India 2001 Travel Diary, Part 8

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© 2001 Giles Orr

Saturday 19 May 2001, 1200

Part of the Mumbai waterfront. More pictures from the Elephanta trip here.

On the boat back from the Elephanta Caves. The climb to the caves was brutally hot, but in the shade on the water is pretty nice. The boat ride is very pretty. It will also convince you that Mumbai is both huge and a very active industrial harbour. The ride is thirty or forty minutes.

Last night was ... interesting. I didn't like the way it was organized. We left the hotel at 1730 and went to Jai Hind, where we were given our own personal dance performance. One woman, she had three musicians with her before the break, and danced to a tape afterward. Different costumes before and after the break. It was ... interesting, but I was tired. I sat next to Julia, who was fascinated and took copious notes.

Phil and Marilyn lead the way.

Then we were led to the roof of the building where the president of the school was throwing us a dinner party. We were served so many h'or d'ouvres until so late (2100) that I was fairly sure it was dinner. But no, dinner (a buffet in another area) was eventually served. As we waited, the president wandered around, evidently ecstaticly happy, encouraging us to drink free drinks, and dance. A lot of people did dance - I think Marilyn and Phil got it started. I took a good number of pictures.

My complaint with the organization was that we were getting on the boat at 0800. I would have been happy to drink and party all night otherwise. We left around 2200, and I'm definitely short on sleep.

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by giles