lowlight #1: asking our driver (balu...yes as in the loveable bear from jungle book) if he had been waiting long and having balu respond with "i don't speak english"...holy s&$#!!!...we're in a completely different area that we know nothing about and we have a driver that we can't communicate with...this will be exciting...
lowlight #2: pulling into the king's international hotel and realizing that their website was way nicer than the hotel itself...a recurring theme of this trip was that bombay must have been a pretty hot spot back in the day (during brit rule) and has now been left to rot...
lowlight #3: having our rather stern sikh bellhop show us to our room and seeing a queen sized bed for all three of us...what would make the desk clerk think that three (and as far as he was concerned 4 because we had met another googler on the plane) guys would share a queen bed???...luckily...this was rectified fairly quickly...
lowlight #4: showing up to the hotel restaurant (whose food was actually quite good) and finding out that because it was india's independence day and as a result is a dry day (and i mean dry as in the town that kevin bacon moved to in footloose)...so we couldn't order booze with lunch...
lowlight #5: did i mention we weren't going to be able to get alcohol for the ENTIRE DAY!?!?!?!...
lowlight #6: walking to juhu beach (pictured) and realizing that it wasn't the spot for "the rich and famous" like the brochure said...
lowlight #7: calling local hotspots to see if anyone was breaking the dry day rule and being told a resounding "NO!!!"
lowlight #8: did i mention we weren't going to be able to get alcohol for the ENTIRE DAY!?!?!?!...
lowlight #9: finding out that our driver may not even be from mumbai because he didn't know where a particular chain restaurant that is located all over the world (no...not mcdonald's) and known to be a tourist destination (i'm not mentioning names to protect the innocent)...and when passerbys explained to him how to get there...he still couldn't figure it out...i'm not sure balu spoke ANY language...
lowlight #10: having the driver lean across me (practically crushing my family jewels with his elbow) so he can yell at an auto-rick driver who was getting a little close for comfort...said auto-rick driver had one of those maniacal gleams in his eyes coupled with a nervous tick which made me think i'd be getting a machete through the skull at any moment...if jihad puts the video on yoeutube i'll link to it...
lowlight #11: playing dumb by ordering beer at the aforementioned well-known chain restaurant...having the waiter walk away like it was all good...then having him return to let us know that it was a dry day...
lowlight #12: did i mention we weren't going to be able to get alcohol for the ENTIRE DAY!?!?!?!...
highlight #1: having the waiter at afformentioned well-known restaurant chain tell us that we could order mixed drinks...HOORAY!!!...our prayers have been answered...jihad rationalized it thusly...they wouldn't serve beer to us because beer doesn't look like anything else...but mixed drinks could look like coke or in my case a ginger ale (whiskey and 7) so if the authorities came by they'd be none the wiser...this is why i won't mention the restaurant by name...
lowlight #13: finding out that mr. rohan (balu's boss and our "handler") doesn't speak english either...
lowlight #13: asking our wonderful balu to drive us around downtown and be greeted by a blank stare...
lowlight #14: arriving to the "gateway of india" (pictured) and finding it under construction...
highlight #2: watching jihad haggle with the balloon salesman...trying to get ten balloons for the price of 1...that was priceless...
highlight #3: finding a sports bar...drinking beer...watching cricket...and shooting pool...
lowlight #15: coming to a complete stop every time balu saw me take my camera out then driving at 5 mph for ten minutes after i took the picture...
lowlight #16: honking from balu for no apparent reason...greg swears he honked at a tree once...
lowlight #17: dealing with the communication gap making me not excited to go anywhere...we went to haji ali which is this really cool mosque out on a peninsula (pictured)...normally this would be something right up my alley but i just couldn't get into it...
lowlight #18: ending up at a shopping mall...watching jumprope contests while jihad and greg picked up a snack...i know jumprope contests shouldn't be considered a downer...but it was at this point that i felt like hurling my guts out and started getting shivers and sweats...
lowlight #19: spending the rest of the evening alternately peeing from my butt-hole/curling up in the fetal position/watching the olympics/wanting to die...this has to be the mother of all food poisonings...
lowlight #20: having jihad scream at balu because all balu wants to do is take us to the airport even though our flight wasn't till almost 7 and we wanted to go shopping...we had just driven past a killer bazaar and balu couldn't even figure out how to go back to it...completely ridiculous...
there's a lot more...but i'm actually growing tired of being so negative...all in all...it was quite possibly the three most painful days i've spent in my life...i still haven't fully recovered from the food poisoning and now i've got a head cold to boot...i can't wait to come home...
pleasant dreams...
No comments:
Post a Comment