Mumbai Life - Part 3
There are two disappointments about Mumbai:
1. The crazy traffic
2. Mumbai flood
During office time an half an hour distance will take 1.5hours to cover. Yes, the traffic is that frustrating. No wonder why the Mumbai residents are used to walking. That's because you can easily cover half an hour car distance in 90 minutes by walking. But walking is not easy when there is knee deep water. Why even I am talking about knee deep water?
That's because Mumbai floods are famous in the country or should I say infamous. Here, during rainy season it rains very heavily and continuously for days and you would suddenly find this city has turned into Venice- there is knee deep water everywhere resulting into, yes, resulting into definitely more traffic!!!
Sometimes the only commuting medium in the rainy season are the local trains, which, of course, have to be stopped for half a day because of water logging. Talking about trains in Mumbai, you simple cannot avoid the trains if you are staying in this city. This is because at the end of the day you would want to reach your destination on time by avoiding traffic.
There are 3 train lines in Mumbai-
1. Central
2. Western
3. Harbor
All the places in the city are addressed with respect to the train lines. Hence you would find two names for every place, for example Thane East, Thane West or Bandra East/ Bandra West. There is no North South names, all names are with respect to East or West.
There are two important apps which have to be kept handy for travelling in local trains - mIndicator (which will guide you about the stations) and UTS ( this is for ticket booking purpose in case you want to avoid long queue).
Here people value time, life is very fast in Mumbai as they say. This is because people are more focused on wealth creation. All people of Mumbai starting from an auto rickshaw driver/ ola driver/ maid servant to corporate people - all are very professional here.They are least interested in other people's lives. Hence, you would never find your neighbor asking questions about your whereabouts or your colleague taking interest in your personal life. While you might miss the 'para' culture here but the good side is you are not answerable to anybody about your choices of life in Mumbai.
Talking about choices - here you would find more live in partners, lgbt community living freely as compared to rest of the places in the country. Here not many couples would take the opportunity of the serenity of nature's park or a lakeside to glorify their romance. Rather you would find all the fitness enthusiasts jogging inside the parks. People are very much health conscious here. Not many potted bellies are seen here, rather you would find all slim figures around you and definitely wearing far more fashionable clothes than most of the places of the country. After visiting Mumbai you yourself would start recognizing the difference between good and bad styles, difference between fashion and not so fashionable clothes. People here whether they live in chawls or in posh societies have a decent sense of fashion - this is unique about this Bollywood city.
Another aspect of the city is its mall culture. Here in order to buy anything be it vegetables or clothes you have to visit malls. On weekends, parents would take their kids to the gaming zone of the malls, or couples/ group of friends hangouts at the restaurants or pubs inside the malls. No wonder why there are so many malls in this city. If you are wondering which is 'the' mall which you must visit, it is Phoenix Lower Parel mall which is the shopping hub of the celebrities. This is the largest mall of Mumbai and you would come across several celebrities lifting their own shopping bags here.
Wanted to talk about weekend getaways of Mumbai, but that would have made this blog lengthy. Hence would continue on the part 4 or the last part of this series. Please be patient.
This is me and my husband at a restaurant inside a mall of Mumbai.
1. The crazy traffic
2. Mumbai flood
During office time an half an hour distance will take 1.5hours to cover. Yes, the traffic is that frustrating. No wonder why the Mumbai residents are used to walking. That's because you can easily cover half an hour car distance in 90 minutes by walking. But walking is not easy when there is knee deep water. Why even I am talking about knee deep water?
That's because Mumbai floods are famous in the country or should I say infamous. Here, during rainy season it rains very heavily and continuously for days and you would suddenly find this city has turned into Venice- there is knee deep water everywhere resulting into, yes, resulting into definitely more traffic!!!
Sometimes the only commuting medium in the rainy season are the local trains, which, of course, have to be stopped for half a day because of water logging. Talking about trains in Mumbai, you simple cannot avoid the trains if you are staying in this city. This is because at the end of the day you would want to reach your destination on time by avoiding traffic.
There are 3 train lines in Mumbai-
1. Central
2. Western
3. Harbor
All the places in the city are addressed with respect to the train lines. Hence you would find two names for every place, for example Thane East, Thane West or Bandra East/ Bandra West. There is no North South names, all names are with respect to East or West.
There are two important apps which have to be kept handy for travelling in local trains - mIndicator (which will guide you about the stations) and UTS ( this is for ticket booking purpose in case you want to avoid long queue).
Here people value time, life is very fast in Mumbai as they say. This is because people are more focused on wealth creation. All people of Mumbai starting from an auto rickshaw driver/ ola driver/ maid servant to corporate people - all are very professional here.They are least interested in other people's lives. Hence, you would never find your neighbor asking questions about your whereabouts or your colleague taking interest in your personal life. While you might miss the 'para' culture here but the good side is you are not answerable to anybody about your choices of life in Mumbai.
Talking about choices - here you would find more live in partners, lgbt community living freely as compared to rest of the places in the country. Here not many couples would take the opportunity of the serenity of nature's park or a lakeside to glorify their romance. Rather you would find all the fitness enthusiasts jogging inside the parks. People are very much health conscious here. Not many potted bellies are seen here, rather you would find all slim figures around you and definitely wearing far more fashionable clothes than most of the places of the country. After visiting Mumbai you yourself would start recognizing the difference between good and bad styles, difference between fashion and not so fashionable clothes. People here whether they live in chawls or in posh societies have a decent sense of fashion - this is unique about this Bollywood city.
Another aspect of the city is its mall culture. Here in order to buy anything be it vegetables or clothes you have to visit malls. On weekends, parents would take their kids to the gaming zone of the malls, or couples/ group of friends hangouts at the restaurants or pubs inside the malls. No wonder why there are so many malls in this city. If you are wondering which is 'the' mall which you must visit, it is Phoenix Lower Parel mall which is the shopping hub of the celebrities. This is the largest mall of Mumbai and you would come across several celebrities lifting their own shopping bags here.
Wanted to talk about weekend getaways of Mumbai, but that would have made this blog lengthy. Hence would continue on the part 4 or the last part of this series. Please be patient.
This is me and my husband at a restaurant inside a mall of Mumbai.
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