I'm not sure when you will get this as HAL ISP will not allow my AOL program to connect again. After several days, as if by magic, it worked again. I hope it will soon.
5167 This is the Victoria Terminus. As you can see it's a blend of styles that defies simple categorization.
5175b This is inside the Crawford Market. Just to the left of the lady in the orange sari you can see the basket of strawberries I could smell as soon as we entered.
5199e This is the spice vendor that was kind enough to let the tourists smell his spices by dipping them up in small metal dishes. He did make several sales.
5199h These are the tourist girls that wanted their picture taken with some blonde members of our group.
5201 This is the Crawford Market building. Definitely British Colonial.
March 11 – At Sea-Indian Ocean. A day to get organized to write about Colombo. It was a nice city and the perfect tune up for Mumbai (nee Bombay). Because as hot, humid, smoggy, crowded and chaotic as Colombo seemed Mumbai will be Colombo raised to another power completely. These next two days are going to be the calm before the storm.
Most of the day was taken over with lectures and activities with the Indian Cultural group that is sailing with us to Mumbai, their home.
March 12 – At Sea-Indian Ocean-Arabian Sea. Another restful day at sea.
As you've probably noticed by not the incompetent internet system that HAL has selected over MTN won't run AOL again and Charter has chosen this time to upgrade it's web site and none of my contacts came over to the new email page. It would cost me about $200 to be online to enter all the contacts again so until AOL works again I'm a mute. I'm not deaf because Outlook can still get my mail they've just made it impossible to send any using it. Maybe it will work again soon. It stopped once before and then started up again. I have never seen such an inconsistent network. The ship's satellite system has always had some connectivity and speed issues but never before has it failed to run AOL when I was connected like it does now. Whoever negotiated this contract with the new provider either didn't know anything about networks or the provider misrepresented the service provided. HAL always emphasizes the 'Excellent' service they provide. Well this Internet service provider is far from excellent. Every hotel, every coffee shop and every network I've ever had to use when traveling has allowed my AOL to connect seamlessly. Not this one. Actually it's disgusting. To top it all off I think I figured out the problem and there's no one here who can do anything about it. I'm not putting this in italics because I want everyone to read it. Cunard's QM2 worked flawlessly on the way over earlier this year but they still have the old MTN provider. I hope Carnival does not force Cunard to accept this bottom feeding provider also. There I feel better but I still can't send any mail.
Our entertainer was Frank King, a comedian. He's a very funny guy but you have to be fluent in colloquial English to get his humor, lots of puns and double meanings. So, after all the non- and marginal English speakers walked out of the room we settled down to have a great time. Of course the high-brow English speakers went with the others. Humor is far beneath their station in life. To be honest if Frank spoke Dutch I'd be leaving the room too.
No AOL connection, two days and counting.
March 13 – Mumbai (Bombay), India. Mumbai is a new port for us so here goes.
Mumbai (Bombay) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is the largest city in India by population. It's the eighth most populous city in the world, with an estimated city population of 18.4 million. If you count the surrounding suburbs it is one of the most populous urban regions in the world. Mumbai is on the west coast of India and great natural harbor. It is also the wealthiest city in India.
Seven islands make up Mumbai and it the past were all fishing communities. Historically the islands were ruled by a series on empires headed by indigenous rulers. The Portuguese got control but the British East India Company was just too strong for the Portuguese to resist. In the middle 1700s they began reclaiming the land between the seven islands, joining them into a single island. This was completed in 1845 and changed the city into an important seaport on the Arabian Sea. The city grew in importantance and in the early 1900 became a center for the Indian independence movement. When India finally gained her independence in 1947 the city was merged wito the Bombay state which was later changed to Maharashtra, which retained Bombay as its capital. The city was renamed Mumbai in 1996. The city is home to India's Hindi (aka Bollywood) and Marathi film and television industry.
The name Mumbai is derived from Mumba or Maha-Amba—the name of the Koli goddess Mumbadevi—and Aai, "mother" in the language of Marathi, the mother tongue of the Kolis and the official language of Maharashtra.
The English and Portuguese struggled to gain majority control over the city but the issue was never settled. Finally both countries were worried about the growing strength of the Dutch in the area and they resolved their conflict with a marriage treaty. In 1661, Charles II of England married Catherine of Braganza, daughter of King John IV of Portugal. The marriage dowry to Charles Ii was the seven islands of Bombay. They gave the islands to the English Empire. In 1668 the Empire leased the islands to the English East India Company for a fee of 10 English Pounds per year.
When the Suez Canal opened in 1869 Bombay became one of the largest seaports on the Arabian Sea. The Bombay Stock Exchange is the oldest stock exchange in Asia. The Railroad Station now called Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus but was the Victoria Terminus when the English built it, is the headquarters of the Central Railway and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Most of the buildings during the British period, such as the Victoria Terminus and Bombay University, were built in Gothic Revival style. Mumbai has the second largest number of Art Deco buildings in the world after Miami, Florida.
Oddly enough they refer to themselves as Mumbaikers, but some still use Bombayite. It's estimated that 62% of the residents live in slums. Even in the largest slum the literacy rate is still 69% That's not bad. The population of the largest slum in Mumbai allows each person only 1 square yard of living space, one of the most densely populated places on earth.
The city is 67.39% Hindus, 18.56% Muslim, 5.22% Buddhists, 3.99% Jains, 4.2% Christians, 0.58% Sikhs, with Parsis (Zoroastrians) and Jews making up the rest of the population. They have a huge illegal immigration problem with people from Bangladesh and the number of those here illegally is not known.
We are going to tour three markets today to get a flavor for the area. On the way to the market we will stop at the Victoria Terminus building It looks like any number of Gothic Revival Buildings you can find from the Victorian period, you just don't expect to find them here. It been renamed the Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus and that's the first and last of the renamed things for which I will include the new Indian name. They're just too long. It was the pièce de résistance of the Raj. It's got stained glass windows, flying buttresses, carved stone friezes and several domes. It could just as easily have been a church except that it's much wider than it is long to accommodate all the rail lines that end here. There's a fairly large niche right below the clock on the central tower. It used to hold a statue of Queen Victoria but the British took it with them when they left. Hmmm. Maybe we should call people who take back a gift British givers rather than Indian givers. If you didn't have that as slang when you were kids, just forget I mentioned it.
We are starting in the most famous and historic Crawford Market. It's in an English building from the colonial period and has been renamed to a long unspellable Indian name that, as I promised, I will not include. Inside the market did not appear to be too different from others we've been to, it you don't count all the ladies in saris. When we walked in I smelled an almost overpowering scent of strawberries. All that smell was coming from a small, about 2 feet across, shallow basket filled to the brim with an orderly array of bright red strawberries. I hadn't experienced an aroma that strong from strawberries since I used to pick the tiny wild ones that grew in one of the fields on my grandmother's farm. They were tiny, usually not much bigger than the fingernail on your ring finger, but they had a powerful aroma and a burst of strawberry flavor when you ate one. To be totally honest the fruit looked much better than you find in the US in general.
There were some melons or pumpkins I was not familiar with. They look a bit like what the Japanese call winter melon but these were orange with green segment stripes. They have those huge mangoes that you sometimes fine Mexicans selling out of the back of pickups on the street in LA. Our guide said that mango is the national fruit of India, not officially but in her opinion. She said that since the Israelis came to India and showed them how to grow mangos they produce huge but very sweet and flavorful fruit. From the smell of them, I believe her.
We rounded a corner and suddenly my perspective on the Crawford Market changed. I have rarely seen a pet section in the middle of a produce market. They had parakeets, canaries, cats, dogs, rabbits, chickens, ducks and geese for sale. Our guide told us that they were pets and the stores did sell a lot of pet paraphernalia so that may be true. The chickens were all peeps and the ducks were being sold in breeding pairs. I was a little too hasty in my thinking. The pet section signaled the end of the produce and fruit and, after the pets, the transition to cosmetics, beauty supplies, toys, linens, wholesale cloth, tailors and clothing. After that came the spice section. The aroma there was a blend of so many spices it was a bit overwhelming. We stopped at one vendor who had his entire shop lined with large jars of spices. He would take a scoopful and let you smell anything you asked about. Several people bought different types of curry.
After the spices we passed dried fruit and nuts, the dates looked great. Then we were back into the fruit and vegetable section again as we exited the market about 20 down from where we entered. We had walked in a very large U to get back to the front of the market where our bus was located. As we stepped onto the street a pair of girls/women probably in their late 20s approached a couple that was traveling with us and wanted to take their picture. They were surprised but agreed to pose with one girl and then the other. As they left the guide explained that they were tourists, probably from Yemen or somewhere without much western contact. The couple they had asked to pose were very white, blonde and blue eyed. This was an oddity to them and they wanted to record the event to show at home, much like we do with the locals when we travel. It was a bit fun to see the tables turned for a change. As it turned out it was not time to board the bus. We are walking across the busiest intersection I've seen in a long time to get to the Zaveri Bazaar.
This is a whole different type of shopping. The bazaar is a maze of small streets lined with shops. There are shops on the sidewalk and shops in a regular store. Our guide told us that the not so real products are sold on the street and the real thing is sold in the stores and that the prices reflect that fact. Getting around the Crawford Market was a bit tricky but this place is mobbed. The little street was wall-to-wall people. Through this mass of humanity you had people trying to drive motorbikes and small cars. I should have mentioned it before but I owe an apology to the previous Indian cities we visited. Mumbai is the capital of horn honking. Not a second goes by when you don't hear at least a horn if not 20-30 of them sounding at once. The din of horns is so constant and loud that I'm not sure what any of it accomplishes. Well here in the bazaar the horn honking is blocks away except when one of the vehicles mentioned is trying to get through the people. They beep but no one seems to mind. Neither does anyone seem in a particular hurry to let them through. I have a picture of the street that shows a motorbike that's only about 2 feet in front of me and all you can see in the picture is half of the handlebars and a rear view mirror. I can tell you from memory that it had two men on it and its horn was sounding nonstop. I wonder where he thought all the people were going to go.
Many of the stores in the bazaar sell jewelry, but then you turn a corner and you're walking down a narrow lane of nothing but tailors. Some make men's clothes and some make women's. I didn't see any shop that made both. Then just as suddenly you are back on one of the bazaar's main lanes with an entire new crush of people.
We stopped at an interesting vendor. He set up a small table, about card table size, and it's covered with small bowls and bottles of various ingredients. He's an offering compounder. You tell him what you are celebrating or what need you have and he takes out leaf and begins to mix several of his ingredients on it. Some he shakes out of containers, some are pastes that he smears on the leaf and some are larger pieces that he drizzles in the leaf. When he's got the formula right for your needs he either rolls up the leaf like a cigarette or folds it into a little package. Apparently you burn the mixture at a temple and it signals your need as the smoke rises and your need is met. I'm pretty sure I've simplified that but it's what I took from the whole experience.
The very last vendor as you leave the bazaar sells very pretty artificial flowers. After that you are back in the square facing the Crawford Market. Once again you weed you way through the snarl of engines and the beeping horns across the street to the bus. While I was waiting to get aboard a small motorcycle pulled up with a father driving and three girls in their school uniforms behind him. Next to him was a woman on a motor scooter with two girls in the same uniform behind her. I waved at them and the girls shyly waved back. They must have said something because dad looked over with a smile on his face and gave the victory sign, or peace sign, who knows these days. I barely had time to get my camera turned on before they were moving forward. Not sure if the man and woman were connected or just happened to be together on the road.
It was at this point that I noticed the 'Silence Zone' sign. This phrase was written in English, Hindi and Tamil and featured a trumpet with the universal red circle and slash around it. The message was clear and clearly being ignored. I zoomed in of the sigh and shot 13 seconds of video. There is hardly a quarter of a second on that video without the sound of a horn beeping. I can't help but assume that this particular law is never enforced because absolutely no one abides by it. After a couple of hours this constant din of horns starts to get deep into your emotions and I personally started thinking about life in the Air Force where in most cases the din of aircraft and other noises was your constant companion. Except for the thump-thump of a Huey helicopter moving at high speed that's the only sound that has had that effect on me.
Back on our bus we started across town and as we passed a park I saw that there was a cricket game underway. Since we were going to yet another market, this time with some free time to shop, I almost asked the guide to have the driver stop so I could get off. I'm really not sure why, but I love cricket. Maybe if I could see it all the time it would get old but I so rarely have a chance to watch it that I appreciate it when I can. The cricket World Cup is on right now and we should be able to pick it up as India is cricket crazy, but the TV channels on board do not have it.
On our way to the Colaba Causeway for shopping we passed quite a few monuments with statues and sad to day I don't know who any of them were. One was particularly interesting in that on the pedestal below the statue there was a rifle (oddly it looked exactly like an US M-14) and an old style plow, still used in many places in rice paddies. I asked our guide about it and she told me the man's name (it was too long and complicated for me to catch it) and she said his motto was that every nation to survive needed farmers and an army. I'm pretty sure the founding fathers of the USA would strongly agree with that. They might have added that a professional army was not enough and that the population needed to be armed as well.
Historical Note: That's why they added the 2nd Amendment to the US Constitution directly after the 1st. This is not a chance placement. We have all seen what has happen around the world in countries where the only people armed are the military and the police. To think that it could not happen in the USA is to have your head completely and firmly in the sand. (I'll bet you thought I was heading toward a different place entirely.) Don't get distracted by the mention of a militia. Any competent grammarian will tell you that the militia clause is subordinate to the main sentence that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. These gentlemen had just come out of a costly war for their independence fought mainly at the start by private firearms in the hands of farmers and shopkeepers, not professional soldiers. The professional soldiers were all on the other side. And they were not talking about arms for 'sporting purposes'. This is not the freedom to hunt amendment; it's all about the ability to insure that the 1st amendment remains available and cannot be easily abolished by the government by force as the British did to the colonies and has happened around the world a multitude of times since. After all the 1st amendment limits the power of the government to interfere with free speech and the practice of religion. As our current president has so clearly demonstrated, the Executive Branch often ignores these limitations of its power. It must be terribly embarrassing to a former teacher of Constitutional law when an Executive Order he signed and his Chief Law Enforcement Officer defended is overturned by the Supreme Court on a vote of 9-0. Even the most liberal judge on the Supreme Court saw his action as a violation of the 1st Amendment. Unanimous votes are very rare on political issues, but this time they all agreed that what he had done was a violation of the Constitution. In the end it's up to the populace in general to insure that the government stays within in its proper bounds but it's nice to see that people of all political persuasions can set aside their own politics and rally around the truth.
Well, that was quite a departure from travel. Sorry! Some issues are just so clear that the media's distortions are extremely frustrating to me.
As we drove to the Causeway we passed the Gate of India (more about that tomorrow) and the Taj Hotel, a very posh British colonial period establishment. As we drove along the waterfront we saw horse drawn carriages for hire. This in itself is not that unusual. All over the world, New York, Brussels, etc., you can find carriage rides. The difference is the carriages themselves. In most cases they are silver and very ornate; they have a Thai style umbrella over the passenger's seat and have colorful arrangements of artificial flowers at the front corners, the ends of the driver's seat, the ends of the passenger's seat, at the top of the back of the passenger's seat and the back corners of the carriage. Most also have an arrangement on the very back of the carriage. They are a splendid representation of Indian style. Much like Hindu temples, colorful and packed with flamboyant decorations.
It's the end of the workday for office workers and the busses are jammed with people who are headed home. They have London style double-decker busses here and the rear entrance has people hanging on with parts of them outside the bus. Safety is not a huge concern here apparently.
Diana and I walked up and down the shopping street. I think she bought some very colorful bracelets for a few dollars. I decided I needed something to drink so we headed into the Piccadilly Restaurant. I wanted a snack too so I ordered some Homous. From its description I assumed would be Humus. I was correct. It came with pita bread for dipping. Pita was also called something else but I forget what it was. In looking at the menu it turns out that the Piccadilly is a Lebanese/Iranian restaurant. I guess my confusion was because Piccadilly is a British name and since Indian is the most common cuisine in Britain I expected it to be English or Indian. I guess you can't tell a restaurant by its sign. The homous was good, garlicky and fragrant with cardamom. I was a little disappointed that there were no tables downstairs as although it was hot there was a little breeze coming through. The owner signaled us to go upstairs and I was worried it would be hot. Actually, the upstairs is sealed off from the stairwell by a glass door and it's air conditioned. A welcome respite from a day of trudging through hot and crowded markets.
We finished up a few minutes before we were due back at the bus so we ambled along the street to see if we missed any treasures on the first trip.
On the way back to the port it was fun watching the driver deal with the swarm of traffic around him. Despite all the honking, all the drivers seemed to be in a very contented and in some cases happy mood. Not a single sign of road rage anywhere.
Still not connection for AOL. Three days and counting.
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