombay has Parsis in such large numbers.
15. The humid weather. I LOVE it. I start glowing in Bombay’s sticky heat…not just with sweat but happiness.
16. The way the city never sleeps and the way you can go out at any time of the night to get a bite to eat and enjoy the sea breeze and convivial atmosphere. This is a special night time buzz that I have yet to feel in any other Indian city.
17. The taxis (not at the airport and at the railway stations). Cheap and not out to fleece you.
18. The sea. The sea. The sea
19. Amarsons
20. Breach Candy
21. Crossword at Hughes Road
22. The doctors. Amongst the best in the world
23. Breach Candy Hospital
24. KEM Hospital
25. The anonymity the city allows you
26. The sense of enterprise
27.The cobbler who has a shop under our building
28. The men in Bombay, of all classes, can be a problem, especially in the way they treat women, as in all Indian cities. But there are others. I applaud especially the Bombay “working class” man. The hundreds and hundreds of honest taxi drivers. The watchman who walked me home, as I cried, shielding me from the rain from where I had been wrongly dropped off by someone else’s parent when I was a child. Those guys who just turn up from nowhere and help you when your car is sliding down a hill. The various “Man Fridays” that upper middle class families in Bombay depend on, the “drivers,” peons, secretaries, who perform all kinds of tasks for various households and businesses. The men who shine shoes, cook dosas on the road, carry your suitcase, bring groceries to your doorstep…
25. Dadar flower market
26. Mahalakshmi temple
27. The Haji Ali Dargah
28. The Taj
29. Coconut water from the Malayali coconut seller on our street
30. Our local paanwalla
31. My friends
32. The women, fearless, outspoken, working and out on the streets long before women of other cities.
33. The NCPA
34. The Race Course
35. The rocks, on which couples in love from all classes congregate at low tide.
36. The fact that it was home for so long
37. VT (hate the name CST)
38. Bombay Central
39. King’s Circle, Matunga
The tiffin box delivery people.
Haji Ali Juice Center
Cafe Samovar Rolls
The walk to the Haji Ali shrine with the strong breeze in the face.
Gujarati thalis at various places
Mahalakshmi temple
Siddhivinayak temple
Mumbai people who are not interested in showing off
Mild winters
Navy nagar
Loved your list. I lived at Juhu and my fondest memories of Bombay are going for morning jog/walks at the beach with my Dad..even though I hated waking up early..where my reward for making it through the walk would be delicious nariyal pani at the beach with the malai…yum!
By the way..I agree with you on the “hate CST” part!
The queues!!! Not standing in them, but the the fact that they came up all over the place..in front of lifts, bus stops…call me wierd but I found it charming and only wondered why the same discipline wasnt there in stations!!
What an awesome list!