India Eight: In conclusion, Mumbai

We are very pleased to be staying at the famous Taj Palace hotel, overlooking the splendid "Gateway of India" On a "heritage tour" through the hotel the next day we learn that the hotel was built when the grand old man of the Tata empire was refused entry by the British racists who owned and managed, what was then the exclusive Watson's Hotel. Tata, in 1903 made it his business to outdo them and to teach them a lesson. He built the magnificent 5-star Taj Palace hotel, subsequently admired and loved by generations of politicians, movie stars, and all Mumbai afficionados. Apart from the "Crystal Ball room", extended conference facilities, several highly rated restaurants (The Zodiac, the most highly rated in Mumbai, where we have our farewell dinner) a gallery of top end boutiques, the most superb service, and many other features, there is now a memorial water feature in the great recption concourse to commemorate the 23 people killed in the hotel lobby at the time of the Al Queda killings in 2008.

There is constant movement of crowds around the Gateway, People lean over the railings and watch the yachts in the habour basin in front. We witness a long and nostalgic rehearsal by several naval and other military bands, for a big event, a week away. Like other places we have visited in India but more so in Mumbai, the traffic never stops and creates relentless frenzy day and night. Hooting and opportunistic shoving are the only ways to make progress in the crowded streets. In the major downtown district of Colaba, we see much evidence of British colonial architecture.The Victoria Terminus, The Prince of Wales Museum, the High Court. the University etc. One of our guides says the British have left much behind in Mumbai, but the best of all is cricket. The Indians eat sleep and live for cricket.We are told that when other sports teams return from international tours, they get a luke warm response at the airport But when the cricketers return, many thousands turn up.

We learn that Mumbai has a serious housing shortage and that accommodation is extremely expensive. An exception is the big fishing village ilocated,ronically, close to the expensive parts of Colaba, where the fishermen and their families make their living and, by some government proclamation, may not be removed. Our guide takes us on a walkabout through the squaled village. Everyone is working at the fishing business. Even very you children are sorting fish or shrimps from the day's catch. No photographs are allowed. They don't want to encourage "poverty tourism"

Several people in our group have read "Shantaram" and we decide to have a drink at the famous "Leopolds" located in a side-street behind the Taj. It's a very noisy young crowd. Leopards is smaller and less appealing than the descriptions in the book. We leave and start walking through the busy shopping and night-activity streets. There is a pulsating energy about this place and a sense of high drive in its people. As we brows in the various shops, the alert owners pick up our accents and start using the odd Afrikaans word. They say that they can give us prices in Rands. The direct SAA flights to Mumbai are establishing us very well in the tourism hierarchy here.

It may be its Bollywood vitality, or the sense of industrious progress and commercial vigor or just the Arabian sea air blended with Indian sweat. We don't know exactly why, but we all agree that we feel special fondness for this place