Evelyn’s Big Day Out

7/27/07
Thursdays are my day off. The past few Thursdays have been taken up with getting my bearings and running errands. But this Thursday, I decided, would be my first Tourist Thursday. After all, I am here to see stuff.
So I got a train downtown around noon. Well, I tried to anyway. I got tricked again by the train that doesn’t go all the way downtown, but stops at the next big station, Dadar. So I had to get out and find where to stand for the ladies first class and wait for the next train. After wandering a little, I found the saris and joined them. After 25 long minutes, (my wait is usually about 5 minutes) the train finally came. Then, imagine my horror, the car that stopped in front of my group of ladies was second class!! The first class one was several cars back! But after standing there for 25 minutes dripping sweat everywhere, no way was I going to stand and wait for another train just so I could get onto the right car. So I had to bustle into second class with the hoi poilloi. It was a decisively different experience. It seemed that everyone wanted to get into the car right away immediately at the same time, but for some reason, didn’t want anyone to get off. The group in the train car wanted to rush off, and wasn’t concerned about letting anyone on. So one mass of ladies was shoving and pushing off, and another was heaving forward. I was a little surprised by the aggressiveness of it all, and hung back until everyone else was finished and squeezed in when the last of the ladies was settled and the train was about to start. (I think I was allowed on because one or two of the ladies at the edge figured I was too dumb to know how to get onto the train and felt bad for me. I am going to work on my idiot look, because they were absolutely right, I am too dumb. I will take whatever help I can get.)
I took the train to the end of the line, Churchgate station. Before I left, I made sure to walk up along the train so I could see where the ladies car was, and so I would know where to stand for first class later, when I wanted to go home. Then I left and crossed the street and started looking for the Government of India Bureau of Tourism. The guidebook says that it is easy to find, right across the street from Churchgate station. The guidebook also says that it is extremely helpful. It was neither. This is not the first time a guidebook has let me down, I expect that it will not be the last.
The map in the guidebook gives a very rough idea of where the tourism office is; luckily I had a map that gave me a better idea, or I never would have found it. I circled the block that it was supposed to be on, but found no clear indication of where it was. My map showed the office’s north side sitting right up against a street, and I figured that would be easy to find, but the only road I saw as I walked around was the one further up on the map, too far north. I walked south a little to see if I had missed it. I passes a dingy little alley with a bunch of stands selling cheap merchandise, but the alley was too small to be drawn onto a map of the city- you couldn’t have driven a car down it. I kept walking, and next I saw a large building behind some construction materials and a locked gate. The around the side of the building there was a small “India Tourism Office” sign between two immense “Buy Train Tickets Here” signs. (Apparently the tourism office is right near the train station’s office.) Ah, ok, so there it is. But how to get inside? All I see is construction and locked gates. I walked back to the ridiculous alley that, apparently, is actually on a city map of Mumbai. I must have looked confused, because a kindly hawker asked if I was looking for the train ticketing office. I figured, yep, I sure was. He told me to go to the other end of the alley/road/glorified dirt path and in through the gate. I went down and found the gate. The gate I was supposed to know to go in was broken down, had complete lack of “Tourism Office, this way” signs, and was blocked by a parked car and a bunch of bricks and broken tiles. Ah, friendly. I kicked and stumbled my way through and went up to the office.
The people in the tourism office were very polite. I told them that I was in the area for a few months and would like any information they could give me. They gave me a mediocre map, a small magazine full of ads, and a handout of things that I already have information on because they are listed in my questionable guidebook, but that were explained in less detail than in my questionable guidebook. Then they looked at me as though they expected me to leave, so I left.
I saw two sweaty, irritated white people wandering around the block as I was leaving, but I wasn’t feeling friendly so I left them to their fate.
I walked over to Flora Fountain, which I mention only in order to give props to the guidebook for being correct when it described the fountain as quotidian. It was interesting to see the colonial architecture around the fountain though, especially because the old British looking stuff is directly contrasted to all the exotic palm trees and lush greenery.