My First "Bazaar" Experience
As a part of my initiation as an engineer in Mumbai, Erin took me on a walking tour of Crawford Market, a huge bazaar nearly one square-mile in size. This place was ridiculous. Picture yourself in Home Depot, in the fasteners aisle. Imagine that the aisle is stretched lengthwise, turning the 15 feet worth of brass hardware space into a full block, divided into a hundred small stores. Stretch the place along its width, dedicating the width of a small two-way street to each aisle. Now jumble the stores up just enough that the occasional plywood salesman finds himself surrounded by faucet-valve stores.
Do the same with a Wal-Mart, a dollar store, pet-shop and produce store and set them all side-by-side, with slight overlap. Add a few hundred thousand people, hundreds of bicycles, scooters, and countless goods-carriers elegantly transporting unknown goods on their heads. Heat at 90 degrees for a few hours and you have Crawford Market, tired feet, and a headache.
It seems that doing anything in Mumbai is exhausting, particularly when travel is involved. Fortunately the Crawford Market experience was improved by a "conversation" with an old goods-carrier. As many people do, this old man stared at me as he passed, inspecting my light complexion, blue-eyes, and western clothes while exchanging a smile. He stopped to talk, yet I remained skeptical that he may soon start asking for money. I exhausted my Hindi vocabulary, asking his name, how he was, letting him know that my friend was in the store, and asking him what he did for a living. Although I still don’t know what type of goods he actually carried, we were both excited to list off as many types of fruits as we could. Long after the conversation died, he stood beside me in an uncomfortable silence with a heartfelt smile that I regret not capturing on film. I was excited to introduce this cute old man to Erin before we went off in search of some fresh-pressed sugar-cane juice.
After my exhausting trip to the bazaar, I began a wild-goose chase searching for a phone. I caught an auto-rickshaw (or just "rick") toward Arvind and Nashant’s house, nearly 40 Rupees away from my house; these two would be my key to a successful mobile purchase. In Mumbai—and perhaps the whole of India—the Rupee is a far more stable and universal unit of measure than the minute. A "five minute" walk is usually turns out to be less than half a block, and anything over 10 minutes is probably hours. But Rs. 40 fluctuates only slightly based on traffic, and if the driver actually knows where he’s taking you. A fifteen-minute ride sometimes concludes with the realization that your driver only thought he knew where your destination is. Even when completely lost, Mumbai rickshaw drivers’ confidence in their navigational skills is unwavering, particularly when the meter is running…
After a few rehearsed commands, my auto-rickshaw driver took me to my destination via a less-direct, yet more scenic route. Our path took us along side yet more slums, which as far as I can tell, comprise the greater portion of Mumbai. These slums are quite common along the railway—where I spend a large portion of my time—which may explain the hasty conclusion I have drawn. My thoughts overwhelm me. This city, which is to be my home for the next two months, is also home to the worst living conditions I have ever seen. I cannot decide whether I am appalled, surprised, intrigued, or apathetic. The former is the easiest, since it is difficult to bear the burden of wealth on a daily basis. Foolishly, I wonder if the children of the Behram slum have ever even seen a tree. I am surprised to see a young girl draw a butterfly—I wouldn’t expect such a delicate creature to enter such a harsh environment, and for some reason picture these kids as being trapped within the slum, unable to enjoy the open spaces and playgrounds that define the American childhood. Basically, I have no idea what these people’s lives are like. What makes them happy or sad, where they see themselves in 20 years, and more realistically, where they are likely to end up. A flood of such questions is contained by a wall of confusion, which I hope to dismantle as the summer progresses.
Back to the cell-phone story…after two hours of talking with the salesmen, Nashant was unable to convince them that they should activate my phone despite the fact that they had forgotten to bring their lease agreement as proof of residence. So Arvind and I hopped on his motorcycle to return to his house, where he would search for the document. Upon our arrival, Arvind remembered that he doesn’t have his keys on him, so I was instructed to wait by the swing-set while he returned to Nashant. While waiting, I heard a group of excited children playing some game just beyond the walls of the complex. My curiousity got the best of me, so I wandered to a better vantage point to investigate. From my perch I must have looked very out of place, and was easily spotted by the security guard.
The old man hired to keep watch over the apartment complex approached me and began to interrogate me in his native dialect. Unable to understand, I assured him with my best effort at Hindi that "my friend, here". After making me call Arvind to confirm my benevolence, he requested that I take a seat, and subsequently that I turn my chair around, facing in the opposite direction of the children I was trying to watch. I took the opportunity to practice my Hindi, asking his name. The entertainment wore off after about 10 minutes of sitting with the guard standing two feet away, so I pulled out my trust Hindi-English dictionary, enabling me to ask the guard to ask if he was my babysitter. As a passer-by began to speak with the guard, I jokingly informed the man that the guard was my friend, and later asserted that I was a "prisoner". I could not tell if my jokes were well received or not, but they provided me with some entertainment during the 10-minutes-turned-30 that I waited for Arvind to return.
After getting into his apartment, Arvind was still unable to find his lease agreement, meaning I will have to wait a few days until he is able to get a new copy from his landlord. As our cell-phone acquisition had concluded—only mildly successfully—it was time to head back to our flat…a journey which ranks among the scarier things I’ve ever done. For future reference, I would avoid committing yourself to riding on the back of a motorcycle with a relatively new driver through the unruly traffic of Mumbai at night, with no helmet or long pants/sleeves, while carrying a shoulder bag and eight bottles of King Fisher, India’s King of Beers. Such adventure (read: recklessness) is commonplace here. The headlights installed on every vehicle are mostly for aesthetic purposes, many drivers content enough with their night vision and the moon’s light that they don’t waste power illuminating the road.
As for pictures, it seems that this website is not very easy to upload photos to. But rest assured that my lengthy posts will one day be accompanied by some pics...
Do the same with a Wal-Mart, a dollar store, pet-shop and produce store and set them all side-by-side, with slight overlap. Add a few hundred thousand people, hundreds of bicycles, scooters, and countless goods-carriers elegantly transporting unknown goods on their heads. Heat at 90 degrees for a few hours and you have Crawford Market, tired feet, and a headache.
It seems that doing anything in Mumbai is exhausting, particularly when travel is involved. Fortunately the Crawford Market experience was improved by a "conversation" with an old goods-carrier. As many people do, this old man stared at me as he passed, inspecting my light complexion, blue-eyes, and western clothes while exchanging a smile. He stopped to talk, yet I remained skeptical that he may soon start asking for money. I exhausted my Hindi vocabulary, asking his name, how he was, letting him know that my friend was in the store, and asking him what he did for a living. Although I still don’t know what type of goods he actually carried, we were both excited to list off as many types of fruits as we could. Long after the conversation died, he stood beside me in an uncomfortable silence with a heartfelt smile that I regret not capturing on film. I was excited to introduce this cute old man to Erin before we went off in search of some fresh-pressed sugar-cane juice.
After my exhausting trip to the bazaar, I began a wild-goose chase searching for a phone. I caught an auto-rickshaw (or just "rick") toward Arvind and Nashant’s house, nearly 40 Rupees away from my house; these two would be my key to a successful mobile purchase. In Mumbai—and perhaps the whole of India—the Rupee is a far more stable and universal unit of measure than the minute. A "five minute" walk is usually turns out to be less than half a block, and anything over 10 minutes is probably hours. But Rs. 40 fluctuates only slightly based on traffic, and if the driver actually knows where he’s taking you. A fifteen-minute ride sometimes concludes with the realization that your driver only thought he knew where your destination is. Even when completely lost, Mumbai rickshaw drivers’ confidence in their navigational skills is unwavering, particularly when the meter is running…
After a few rehearsed commands, my auto-rickshaw driver took me to my destination via a less-direct, yet more scenic route. Our path took us along side yet more slums, which as far as I can tell, comprise the greater portion of Mumbai. These slums are quite common along the railway—where I spend a large portion of my time—which may explain the hasty conclusion I have drawn. My thoughts overwhelm me. This city, which is to be my home for the next two months, is also home to the worst living conditions I have ever seen. I cannot decide whether I am appalled, surprised, intrigued, or apathetic. The former is the easiest, since it is difficult to bear the burden of wealth on a daily basis. Foolishly, I wonder if the children of the Behram slum have ever even seen a tree. I am surprised to see a young girl draw a butterfly—I wouldn’t expect such a delicate creature to enter such a harsh environment, and for some reason picture these kids as being trapped within the slum, unable to enjoy the open spaces and playgrounds that define the American childhood. Basically, I have no idea what these people’s lives are like. What makes them happy or sad, where they see themselves in 20 years, and more realistically, where they are likely to end up. A flood of such questions is contained by a wall of confusion, which I hope to dismantle as the summer progresses.
Back to the cell-phone story…after two hours of talking with the salesmen, Nashant was unable to convince them that they should activate my phone despite the fact that they had forgotten to bring their lease agreement as proof of residence. So Arvind and I hopped on his motorcycle to return to his house, where he would search for the document. Upon our arrival, Arvind remembered that he doesn’t have his keys on him, so I was instructed to wait by the swing-set while he returned to Nashant. While waiting, I heard a group of excited children playing some game just beyond the walls of the complex. My curiousity got the best of me, so I wandered to a better vantage point to investigate. From my perch I must have looked very out of place, and was easily spotted by the security guard.
The old man hired to keep watch over the apartment complex approached me and began to interrogate me in his native dialect. Unable to understand, I assured him with my best effort at Hindi that "my friend, here". After making me call Arvind to confirm my benevolence, he requested that I take a seat, and subsequently that I turn my chair around, facing in the opposite direction of the children I was trying to watch. I took the opportunity to practice my Hindi, asking his name. The entertainment wore off after about 10 minutes of sitting with the guard standing two feet away, so I pulled out my trust Hindi-English dictionary, enabling me to ask the guard to ask if he was my babysitter. As a passer-by began to speak with the guard, I jokingly informed the man that the guard was my friend, and later asserted that I was a "prisoner". I could not tell if my jokes were well received or not, but they provided me with some entertainment during the 10-minutes-turned-30 that I waited for Arvind to return.
After getting into his apartment, Arvind was still unable to find his lease agreement, meaning I will have to wait a few days until he is able to get a new copy from his landlord. As our cell-phone acquisition had concluded—only mildly successfully—it was time to head back to our flat…a journey which ranks among the scarier things I’ve ever done. For future reference, I would avoid committing yourself to riding on the back of a motorcycle with a relatively new driver through the unruly traffic of Mumbai at night, with no helmet or long pants/sleeves, while carrying a shoulder bag and eight bottles of King Fisher, India’s King of Beers. Such adventure (read: recklessness) is commonplace here. The headlights installed on every vehicle are mostly for aesthetic purposes, many drivers content enough with their night vision and the moon’s light that they don’t waste power illuminating the road.
As for pictures, it seems that this website is not very easy to upload photos to. But rest assured that my lengthy posts will one day be accompanied by some pics...
posted by Adam at 9:49 AM
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