I have been to Delhi three times, but Mumbai is entirely new to me. I went to Mumbai to attend the J.N. Tata scholarship. Though it was a big flop, I really enjoyed the Mumbai trip. It was a 24 hrs journey by train. I had a nice chat with a small whiz kid named “Sahil Gupta” from bangalore and a guy from Raichur. I really cherished ‘vada pav’ and ‘butter milk’ on the way. The tunnels in pune and the places like lonawala were really amazing. However, I missed to capture some nice shots to put it on my site. I stayed with my brother in South Mumbai at Colaba. The view of the ports at night from tall storey buildings were awesome. Mumbai has good transportation facilities – the taxi’s you pay them with meter cards and buses give punched tickets. Most buses are red and everything is written in hindi. I knew a little bit hindi, hence I managed to get down at the right place. I reached MG Fort on time to attend the interview. The Endowment office was housed in a very old building. The Interview was a bit ok, but I felt I didn’t do well. After the interview, I slept for some hours at my brother’s appartment. After my dinner I took a taxi to the railway station. I took the local train to kurla. I was in a hurry, but the queue was really long to get the tickets. Finally I got the ticket and people were waiting to catch the train. There were two lanes, I don’t remember which one I took to reach Kurla. The trains were fully crowded, nonetheless I managed to get a seat. A middle aged lady asked her little daughter to sit on my lap (bhaya ke pait mey bhaito), some things are taken for granted 
. I reached Kurla on time. On the way to chennai, I met a man named ramseen, a gujarathi. He illustrated the trajedies of torrential mumbai rains and bombay blasts. I also enquired about the Dhabbawalas. He spoke to me at length on ‘Sanathan Dharma’. On the whole, it was a great learning experience.
17 Aug
