Many gods in Mumbai

Much as a continuation of the visit to the ancient temples the day before I planned a route to see a number of religious sites in the city, starting out with a short cab ride to the newly renovated St. Thomas Church at the Horniman Circle. A rather small church in a slightly gothic style, its side wall lined with pompous marble gravestones and memorabilia. A strange impression gave the two series of ceiling fans that were suspended from the pillars like lanterns, but on long sticks so they would reach down to the benches beneath. It looked a bit like a multi-engine heavenly aircraft. The room was empty except for an old woman kneeling at the choir entrance. A group of three European looking tourist girls gathered in the back of the church. They were all wearing mini skirts and sleeveless tops. - I was wondering about the thoughts and comments of the locals on that.

I continued on walking South thru a bazaar I called "office town". Almost every single store advertised in yellow, red and black letters services like computer typesetting, xeroxing, lamination and the like. It's incredible where people around here can fit a computer workstation! In tiny booths along the street sat people in front of 14 inch CRT monitors on crooked shelves, typing away in concentration. While I usually had trouble fitting in in cybercafes, knees bent and back to back with the next person, Indians cope with that by simply not taking up much space. Most of the times their loosely fitting dress shirts, pants suggest slim and bony bodies, and obviously they're rather short. What if you would magically swap every Indian with an US American, and every minimal sized vehicle in the streets with one of their hummers and pickup trucks? India would be piled 3 miles high!

I was actually looking for a Jewish synagoge in the quarter, and although I was certain it had to be in the immediate proximity I decided to interrupt my search and go for lunch instead. The rather exclusive and stylish Chinese restaurant "Silk Route" seemed a welcome change from all the bazaar snacks. Half an hour and only a few steps later I had reached the light blue building. After signing into the book a warden would let me up to the ceremony room on the first floor. Being small and furnished with generous, laid back benches gathered in a circle around an altar in the middle of the room it had a cozy feeling to it, but other than that it was rather plain and uninteresting. There were no churchgoers at the moment, only one guy sweeping the floor and another one waiting to ask for a baksheesh for opening the door to the upper level.

Churchgate train station could be easily reached walking a couple of hundred meters along the traffic. Just looking at a map in order to decide which station to buy a ticket for would attract a tourist guide trying to make friends with me, telling me at which train station I actually was and pointing out a garbage disposal when I apparently wanted to dump my empty water bottle. - Come on! Luckily, he was gone again after 4 minutes. I noticed that's the time that people from any line of business would harass you before looking for their next victim.

I followed the LP travel guide recommendation to see the clothes washing from the overpass at Mahalakshmi train station. - The view offered a wonderful composition of the facilities indeed, making it look much more like a fantastic movie set than a place of unforgiving every day labor.

There were two temples at the water. It was a bit hard to find the access routes from the street, but soon I passed a colorful bazaar lining the alley to the Hindu temple. It ended at the bottom of a staircase, where I was going to add my new sandals to the pile of shoes from the other visitors before the climb, but a beggar woman took them into custody, handing me a numbered plastic chip for a token. At the top of the stairs I was reminded by security personnel to keep my camera in the bag. The temple site was small and mainly consisted of an open air square lined with benches under an arcade. the building in the center looked much like a box office and held lots of fences ready for long lineups, men and women separately, for blessings by one of the two massive shirtless priests. Donations were given by sticking (by what means I didn't inspect) coins to a wall. If the space got too full a temple servant would wipe them off and they would fall thru a grate into a container. - Most of all however I was drawn to go down the steps to the sea that had been absoluteley conceiled from view until now. There was a small resting area with snack opportunities, but no outside seating and no access to the water. Thru a an iron fence the Hindus would watch their Muslim fellows cross a quai to their church, located out on the water, maybe half a mile away.

The quai would flood at high tide, and the church would become an island. I didn't do any planning regarding the tide and was lucky the quai wall was far above the water level. It wasn't straight, but had a slight swing to it, and a colorful band of people stretched on it in the afternoon sun. The path was lined with sellers and beggars of all sorts. A guy had dug out an old scale and tapped onto it with a stick, encouraging the passers to have their weight measured for a baksheesh. People with deformities. Three crippled monks laid on the ground singing a rhythmic chant, their stubby legs in the air.

The church was bigger and more elaborate, but much like the Hindu temple consisted of a courtyard. You had to leave your shoes outside the bungalow in its middle in order to receive the blessings, and again there were separate doors for men and women, the room for men however being quite a bit bigger. I entered barefoot and after a moment remembered to put my hat back on. People brought the priests flower ornaments wrapped in newspaper and in return received a pat on their head with a feathery utensil. There was no ban on photography, and other people took pictures too. But then bystanders interfered when I would take a picture of the women on the other side of the altar. I decided to leave the room at all. I found that in the back the church opened to the seashore rocks below and people enjoying a 5 Rupee ice cream would spread out over it, eventually go in the water, too. A buy even bared his upper body. So much freedom!

I took a taxi to Chowpatty Beach and took a stroll. I passed a circle of girls sitting on the sand, of course all of them wrapped up in clothes and veils. Much to my surprise they called "Hello! Come over here!", but when I approached they all froze up. - So it was a joke after all. I continued on along the seawall, and eventually ended up walking all the way back to the hotel.

I had met no other white tourists all day. No wait, I caught a glimpse of two older ladies at Mahalakshmi and a young couple near the temples. - Of course I was a stranger in India, but I was also basically alone being a stranger. Which was a good but unusual thing. In any case I never felt lost or unsafe.

Completely oblivious of my experience the other day I ordered the same "Chicken Roast" in the same restaurant and got the same disappointment, only this time it was fully cooked.

I had plans to go to a night club with the frivolous name of "Red Light", and since it would close around 1:30 I took a taxi to around 9:30. But no... The place was still empty and lit. I was advised to come back around 11:30, and I walked down to a bar in Colaba. It was crowded, so the waiter sat me down at the table of the lonely beer drinkers where a guy from Belgium and a Saudi already had been quietly enjoying their Kingfisher. They both temporarily worked in Mumbai. We talked, no, slandered about the town and its inhabitants until I took off and went back to the club. The entrance fee was 1000 Rupees, of which 800 were returned as vouchers for booze. I couldn't quite enjoy the nice setup of the club as half of it was a restricted VIP area. I started talking to two white men - business from South Africa as it turned out - who were also trapped in the lower caste, and the slandering went on. - Once it was full the club featured an exceptionally multicultural crowd. As everybody sang along to the "Hare Krishna"-song however I was reminded I was in Mumbai.