Contradictions:

The city is a remarkable sight from high up in a plane. Tall buildings sprouting in various directions….and the rest of the area filled with slums. Not an inch spared….it seemed that more people lived in the slums than in proper buildings. In a city so expensive, just how do they manage to survive?

Travelling within the city, I was amazed to find that most buildings were as ancient as life itself….blackened walls, peeling paint, tiled roof, wooden stairs, age-old lifts…..the resemblance to Calcutta old city is just amazing (except for the caged windows here). What I absolutely love is the big sprawling Parsi bunglows on the way to Fort and tiny pretty houses in and around Bandra. For just how long these links to a comfortable past will survive, is a question I do not want to answer.

I also found that there are these perfect little villages right within the city with lush greenery and fields around. Some so isolated that people refuse to travel after nightfall from that area.

I hate the ugliness of the city during the day-time but I love the dream-like sparkling city of the night.

In a city where everybody is rushing, in a tearing hurry….where there is only one chance that you get……its strange how the dream-like ‘another chance’ by roger sanchez, late one night with friends and zipping through another glittering road seemed to hold the very essence of my life here.