The 15th August is India’s independence day. A coincidence that we arrived at just this day, but a positive one. The colors orange white and green guided us through the day, along with thousands of happy Mumbai citizen – and this is only a small fraction of the over 15 million inhabitants of the most populous city of India.
Illuminations of buildings could already be seen the night before, in the morning of the day itself, a public holiday, the flag was raised with a ceremony opposite to the old Victorian train station (CST). With most spectators already in place a rain shower brushed though the crowd but ended just in time for the ceremony to take place.
As it was our first real day, we still had to make some arrangements like getting our mobile phones online with a local prepaid SIM card and getting some food. We were supported by the locals, this time the staff of the Residency Hotel Ford at it’s best. An employee walked us to a SIM card dealer, who got to work on the day of the celebrations just for us and two more tourists. “Always at your service” appears somehow like a baseline of any action, at least towards me as a westerner.
In the afternoon, we walked for some Victorian buildings. All on the way towards the Gateway of India, the must see number one in Mumbai as every travel guide says (the printed ones and the personal ones). The formerly English buildings we found in Mumbai show a broad variety in condition, from well renovated or preserved to widely deteriorated.
Following our path towards the stream of citizens accompanying us (or we accompanying them) grew bigger and bigger. And as especially the blond Levin attracted the views of many young Indians, the stops for “can I have a selfie with you” became more and more so we did decline several requests in the end. Especially when you agree to one you won’t get away with it as then also the more shy guys dare to ask for a selfie. Yet, even if it was stressful at some point, none of the men were impolite.
Reaching the Gateway of India, the place was full already, for what action exactly we did not know, but the stream of people seemed not to end. We felt that for the day we had enough of a bath in the crowd and returned to our hotel while we could still enjoy (or tolerate) liveliness with all the horns of cars, busses and all kinds of 2-wheeler pressing into every gap that should open up.
After a rest in our room we chose to have dinner at Bademiya, a Kebab restaurant. This was also amongst the many many recommendations we received from Kedar. While the waiter spoke good English we still had some cultural differences in the beginning regarding the food order. Each of us had chosen a dish for her-/himself, yet we were told that the items are rather for the four of us as a starter. We couldn’t figure out in the end what was a starter and what not but we ended up with three rounds of different food, each for all of us. It was delicious and sometimes this is what matters most.