Sterling Sunday

Decisions

The day picked up pace towards the end of Sunday evening when I saw the sun dipping by the horizon. I was casually going through the newspaper at my cousin's place in Mulund when I sensed this sudden urge in me to watch a film. I wanted to see "Ray" but was certain that the tickets would be exhausted by the time I reached the counter. On second thoughts, Bollywood's most promising movie "PAGE 3", took my attention and a decision was made in a split of a second.

2200 IST Hours : Shuffling Locals

Armed with the idea of going all the way to South Mumbai from the northern most point, I managed to enticed my cousin for a 22:00 show. The clock read 21:00 and one should accept that it was a tough call to make 'it on time'. One peculiar thing about 'Mumbai Sunday' is the number of fast locals runnning to and fro from north-south is limited when compared to weekdays (Saturday is a weekday and not a weekend in Mumbai!). As luck would have it, we managed to catch an amazingly jam packed slow local and the estimated time to reach our destination was now building out to be 45 minutes! Frustrated we got down in one of major stations in the hope of boarding a 'fast' one, but unfortunately managed to find none. The next 'fast' was scheduled to arrive at 22:00 hours; it was a futile effort from our part but my cousin was quick to rectify the mistake. He spotted a slow local across the other platform and we barely managed to board it. This one was less chaotic and the commuters appeared more relaxed from the previous one. We were back to square one; just that now we had consumed an extra 4 minutes during our so called 'train shuffling'!

Tip Toe

My toe was badly hurt ; thanks to the new Kholapuri 'joothi' (footwear), whose rough leather had scraped off 3 layers of my little toe's skin. The toe ached, but I had to keep moving. With each step, the pain increased but I did not want to miss the show. Finally I arrived in the 'hall' huffing and puffing. We procured to get seats in the lower stall. The seats were in a good condition and 'clean'. There were no 'pan' stains / chewing tobacco on the seats; it was a great sign of hygiene! The movie just begun and AC at it's best, the toe factor just disappeared. Things were moving in the right direction with the movie and ambience supporting me to a great extent.

Stranded

The movie over, it took us a little more than 'sometime' to realise that we had missed the last local to take us back 'home'. The station wore a deserted look. A few cops roamed around the platforms with beggers and stray passengers giving them company. All the stalls, had brought their shutters down. The sweeper happily went about doing his job and for the first time I realised how beautiful and clean Victoria terminus (aka Chatrapathi Shivaji) was! The restrooms were being cleaned and so were the 'pan' stains from the walls of the station. But for the people, I guess VT would probably be voted as India's finest stations. There are so many commuters that the station loses out it's sheer magnanimity and charm.

Bus Service

Having realised that we did not have a train to catch, we checked on our next 'BEST' alternative : "Mumbai's renowned Bus Service". My cousin was pretty doubtful with regard to the much acclaimed 24 x 7 service. My toe began hurting again and I felt like walking bare feet. I would have loved roaming around the streets of 'Genuine Mumbai', but for the damn toe and my lousy footwear. The streets were broad and the last of the traffic was seen heading towards their respective destinations. People did not entertain hitch hiking in these parts of the city. We could hardly see any bus service. With all hopes lost of boarding a bus, I decided to take a cab, back home. It took a couple of minutes to convince my cousin with respect to 'taking a cab', as he felt it was too costly an affair. We argued on for sometime till we luckily managed to stop a bus speeding by. What a stroke of luck ! Believe me, it took us half way through our destination : 'DADAR'.

Hunger Pangs

My stomach growled and the energy level was zeroing down pretty fast. We got down at Dadar to smell Mumbai's very own darling, ' The delicious Pav Bhaji ' (amchi Mumbai fast food). We had to literally wait for half an hour to (1:15 am - 1:45 am) to eat the same. It was outstanding; hot, the bread (pav) with a dash of butter was simply yummy. The Bhaji (curry) was spicy loaded with veggies which included corriander, green chillies,onions, peas, potatoes and tomatoes. I could see a couple of the late nighter's hogging their way out. Most of them drunk to the core, were accompanied with their respective 'hookers' (both male and female). The attender himself was half drunk, while serving us. The night life of Mumbai had just begun! The cops were keeping a vigil watch for miscreants, but unfortunately all were 'well behaved'.

Dog Fright

After a perfect roadside meal, we dragged our feet to the nearest bus stop, to get it sniffed by stray dogs. The dogs were huge and looked rather insane. Both of us detested mongrels and were 'shit' scared (I was bitten by a dog, years ago and it quite a horrid experience!) of them. Luckily a small bus stopped by to offer us freedom from the dogs. It promised us to take to a place quite close to our destination. It was quite a resourceful trip, cause our only co-passenger was rather an 'extra helpful' guy. I suspected him to be an underworld gangster for his looks, but guess I was wrong. He helped us to get near our destination. It was really sweet of him, godsent should I say !

After several futile attempts of 'hitch hiking' , we finally decided to take a 'rick' back home. The whole episode was worth it. A perfect night out in Mumbai!