Saturday February 2nd, our last fling in Mumbai

For our last day in Mumbai, we really, really didn’t want to get in another car for another very long ride, so we decided that we would explore closer to home.

First was the little village just outside of our hotel’s gate. We had been driving by several times a day and wanted to see it “up close and personal.”

There were many little shops. They were selling clothes, shoes, electronics – you name it, some teeny shop was selling it. They tried to tell us that a scarf was pashmina – but it was a filthy (from all the street dust) piece of harsh wool.

The medical facilities:

We all shuddered and said, “Don’t get sick!”

The kids were adorable. They came to talk to us and loved getting their picture taken and then wanted to see the result. These kids looked well cared for. We have seen some that make your heart ache.

At the end of the shops, we could look across a stream and see some houses:

A barber shop:

All was going well, until Carol, in a well meaning way, decided to give one of the kids a dollar. Deena was taking some pictures when she heard a commotion and thought that the kids were going to knock Carol over in their effort to get to her. She reached in and grabbed her and pulled her out of the scrum.

Meanwhile, Mary and I had been wandering farther on. We couldn’t understand, why all of a sudden, all of the kids who had just been chatting and asking questions and answering ours, started asking for money. We regrouped and retreated to the hotel.

Our next adventure was to take a taxi to the chandelier shop that we had seen everytime that we went to the conference.

Yes, there they are, just hanging from the tree on the edge of a very busy street. We took some pictures and walked along this street to a restaurant that was over the Pizza Hut. We thought that this was closer that it really was. “Mad dogs and Englishmen” did cross our minds as we walked along.

Mary thought that since we were on the shoulder of the road, we were safe. She was clipped a little by a motorcycle. Not enough to really hurt, but enough to scare. I didn’t mind the motorcycles using the shoulder, or even the auto rickshaws, but I thought that the dump truck that squeezed us against the wall, was a bit much.

Before we could get to the restaurant, we had to cross this street. It did have a median, so we could go across the lanes nearest us, while the traffic was stopped. Then we rested before darting through the moving traffic on the other side.

We took the levitator:

It was open with just a chain across the entrance.A nice view of the traffic from the window of the restaurant:
We each ordered a dish. The waiters dish them out onto each person’s plate. When I said before that it was hard to photograph, it was because it was all done sort of piecemeal. The food itself is really tasty.

This was just after each person had received a portion of the dish that she had ordered. The naan in the middle of the table is also delicious.

After lunch, we walked up the street to a bazaar. The building was really elaborate and fancy, but inside there were just a bunch of stalls.

It did have a “food court” with a Baskin-Robbins.

I had left my pink hat in the restaurant, so Mary and I walked back to retrieve it and took a 3 wheeler home. Deena and Carol shopped a little more and took one from the “mall”.

That night, Chuck and I went back to the same restaurant. He has been eating at the conference and at the hotel the whole week. We had been planning to go to one of the other hotels, but this restaurant was nice and a little different and better than hotel food.

We took a taxi there and, to give him the true experience of India, an auto rickshaw back.