Mumbaikar Spirits

Ah! Mumbai, Amchi Mumbai! The city of dreams, of Bollywood, Marine drive, Juhu Chowpatty and Big B himself. A city you have to be in to be somebody. A city that never sleeps. Mumbaikar spirit! Bhel Puri and vada pav by the sea shore!'Mumbai is the place to be!You are soo lucky', they said to me when I told people that I was off to Mumbai for my internship.

Little do they know about the horrors and perversions that plague the place.

My day begins with a ride on the ghost trains of Mumbai.The Mumbai stations are filled with thousands of zombies. Hoards of people waiting in silence for the worm like monster to come and devour them. These trains seem to suck in everyone who stands within 2 feet of them. Some poor zombies want to be devoured so badly that they try and stuff themselves into the already bulging belly of the monster. This results in a few zombies being left on the edge of the entrance hanging by a finger nail. These hanger-zombies as I like to call them start a chant of 'Eh! Andar Chal na! Dhakkan! Andar Chal na' . I believe it to be a prayer to the worm monster to squeeze them in and accept their sacrifice.

The Hanger Zombies! Why don't they just jump off already?

Then these zombies begin to rearrange themselves and form queues inside the belly! This is quite remarkable seeing as there is no space to even turn without invariably squeezing someone's jewels, but the zombies manage it. Then begins a chant of 'Dadar?Dadar?' and several zombies make their way from the seats and aisles to the exit. Now , my friends, a word of caution. Never ever stand at the exit when this 'Dadar' chant begins and not get off. This seems to tick the zombies off. In my personal experience twenty of them began a chant of something that sounded very similar to 'Soothiya'. I like to keep things clean on this blog as you can see. If you would like to hear exactly what was said, I would gladly say it to you on request. Drop me a comment below and I'll let you have it. Now at this Dadar, the zombies are as eager to get off as they were to get in! This results in several zombies being flung off the worm monster while it is still moving. The poor hanger-zombies don't stand a chance and plead 'Dhakka mat de!Aargh!' but to no avail.

So finally I get off at my station and now I find hundreds of these zombies walking up the sloping walkway, all in silence, their heads swaying from side to side.The sun's rays fall upon me as I exit the station and I feel I've been lifted from this trance and saved only to find its time to say hello to another dreaded spirit of Mumbai.

The taxi-driver from hell....(TDFH)

The TDFH cajoles his beast

The taxi driver from hell is a forlorn figure. One usually finds these creatures dressed in white leaning against their black and yellow beasts. Make no mistake about it. They are evil! I step up to them and meekly mention my destination and I get a cold stare and a slight nod in response which apparently is the signal for me to get in. Never enter the taxi without appropriate change cause the man from hell will make sure you pay for it with your life! The TDFH then coaxes and cajoles his slumbering beast into motion by sticking a sharp object into a crevice. And then, we're off! The beast thunders past people and the TDFH abuses the same people all the while snickering and laughing. He too uses the chant 'Soothiya' quite a lot. But the TDFH has a lot more in his vocabulary as compared to the zombies in the train. Chants that sound very close to 'Mark a louder...' and 'bank a louder..' are thrown in quite often. I think he is actually shouting at himself for narrowly missing out on ramming into hapless pedestrians.

So finally, after paying the TDFH the exact change for releasing me and thanking the Lord that Im still alive,I reach my office, the dungeons of hell, where I am made to stare at a screen for hours on end while I keep tapping away randomly at some keys. This slow torture has made my brain rot.At the end of what seems an eternity I am released from my prison only to make my way back to the station to catch the worm monster again and go to the station closest to home- Sion.

Now at Sion, I catch one of these red devils. This contraption has the word 'BEST' embossed on it but I think they forgot to include an 'a' because this contraption is surely a beast. The ones' who control this thing are mighty powerful and are the Basura Driver and his sidekick the Mad Con-doctor. I get in the red beast and ask the Con-doctor for a ticket to the next stop but alas, I produce a Rs.10 note instead of the Rs.4 required in coins. The Con-doctor is mad now. He yells out an incantation in a hoarse voice 'Chutta deee naa! Kaha se aate hai yeh log' and reaches out into his box of sorcery. The B-asura Driver meanwhile is struggling to keep the red beast under control and both me and the Condoctor are being thrown about. In this mad struggle, he pulls out a piece of paper and pokes it with a stapler. He is still angry at me. He reaches into another bag, and starts searching for something inside.This bag sounds like its full of metals and it begins to jingle. Any minute now, I feel, I am going to be either abused or physically hurt. However, he just gives me a stare and pulls out the Rs. 6 in change. The stare was one that conveyed 'You Soothiya, you got lucky this time' . I then beg the B-asura driver to let me off, all covered in sweat. He growls at me and gets the beast to stop.

The B-asura driver on a rampage!

The mad Con-doctor with his box of sorcery!

I get off,my ironed shirt crumpled, my polished shoes no longer shining,my hair a mess and I wonder how I am going to survive in this place. The city of dreams?? I am in a nightmare!!