25-Jan-2026, With the Indian wedding behind us, it’s now time to focus (and write) on all the other things I did in Mumbai. Sara and I mostly roam around the streets and do some random sightseeing. With random I mean going around without a fixed plan. This mostly happened before the wedding, but since the wedding is the primary reason to go to India, it deserved to be the first ‘Indian’ story on my blog.

Sara and I are staying in the Fort area of Mumbai, you could say this is (or close to) the ‘old town’ from the colonial era. It is the perfect spot to explore the city by foot and we zigzagged our way through the small and bustling streets of Mumbai. We are getting a good glimpse of the local way of living here on the streets.

We visit the highlights in this lively city and we stumble upon old colonial buildings; they are massive and impressive. I always enjoy looking at these old majestic buildings, they have so much more character compared to modern buildings. It’s a shame they don’t build like this anymore. The first thing I noticed while walking these streets is the absolute chaos in all traffic. Whether it’s on foot, operating a vehicle or with an animal; there is no structure or order whatsoever. Absolute no civic sense or consideration is given to each other. Nobody cares and it truly is survival of the fittest. They don’t even seem to be aware of others and just push through traffic. This is their way of life, they don’t know any better. Status quo.

Life happens on the street (as it does in most Asian countries); it’s crowded; food stalls and street vendors everywhere, tiny shops in small alleys; and cows roam around freely, No joke! Cows are considered a holy animal in India and are therefore left alone. Going around Mumbai is an interesting and aromatic experience, but these are not always nice aromas. Certain specific or concentrated areas smell pretty bad, but I have to say that overall, it’s not as bad as what I expected, it’s still tolerable. Instead of the smell, what gets to me the most is the heavily polluted air. I’ve never experienced something like this before. After a full day of walking around, I developed an irritated and sore throat with a persistent cough. And it persisted throughout my stay in Mumbai (and other big cities I would visit later). It only cleared up when I traveled to more remote areas and spent more time in nature. Topics for my next story!

After a long day of walking, and after visiting Dhoby Ghat (the world’s largest open-air laundry where 7000 people flog, scrub, dye, and bleach clothes on concrete blocks for 18 to 20 hours a day), Sara and I want to treat ourselves to a nice massage. Unlike these extremely hard-working men at the laundromat, who deserve the real credit, Sara and I are just spoiled and already want a massage after a bit of walking. After a short Google search, I found a decent spa close to our hotel. We hop into a taxi, and we are excited to lie down and get pampered. The spa is up in a small, dark staircase, not very promising but I give it the benefit of the doubt. During all my travels I have often walked down a small or creepy staircase or alley to find a hidden gym. Unfortunately, this was not one of those hidden gems. The toilet was extremely filthy, and the massage rooms didn’t look very proper either. It is dodgy place and alarm bells are ringing. The fact that they only accept cash turns out to be a blessing in disguise. We didn’t have enough cash on us, so we had to go back down and get cash… we never went back.

Despite the debacle with the spa, Sara and I are having a great time going around. We never travelled together but we are getting along very well as friends. It’s fun, easygoing, and without any kind of romantic attraction between us. In fact, we are being each other’s “wingman” to find a match for the other. I tell her about my Tinder matches and for Sara we might find a nice single guy at the wedding.

One of the most memorable trips we take in Mumbai is a guided tour through the Dharavi slums, one of the largest slums in Asia (parts of the Slumdog millionaire movie are recorded here). This is not just a slum with poor people living in a highly congested area. This is a massive, bustling and informal economic hub generating a high income (as a whole), with over 15.000 single room factories that produce a variety of products, especially textiles items. It’s also a place where a lot of recycling and sorting is happening. Even though the living conditions are extremely poor, unhygienic and without any personal space, the people are incredibly resilient with a strong sense of community and there is a very low crime rate. It is remarkable how these people live and even seem to thrive in these small alleys. Whole families live and sleep in just a few square meters. I am deeply impressed and humbled by the visit to such a place. It once again reminds me of how good of a life we have in The Netherlands. I cannot even imagine to be in their shoes. Some call me crazy, but I couldn’t resist to try some food in one of the most unhygienic places of the world. The food being cooked in front of me reassured me to try it. Cooked food usually means bacteria are predominantly eliminated (I would never try fresh food here)

On another occasion we visit the Sanjay Gandhi national park. The “green lungs” of Mumbai. I was looking forward to be spending time in nature and finally breath in some fresh air. But we are in the dry season now, this means it’s hot and of course… dry. Plants and trees are brown and dried out, there is hardly any greenery. Moreover, the city smog has penetrated this park, and I don’t think I got any fresh (unpolluted) air into my lungs. But we had a good time exploring the ancient caves with our guide. The guide shared interesting facts about these ancient carved caves, but after one hour I had enough of his constant stream of information. He did a great job and he knows a lot but I was losing concentration and I wanted to explore on our own. Interesting fact is that these caves have been part of the ancient silk road, or at least that is what the guide claims, I have no idea if it’s true.

In the evenings Sara and I search for the restaurant hot spots to enjoy delicious meals. I enjoy good food, especially healthy food, but I hardly travel for culinary experiences. Mostly I travel to experience the local culture and to see their way of living. And boy, we were blessed with an authentic and cultural experience! An unforgettable evening, so on one of the first nights in India, Jim (my friend that is getting married) invites the whole group for some drinks at “Late Checkout”; a hip cocktail bar. It’s a great opportunity to meet other friends of Jim. As we walk towards the entrance, Sara casually holds her e-cigarette until we are suddenly stopped by the police. We have no idea what is going on, but they keep pointing at the e-cigarette. As it turns out these are completely forbidden in India, we honestly had no idea. The cops started threatening with jail and court and blablabla. While in fact they are only looking for a quick payday; a bribe. This is not my first encounter with cops looking for a bribe (it happened to me in Thailand and Indonesia), so I wasn’t spooked or scared, but it was still very annoying. We wanted to go to the party, and after lots of negotiation we finally did give them a bribe. On hindsight we should have challenged them and agree to go the station and pay the official fine. I am pretty sure they wouldn’t have wanted to go through that trouble. As a matter of fact, we should have reported them to their superior and I am sure they would quickly let us go. In the end we chose the road of less resistance and reluctantly filled the pockets of corrupt cops because we didn’t want the hassle. Next time I will call their bluff. Despite this hiccup at the start of the evening, the night that followed was great. We had some drinks and met many new friends of Jim.

Before I close this story, I would like to share one last experience. On the day of the wedding ceremony – guests are welcome from eight in the morning onwards, as the ceremony starts at nine am. Sara and I want to be well on time and we order a taxi at eight am. The wedding venue is nearby so we should be well on time. Unfortunately, our Uber driver had other plans in store for us…

To start off, on the Uber app we can see he is circling around the hotel for nearly 25 minutes because he couldn’t find the entrance of the hotel, maybe those big signs of the entrance are still not big enough(?). We got slightly impatient and walked down to the road before he would pass us by again. It turns out he is new to Uber and it takes him ten minutes to figure out how the app works and how to use the road directions. Then he manages to navigate us to the wrong address. I don’t know how you mess that one up because all you need to do is follow the app. This was another ten minutes lost. As we noticed he was going in the wrong direction, I jumped into the front passenger seat and gave him directions on where to go. What a morning it was, and with the cherry on top; he claims we didn’t pay him. We ended up in a discussion that the payment is done through the app (online payment), but it didn’t get through to him. In the end the matter was settled by paying him cash (so that meant we paid him twice). It was not worth our trouble to stand our ground, we had somewhere more important to be and we were talking about roughly two euros here. All I can hope is that he does better for his next customer. We missed the group breakfast but at least we were in time for the wedding ceremonies. As you were able to read in my previous post, it was a beautiful and unforgettable experience.

One last thing, on my last day in Mumbai I have a match with a lovely Indian lady on a dating app. Our conversations hit it off, and there seems to be online chemistry, but unfortunately there is no more time for us to meet. I guess now I have a reason to potentially come back to Mumbai and meet this pretty lady.

But first I am following the group to Goa, a place famous for the Arabian sea beaches and a vibrant nightlife. So stay tuned…

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