Aamchi Mumbai

"Ae dil hai mushkil jeena yahan...
Zara hat ke, zara bach ke, yeh hai bambai meri jaan..."
- C.I.D. (1956)


Very true. Mumbai is a altogether a different cultrue in its own. I had been to Mumbai many-a-times before I went for a week from March 28th, 2005 to April 4th, 2005. But this time it was different and subconciously "studied" Mumbai.

Mumbai wakes up very early. If you start moving on at let's say 7-00 in the morning, you won't feel it's early in the morning, because you soon realize that you're not rare that you started moving so early. I feel there is no such thing as night for Mumbai, except may be 2-3 hours around 0400-0600. Lifeline of Mumbai is its local train. Mumbai is stretched in a belt, so unlike Delhi or other metro city it's better to have end-to-end transport rather than circular route buses. 60 km route from Churchgate-to-Virar is covered by hundreds of local trains. You can't imagine Mumbai without these trains. It's said that one who is not used to trains shouldn't catch trains in morning going towards Churchgate and shouldn't catch trains in evening coming from Churchgate. Crowd is huge!!! if you want to get down or get in you just need to stand in between and people around will do rest of your job :-) It's worth having an experience.

Mumbai has his own rhythm, which is very fast. When you're walking among people, you realise that you're not moving at your normal pace, instead you're just one among them. Once you step outside bombay you feel that everything is so slow. Speed flows in vein of Bombay. Mumbai is city of dreams. Whosoever came to bombay, had a dream, had thought of an accomplishment. Characters moving around you're worth observing. While you move along, you can feel a different atmosphere altogether while moving any part of bombay. What else could I say? Just "feel it to believe it..."