Final Day in India

Kash Cooks

Who is that woman in a Sari

The ferry made it

Hot Building Inspectors

 Bombay at Night from Kashmera's Condo Terrace

We are now in Singapore.

We thought today would be an uneventful last day in India, but like all of the trip, it surprised us. We checked out of the hotel about noon and our driver drove us to Kashmera’s Condo in Andheri. That is north Mumbai, near the movie studios. This is an area of the city we are not familiar with. On the way to Kashmera’s our driver drove us through many seaside towns and villages where many of the Bollywood film stars live. He pointed out their mansions (called bungalows in India).

We arrived at Kashmera’s condo located on the 10^th floor of very modern highrise complex. The rest of the day we spent with her, her driver and her cook, her two dogs and two cats. We were served a delicious lunch prepared by kashmera’s cook and experienced a real Mumbai at home experience. No silverware, you eat with your fingers, you sit on the floor. It was all very “real” after the unreal opulence at the Taj.

Kash played dress up with Cathy and she looked ever so Indian!

We then drove to a landing to catch the most primitive ferry you can imagine. The ferry took us to Madh Island, one of the seven islands that compose the original Mumbai. The island is separated from the mainland by maybe 500 yards. The ferry ride takes about 5 minutes. The ferry cost 3 rupees (about 6 cents). The old rickety ferry, was jammed to the gills with school kids, workers, people returning to the island, men with their motor bikes and 2 white Americans that everyone stared at. The kids are all adorable in their matching uniforms. We both independently had thoughts of ferry going down with massive loss of life, but the ferry chugged across, and we walked down the 1 foot wide narrow planks to the landing. From there we rented a tuk-tuk and drove into the island proper. It was like going back in time to Mumbai of 60 years ago. It had a total village feeling, dirt road one lane wide, narrow open shops, people walking everywhere. On the island rich Mumbaikers have built mansions and a few massive condo complexes. We were investigating the construction of one where Kashmera and Krushna have bought 2 condos. It was fun walking thru the construction zone and of course all of the workers recognized Kasmera, wanted their picture taken with her and we very nice to us.

On the way back the Kash wanted to change some money, so the tuk-tuk stopped and Kash and the driver got out to go to a small store. Meanwhile a truck backed directly into the side of the tuk-tuk, damaging the tuk tuk, scaring the hell out of everyone. The driver clearly didn’t know how to drive. The truck struck the vehicle directly next to where I was sitting and I was very lucky my arm was not sticking out of the tuk-tuk.

We returned to Kashmera’s and the feast continued, Bombay Duck (really a fish), shrimp, rice, daal, it went on and on. No airplane food for us tonight. We finally said our goodbye (Namaste) and have now checked into our 25 hour flight, Mumbai to Singapore to Tokyo and finally home. No more incidents please.