A Saturday in Mumbai (Bombay)

O What a Party

Holi-Mania! The Festival of Colors

We’ve spent the last month in awe of the brilliant colors of India and as fate would have it, our departure date happens to fall on the occasion of one of the most vibrant Hindu festivals of the year – Holi. I can’t think of a more fitting celebration to mark the end of our GSE experience! Based on the Hindu calendar, this year Holi falls on March 1st and was originally an agricultural festival celebrating the arrival of spring and commemorating various events in Hindu mythology. Given that we will be en route to Delhi and Agra early tomorrow morning, our hosts arranged a special event for us today to ensure that we didn’t miss out. What a sight it was! Greeted with fistfuls of colored powder rubbed across our face and clothes, it wasn’t long before we were right in middle of all the crazy action, dumping bucketfuls of colored water over one another and shooting water guns under the cool spray of a huge fountain in the early morning sunlight. Our clothes drenched and our skin dyed various shades of pink, green, purple and yellow, there was nothing left for us to do but laugh uncontrollably and shout over blasting Hindi music: “Only in India!!!”.

Holi Colours

Small Town* India

As we near the end of our GSE journey, I find myself prematurely nostalgic for the little eccentricities that make India so endearing. It was in this spirit that I set off through the streets of Old Panvel with Lianne, determined to experience and capture life in small town* India.

Few tourists explore the streets of Old Panvel on their own, or so the perplexed gazes we received suggested; it's their loss.

Old Panvel

Cow crossing the street in Old Panvel

Trying on Kurtas in Old Panvel

*Small Town: In India, a small town like Panvel has about 400,000 people.

Elephanta Island

Today we had the opportunity to visit Elephanta Island which is located in the Mumbai harbour. The island is named in honour of carved stone elephants found inside its unique cave temple, which was excavated in the eighth century from solid rock. It was an amazing visit enjoyed by all the team where we were transported back in time through the stone temple complex. The architecture was beautiful and even though centuries old still retained much of its original details. There were massive columns and equally large stone carvings of Lord Shiva that even though they were partially obscured by the throngs of tourists it was still a pleasure to see.

To get to the island we took an old but seaworthy open-deck ferry from the port of Uran. The crossing was just over 30 minutes and provided our first glimpse of the Mumbai skyline in the distance. One of the highlights was travelling to the boat launch from the village as it was a feast of the senses with a host of colours and textures from the old and colourful boats and nets, to the smells of the daily catch and saltwater bay.

Magical Matheran

Surrounding the areas around Pune and on the way to Bombay are beautiful hills and mountain valleys that stretch as far as the eye can see. A dusty, steep and winding car ride took us high up into the mountains today to reach the base of a hill station where tourists from all over India come to escape the noise, traffic and crowds of the city. Matheran is a small village accessible only by foot, horse or if you’re there on time, a small “toy” train that slowly crawls up the mountain in a long and laborious journey to the heart of the village. A few of us chose to make the journey by foot while Tom and Jessica enjoyed the trip by horse. Dusty and rocky terrain led us through leafy forests and we had to hold our bags and cameras tight to avoid the mischievous grasps of wild monkeys who eyed us curiously as we passed. A few hundred people still make their home here and are referred to as tribal people. Many work in the modest hotels and guests houses in town, while others sit on the floors of small shops making leather sandals and shoes selling for the equivalent of 4 Canadian dollars. The peaceful crackling of fires outside homes and the clanging of pots as women prepare meals is interrupted only by the grunting unison of up to 6 or 7 men who heave huge wooden carts of food, drink and construction materials up into the village. As we walked, guests of the village accommodations whisked by, pulled along in handcarts by one or two men while we kept pace with those men who were left to carry their suitcases balanced squarely atop their heads – often 4 bags high!

Feasting our way through India

India is full of surprises - not the least of which is its seemingly endless array of cuisine and regional dishes. It didn’t take us long to learn that most of the Indian cuisine we are familiar with in Canada represents only a tiny fraction of the culinary delights available here and comes mainly from the Punjab region. The sheer variety of food and their difficult-to-pronounce (and even harder to spell) names makes them hard to do justice to in writing. Suffice to say that we are not going hungry – in fact, on the contrary, we are still trying to figure out how best to politely refuse 2nd, 3rd and 4th helpings of food at each meal. It is a great cause for concern if we are ever seen at any event or gathering without a plateful of food – unfortunately the explanations “I’m full” or “I just ate” don’t go over as excuses … the best we can do is to slooowwwly savor each bite of food in order to avoid attracting attention. As long as our plates are full, then everyone is happy. Our hosts make sure that we have sampled every dish available until buttons and belts need to be loosened for the rest of the evening. But you won’t hear any of us complaining as there are so many tastes to discover, each one more interesting than the last.
Given Maharashtra’s proximity to Gujarat and Pune’s location approximately midway from the North and South of the country, we are seeing a mix of dishes from the different regions (or as one host put it, “the best of India”). A typical Gujarati meal is “thali” (pictured below) with a huge metal plate and small bowls filled with savory dhals, sauces and stews for dipping chapattis and rotis, chutneys and pickled hot peppers – all refilled before you have time to finish the last bite of your first helping. And the best part of it all is that we get to eat everything with our hands!
Mixed in with all the spicy and savory dishes are the sweets served alongside. And somehow the word “sweet” does not adequately describe the taste. Noodles that melt in your mouth swimming in a liquid of sugar, milk and coconut, balls of fried dough dripping in sticky sauces …. let’s put it this way – I’ve gone from taking coffee with less than a teaspoon of sugar back home, to taste buds that now crave a minimum of three heaping tablespoons of sugar every morning. So if there is any truth to the saying “you are what you eat” then you won’t find 4 sweeter Canadians!

Yogourt made from buffalo milk in earthen pots

Gujarati ThaliA staple in every Indian kitchen - the essential spices

Go Team Canada!

Tom the Horse and Tom "Goodman"

Tom the Turkey

I love Monkeys

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