I am so excited to have my first visitor from Spain ("La Visitante") staying with me and Mr Jules in Mumbers! Actually, La Visitante is actually of Scottish origin but she has been living with her handsome Catalan husband in San Sebastian for seven years now and speaks very good Spanish so I regard her as a bit Espagnole.
Anyway, I am off on my travels again tomorrow (with La Visitante) so I will be a bit quiet for the next 10 days or so. Very excited as we are doing the interesting, if slightly predictable, Golden Triangle Tour - Delhi, Jaipur, Agra and Varanasi. I booked all of this some time ago, not realising that we will be away during the Indian festival of Diwali 13-17th November - so we are sure to experience some interesting sights and sounds! And I am excited to be seeing the Taj Mahal again - but this time we are staying in Agra itself so we will be getting up before sunrise to see the famed mausoleum shrouded in the early morning light.
It's been interesting showing La Visitante various sights around Mumbai. She has taken everything very much in her stride and has been fearless about peering out of the car window at what may be perceived to be pretty scary stuff. But it also made me realise that I am already totally immune to the every day life of every day people in Bombay. I speak of the millions of poor and destitute living on pavements and verges, of mounds of rubbish being dissected by crows, of dogs and humans sleeping everywhere and anywhere they can, of crazy people weaving in and out of the insane traffic.
However, I did become quite distraught when we drove around Mahalaxmi yesterday and noticed that the BMC had been around with their bulldozers, knocking down rows and rows of pavement dwellings, leaving nothing but rubble for the ex-dwellers to pick over. These people have gone from having very little to having absolutely nothing in a matter of minutes...who needs a tsunami when human beings can do this to each other?
Anyway, enough of that talk! I just wanted to say bye for now and see you soon. I hope to have some stories to tell upon my return!
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| La Visitante (Spanish for The Visitor) at the Gateway to India |
It's been interesting showing La Visitante various sights around Mumbai. She has taken everything very much in her stride and has been fearless about peering out of the car window at what may be perceived to be pretty scary stuff. But it also made me realise that I am already totally immune to the every day life of every day people in Bombay. I speak of the millions of poor and destitute living on pavements and verges, of mounds of rubbish being dissected by crows, of dogs and humans sleeping everywhere and anywhere they can, of crazy people weaving in and out of the insane traffic.
However, I did become quite distraught when we drove around Mahalaxmi yesterday and noticed that the BMC had been around with their bulldozers, knocking down rows and rows of pavement dwellings, leaving nothing but rubble for the ex-dwellers to pick over. These people have gone from having very little to having absolutely nothing in a matter of minutes...who needs a tsunami when human beings can do this to each other?
Anyway, enough of that talk! I just wanted to say bye for now and see you soon. I hope to have some stories to tell upon my return!
Have a lovely time on your travels.
ReplyDeleteLiz @ Shortbread & Ginger
Don't forget to take pictures!(I'm talking about the trip, of course, not about the bulldozers!)
ReplyDelete