I feel like celebrating Mumbai, a city I love to visit.
I’ve stayed in the Taj Mahal Hotel a couple of memorable times and looked out my window at the iconic Gateway to India monument. Looking down from my window at dawn, I watched men squat with tiny coal fires in tin cups, ready to cook a little breakfast for passersby. Or for those waking from a night’s sleep on the plaza. Entire lives are lived out on the Mumbai streets.
At a tea stall in the Colaba district, the chai-walla pours boiled milk onto tea leaves and spices.
After my first and second visits in the comforting embrace of the grand Taj, Bob and I chose more intimate Indian hotels in the Colaba area. Less quality control, more flavor! The neighborhood is a congested, confusing warren of small streets that run into the slums Mumbai is famous for, the kind you can walk in and start a parade of the curious and friendly, not beggars, just those smiley-shy children and adults who want to see what you’re going to do and why.
We got into the habit of buying milky masala chai from a stall near our hotel. The tea-walla always opened a new container of milk and boiled it while we waited. To his generous handful of tea leaves, he added his own mysterious mixture of “warm” spices: cinnamon, clove, cardamom, allspice, black pepper. When the tea was brewed and strained, he poured it into a take-away plastic bag, and off we walked with it, to drink in the mugs in our room.
We’ve had a few meals at Cafe Leopold, too, my favorite of which included curried eggs. Anybody who’s read Shantaram knows that Cafe Leopold is an institution central to social life for expats, locals, and tourists. It’s where the sunny and the shady commingle, knowingly or not.
For a deep look at Mumbai and all things mafia, which is to say all things Mumbai, read Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found, by Suketu Mehta. Or better yet, visit the city and see for yourself.
3 Comments
Find nothing appealing about the place. On the contrary it looks like a place and a culture I am definitely not interested in. Shame on the attacks. Tourism is going to suffer even more.
We also stayed at the Taj. It was terrible to watch it burn on t v. You have certainly had an in-depth look at Bombay.
Your photos are great!
Try to catch Slumdog Millionaire, another fascinating glimpse of Bombay
The city looks beautiful and colorful, but I would have difficulty eating the street food. The milk was boiled but how clean is the cloth strainer? The tea leafs? His hands! Interesting from someone who washes veggies with soap and a brush….