Mumbai - the home of Bollywood

John & I have arrived safe & sound in Mumbai. It is hot & hectic but watching the indian way of life is fascinating! We have been here for 4 days now and have loved it but we are ready to move on and hit the beaches for some R&R.


Here is a quick run down of our 4 days in Mumbai.....We arrived early on Sunday morning after a quick hop flight from Dubai with Emirates. After thankfully spotting our bags and arranging our prepaid taxi ticket we headed to the taxi rank tired but extremely excited! The car journey to Colaba was brilliant, we were in a 'PAL' car - very vintage looking thing with no 'mod cons'...and no A/C (sweat!!!). The driving needs a strong stomach and maybe some ear plugs! They toot constantly - not that it does much good!!


We had booked two nights at the Sea Shore Hotel, Colaba which on arrival was good...and clean, which is all we wanted!


The first day went by in a bit of a blur of power naps & strolls around the streets of Colaba. We experience our first Thali at the Madras Cafe, a pretty grotty looking cafe but it came highly recommended by the locals, the food was delicious!! Oh, and I experienced my first grope at the night market...best get the first one out the way!


Before we conked out for the night our hotel receptionist guy asked us if we fancied being extras in a Bollywood movie the next day....the biggest film this year apparently! Aye right! Keen to experience as much as we can of Mumbai we jumped at the chance...not to mention the free meals all day and the 500 rupees payment (around 7 quid!)


We were collected at the crack of dawn from our hotel & after a very bumpy 1.5 hour bus journey arrived at the Bollywood studio. The day was long but a great laugh and a brilliant insight into a crazy world. Watching how the stars have a 'wallah' for everything is hilarious but quite wrong - shouting their water boy, or the boy who mops their brow, their boy with the white gloves who holds their suit jacket....the list is endless! I did take some pics but I got spotted and told to delete them. John ended up being made the saxophone player and was on stage as part of the band! What a laugh watching John have to dummy play the sax whilst dancing on stage ....in gold trousers and a green & gold suit jacket!!! I hope he makes the final cut! The film is called Housefull 2....god we are in a sequel.


The next day we headed to Elephanta island which is around 1 hour boat ride from the Gateway to India. As you can imagine John was pleased to get his first boat trip underway - he was very excited to hear the skipper ringing the bell to tell the engineer in the engine room what to do with the engines......apparently this is very old school! The island has cave carvings dating back to 6000AD which are amazing and, after a hot hike to the top of the island there are some spectacular views back to Mumbai! The island is full of monkeys who are very curious & cheeky...in fact one stole my banana - damn monkey! Unfortunately the island is covered with litter which is a shame as it could be gorgeous - it seems Indians dont care where they drop their litter.


We were exhausted after the day on the island - it doesnt take much to exhaust you in this heat so decided we would check out a Bollywood film. Need to know what to expect when our Bollywood careers take off. The film was called Gangster and was in Hindi, so we didnt understand a single word! But it wasnt at all what we expected....ranchy, violent and only one song! One highlight was the national anthem which was played before the movie started...I wish they played Flower of Scotland at the Xscape Odeon! ...John might think differently being British!


Tonight we are catching the Konkan Express sleeper train to Goa in 2nd class which we are both really excited about, lets hope it meets our expectations! We will write soon to update you all on the experience!