Monday, May 2, 2011

Mumbai!

Definition: A big Indian Metropolis which is so filled with buildings, people, cars and pollution that there isnt any space for everyone but still there's space for everyone and everything!
If thats too complicated, please read on:
Ask any Delhiite ( or similar other "unmumbai" city person) and he will say that Mumbai is a living hell, an urban disaster! Ask any long standing( 3 years down in the city) Mumbaiite and he will swear by the city!

Some characteristics about the city:

1) Traffic: This is a constant with the city and anything from interviews to marriages are pardoned if you give stuck in traffic as an excuse!

2) Road construction: Another constant.Ever since eternity, Mumbai's roads are getting made, so that there's lots of earth and filth everywhere next to swanky cars honking angrily away at other cars or pedestrians or just nothing!

3) Rains:A Constant every monsoon. One shower and you get stuck for hours and may even be floating for hours of course in murky water with other garbage spillages! Another thing which is heavily pardoned in the city!

4) People: Wherever you go you see people. Hoards of them.Constantly!

5) House rents/ prices: Unbelievably high prices for pitifully small spaces. If you have a two bedroom house you are a king and if you have a balcony to add, you are an emperor!

6) Crowded local trains: So crowded that if you get to sit, its fishy!

If Mumbai is so bad, why do people come here?
Why Mumbai ticks:

1) Its an "objective oriented" city. People are moving from one place to another for some work. Noone has time to waste. Being a very big city travelling is a huge thing and getting to and back from wherever you wanted to go is the most focused thing. So ordinary people do not have time to accomodate other things into their agenda!

2) People actually make queues here for everything!

3) There is order in the chaos, method in the madness.

4) People are not too nosey, for the sheer lack of time. They never get around to finishing their own jobs, so there isnt time to delve into someone else's problems.

5) People are exhausted most of the time by the constant traffic and long travel and bad roads, so much so that they have no time to focus on being really bad.

6) Cosmopolitan crowd: General tendency and exposure to a mixed crowd makes people more acceptable towards cultures.

Peculiarities about Mumbai:

1) Vada Pau
2) Misal pau
3) Long distances perceived to be "baju mein" or nearby.
4) Local trains
5) Filth
6) Ditches
7) Drains with clogged water
8) Drains with clogged water near swanky upmarket looking complexes
9) People completely ok with living in beautiful apartments overlooking or neighboured with dirty slums.
10) People ok with dipping their feet into dirty, murky rain water with loads of curious looking stuff floating in it.
11) People asking you " you aren't from Mumbai?" if there's something alien about you, but then accomodating you as you are nevertheless!
12) Absolutely no parking space
13) Policemen glaring at you like you asked something strange if you ask where to park your car!
14) Buildings, buildings, buildings!
15) Everyone in a "train / bus catching" mood. 6:15 local, 6: 15 dadar etc.
16) Mumbaiites calling themselves Mumbaiites and proud of it!
17) Clueless about the workings of other cities in India
18) Benchmarks, jokes, problems are all Mumbai oriented unlike other cities where discussions are more globalised!
19) Autorickshaws
20) Cabs (good old  kala-pilas i.e. black and yellow fiats, cool cabs etc etc)

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