Mumbai

Mumbai was a last minute trip that Salim and I took. Mumbai is a huge, huge city that is completely polluted. Coming in on the airplane we saw miles of slums and layers of smog. The drive from the airport to our hotel was surprisingly civilized. I am beginning to truly believe Hyderabad is the craziest city to drive/travel by car in.

This first picture is of the Gateway of India. This was were we caught a ferry to take us out to Elephanta Island.

To get to Elephante Island, you ferried across a small part of the Arabian Sea. While on the ferry, some of the families made a game of throwing their juice boxes and other garbage overboard. The child would toss it, and the whole family would clap. This is probably the least of the problems in Mumbai given the amount of poverty, air pollution, and water pollution from the oil refineries, but it hurt my heart nevertheless. We were told to avoid seafood while in Mumbai. After that trip across the water, I realized what great advice that was.

We got off the ferry and walked the 100+ steps up to the temple. It was a still, hot, hot day and we were both drenched by the time we got to the top. Salim was sure there was something wrong with him he was sweating so much. There were guys at the base of the steps that would actually carry you to the top of the staircase for a small fee. I kid you not.
















Some details in the temple. Most of the sculptures were damanged in some way becaused there were used as target practice during the Dutch (or maybe English??) occupation.