Just when I thought things couldn't get better...
Rob and I had a tearful goodbye from his brother Tom in Hampi and were off on the most luxurious night bus I have ever seen. The chairs near fully pulled back into beds and when I wasn't sleeping soundly I was bobbling my head enthusiastically to the sounds of bollywood (not karaoke) till we arrived four hours earlier than expected. Never have I arrived early on a bus throughout the five countries I have travelled on this trip. It was brilliant.
Sure that I would hate Mumbai and happy to book a ticket out for that same night I was quite surprised to really enjoy India's most westernized and yet still quite desperate of cities. After handing out candies with morals to children, we spent a good amount of time playing at the post office. They have the most intricate postal system employing heaps of people that are responsible for god knows what tasks. After filling out forms, customs has to rummage through your parcels, then theres another guy who boxes it all up and sews it into a pretty cotton package, then theres another guy (my favorite guy) who applies hot wax to each of the corners of the box and stamps them with his fancy seal, and then you bring your package to another guy who offers you weird sugary bits to eat for your long parcel process and then theres another guy who weighs it and quotes you a price and then theres another guy who takes it and then theres way more whos jobs I couldnt even discern. It was AWESOME. way better than any tourist attraction. I made friends with San Jay the wax stamp guy and tried to convince him to stamp my backpack or shirt or something just cause I thought it was so neat...he of course could not, it being an official stamp and me a potential drug smuggler. or at least this was his arguement. it was still AWESOME.
We decided to deal with Rob's nauseau from the smell of human shit everywhere we went by exploring the world of Indian McDonalds. Yes I know, really. I think that kind of shit is fascinating. How western culture gets translated, if its the same social/economic breakdown of customers, what things they serve, all that. And also the airconditioning was soothing in a land full of sweaty smelly crap.
After a delightful and yet disgusting meal, we decided to continue our western eastern adventure andw ent to the cinema. We chose Pride and Prejudice, as camp and wonderful as they come. But again it was brilliant to see how its all done, India style. We had to buy tickets as if it were a theater, paying different prices for better seats, and then we all had to rise for the national anthem and there was an intermission and crazy women flipfloppng loudly down the stairs at key moments like when darcy confesses his love for elizabeth and the snack were all meaty. It again was AWESOME. Rob and I were practically skipping as we walked along to go check email and find some food and then it happened.
It had been such a lovely day. We were both so excited about how so many little things could have felt so fulfilling and how pleased we were with our time in Mumbai when we were stopped by a man named Polo.
Polo was a spotter for one of the TOP bollywood films and he wanted us to be in it! We would be picked up at 8am, it would take the whole day, they would feed us and pay us. We were about to become bollywood stars.
We rushed to the train station practically shaking from excitement and by practically I mean definetly shaking from excitement. Its what everyone hopes for when they come to mumbai. Westerners walk around all day looking for spotters, trying desperately to get noticed and we just bloody walked right into it. We changed our tickets, got a room and tried to sleep, cause we knew that we had quite the exciting day ahead of us, quite the exciting day...
Sure that I would hate Mumbai and happy to book a ticket out for that same night I was quite surprised to really enjoy India's most westernized and yet still quite desperate of cities. After handing out candies with morals to children, we spent a good amount of time playing at the post office. They have the most intricate postal system employing heaps of people that are responsible for god knows what tasks. After filling out forms, customs has to rummage through your parcels, then theres another guy who boxes it all up and sews it into a pretty cotton package, then theres another guy (my favorite guy) who applies hot wax to each of the corners of the box and stamps them with his fancy seal, and then you bring your package to another guy who offers you weird sugary bits to eat for your long parcel process and then theres another guy who weighs it and quotes you a price and then theres another guy who takes it and then theres way more whos jobs I couldnt even discern. It was AWESOME. way better than any tourist attraction. I made friends with San Jay the wax stamp guy and tried to convince him to stamp my backpack or shirt or something just cause I thought it was so neat...he of course could not, it being an official stamp and me a potential drug smuggler. or at least this was his arguement. it was still AWESOME.
We decided to deal with Rob's nauseau from the smell of human shit everywhere we went by exploring the world of Indian McDonalds. Yes I know, really. I think that kind of shit is fascinating. How western culture gets translated, if its the same social/economic breakdown of customers, what things they serve, all that. And also the airconditioning was soothing in a land full of sweaty smelly crap.
After a delightful and yet disgusting meal, we decided to continue our western eastern adventure andw ent to the cinema. We chose Pride and Prejudice, as camp and wonderful as they come. But again it was brilliant to see how its all done, India style. We had to buy tickets as if it were a theater, paying different prices for better seats, and then we all had to rise for the national anthem and there was an intermission and crazy women flipfloppng loudly down the stairs at key moments like when darcy confesses his love for elizabeth and the snack were all meaty. It again was AWESOME. Rob and I were practically skipping as we walked along to go check email and find some food and then it happened.
It had been such a lovely day. We were both so excited about how so many little things could have felt so fulfilling and how pleased we were with our time in Mumbai when we were stopped by a man named Polo.
Polo was a spotter for one of the TOP bollywood films and he wanted us to be in it! We would be picked up at 8am, it would take the whole day, they would feed us and pay us. We were about to become bollywood stars.
We rushed to the train station practically shaking from excitement and by practically I mean definetly shaking from excitement. Its what everyone hopes for when they come to mumbai. Westerners walk around all day looking for spotters, trying desperately to get noticed and we just bloody walked right into it. We changed our tickets, got a room and tried to sleep, cause we knew that we had quite the exciting day ahead of us, quite the exciting day...
posted by Maya J. Gat @ 8:46 PM
1 Comments:
At 7:36 AM,
Anonymous said…
ahh my cousin is becoming a star in india before i become one in the U.S. and maya how many lines did you have in this movie i'm wondering and it's probably in the indian language so basically they are telling you to say stuff in a different language that you don't understand.
-shelly
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