My heart belongs to Bombay
Its funny, even though ive been brought up in Kochi, a beautiful city, bombay is the city of my heart...Its the loveliest city in the world, of the ones ive been to i mean..(not many to be honest)
Two of the most poignant memories i have of bombay -
One night at Worli sea face, its raining, slightly chilly and the spray from the sea whips into yr face..you can taste salt on yr lips..
a little boy, carrying a plastic sack, appraoches me and payel and asks us to buy water. hes selling small bottels of aquafina for 10 bucks each. payel the soft hearted (bless her) buys three, even though we dont need any. the kid sits down next to us, quite comfortable in his shorts and torn shirt , and starts talking to us..he goes to school, he informs us proudly. He loves second standard, its much better than First standard. Payel and i grin at each other and tell him very solemnly that were sure it is.
his father will beat him if he doesnt go back soon. we urge him to leave. he grin waves and sprints off.
two mins later, a small voice asks us -"Chahiye?" Hes back, this time with a large pink spool of cotton candy hes bought off one of the vendors. he must have spent 20 bucks from the 30 payel gave him. he pulls off large sticky wads and presses it into our hands, smiles, and tells us to come back.
weve gone back many times, payel and i, but we never saw the little man again. i wonder where he is right now? and whether hes in third standard?
Another time, were sitting in shivaji park, on the grass, talking and having horrible vending machine coffee weve bought off the periphery of the park.
soon we notice that a group of men have started to create a ruckus. turning to look, its very obvious that theyre drinking, sitting in a circle on the ground. in two minutes theyve pulled up one of the smaller guys in the group and started beating him. his clothes come off and he starts screaming..we start to walk away quickly. suddenly the yelling becomes louder. turning to look, we see a prostitute, one of the many who grace shivaji park with their presence at night, barge into the group. she slaps the one who is clearly the ringleader and gives him a shouting in marathi.
whirling around, she picks up the discarded clothes of the poor guy, catches him by the ear, and drags him off to the police thana at the entrance to the park. silently, we follow her. a crowd gathers around them. another crowd keeps the other young men from running away.
watching to see what happens, we wait, convinced the constable would tell her to shove off.
he doesnt. he takes down her complaint and brings the rest of the guys into the station.
It happens only in Bombay.
Labels: this shit is addictive
posted by Meera @ 9:36 AM
Comments: 3
