Survival in maximum city

Yesterday was a really bad. In this maximum city, you get more reasons than people in any other city to enjoy life and at the same time you get even more reasons that make your day bad. Irony is that a person who has not been to Mumbai will in his life never understand these reasons. Thats why I love the name "Maximum City" given to Bombay given by Suketu Mehta. You don't even know what you have missed in life unless you spend some time in Mumbai.

I got up a little late last morning, some trouble kept me in the bed till a little late (probably the after effect of the great Mumbai Marathon of last sunday was still there). Some how managed to motivate myself to work and left home by 8:15. My dad/brothers back home in raipur or Friends in any other city will be shocked to know that i call leaving home at 8:15 late. The wonderful AC Special buses the BEST (acronym) has started in Mumbai has served as a big boon for the Mumbaikars like me who hate the lifeline of mumbai... aka the local train. So by 8:20 I was at the bus stop waiting for my AC Bus. I missed the7:55 one and thought will catch 8:20 one and reach office by 9:30 - 9 :45. Was reading 'Mint' which I have heard/read that people who are part of a special community read. Even I feel special when I read 'Mint' not because I love reading it or there are lots of interesting articles to be read but because it makes me feel like a part of 'Mint Readers community'. That is the effect of Media on us. I carry 'Mint' with me on my daily travel, not to read but to show off. I dont know how many people in Mumbai actually bother to even see what the person standing/sitting next to him is doing but i still think someone will notice that I am carrying a 'Mint' and think that this guy looks like some corporate manager-to-be-CEO. Anyways, the mint story later.

So I am happy showing off Mint while playing "Ibn-e-Batuta and Dhan-te-nan" on my earphones. Suddenly i realise that its already 9:15 and i have waited for more than 45 minutes and the bus has still not come. Thats mumbai. If it was Raipur, I would have walked to my shop (which my dad says is quite far from home) in less than an hour. How can I explain that the relation between when you leave home and when you reach office is not linear and simple. If i leave home at 7:50, I reach office at 8:55 while if I leave home by 8:00, there is no way i will reach my office by 9:45. Mumbai teaches you what your parents/teachers could not, the importance of time. I have seen so many people who target 7:52 Borivli-Churchgate local every morning that their life is tuned to it. They can not afford to be 1 min late and the consistency at which they have been taking the same train daily for years/decade really really surprises me and tells me what I know that I am one of the laziest persons here and not made for mumbai. Even if they stay 5-6 kms away from the station and depend on share-auto-rickshaws or busses to reach to local station, they still manage to reach on time.

The same phenomenon happens in the evening as well where I miss my 6:25 bus and have to wait till 7:25 to get the next bus. Its not that there is no bus in that one hour duration that I weight. Its just that Mumbai is trying to teach me a lesson by making sure there is traffic or some mechanical problem with the buses in that duration and I wait till 7:25 just as a punishment for not respecting the timelines and there by not respecting the culture of the city.

Anyways, I take that bus. Cross Siddhivinayak, take forehead and lips with the index finger of mine and ask Ganpati Bappa to take care of me in this maniac city. All through my way, I see hoardings/billboards of Bal Thakrey announcing his birthday on 23rd of January and the celebrations scheduled for the same. I see hundreds of different faces on those faces congratulating The old man who almost ruined this city and is still trying to do it. I was just wondering what do these people get by putting up big billboards all around the city wishing the old many a happy birthday and announcing some cricket competition or some rally or some yagya somewhere. I dont think the old man has the guts/energy to travel the entire city and see what his followers are doing for him. I dont think the public (like me) will ever notice those hundreds of faces in the hoardings. After every 250 odd meters there would a new hoarding with another set of 10-15 new faces wishing their so called tiger a happy b'day. I said f'get it, they must be of those groups where people just like to see their faces anywhere possible and so they spend all this money to see their faces on roads on billboards or may be impress their gals by doing so.

In the evening I meet some contractor who works with my wife(she is an interior designer). This contractor and his team of around 15 odd guys (all present at that place) are all from U.P. and are actually having a good time in Mumbai. A couple of them are involved in some murder cases while most of them are really innocent and cute and don't even know the ABCD of politics or violence. I casually asked him what is he upto these days. He says he is supporting one of his guys who is supporting one of the NCP candidates in the forthcoming elections. I said great. "tumne lalchand ka photo nahi dekha kya thakur complex me", says Mr Sunil the contractor who himself has been involved in a couple of murder cases, is younger than me, owns a flat in mira road, is married and has a hobby of changing mobile phones and bikes every alternate months.

I then thought this might answer some of the questions that came to my mind while on the way watching those hoardings. Apparently, neither the thakrey (or soniya or whoever is being wished) goes around watching these wishes and saying thankyou to all these people nor the common junta watches and is affected by these photos. Interestingly, the local vendors; the chai wallahs, vadapav wallas, fruit and vegetable vallas, pirated CDs vendors, second hand books vendors etc who consider the lanes and by lanes around the main roads(??) as something written to them in their fathers will are the real target segment for these outdoor exhibitions. If your photo is seen in any of these hoardings, you get a licence to collect 'hafta' and you become the owner of that street/area and all these vendors pay you a weekly fee for being allowed to continue their business in these their father owned service lanes. Interesting, I thought. If I put something of this sort promoting Amar Chitra Katha I will have to get permits from various babu's in BMC even if I pay the regular fee for it while these guys get paid for doing so.

The next day I go to the passport application acceptance office. I have been to this place a couple of times while my wife also has been to this place a lot of times. Every time we show our documents to the guy accepting (?) the applications (i.e. if we manage to reach till the counter in 5-6 hours enduring the heat in the long waiting ques) ,the babu has a different objection; "what is the proof that you are mr. Santosh Thourani's wife? - I say the Marriage certificate, he says : "what is the proof that the MC is authentic" -I say i got the original also, he says "the original doesn't look authentic" - I say what can I do about it, you can see the seal and sign of the some office from the Government of Chattisgarh, he says"you need to give a proof saying this certificate is authentic, go to raipur and get an affidavit made"... and this went on for around 10 months. Every time we went there, we were asked for some other document/affidavit. Only I know how many affidavits i finally got made which were still of no use. "are aapne ye affidavit kyu banvaya, marathi me banwane ka tha, aapke photu nahi lagele hain us par... etc etc etc"

Then finally I decided to go to an agent (i had decided i will get the passport without paying any bribes and through a proper system as some body had told me that the system has improved and it is easy to get the passport without any agent or bribes now). I still hate that I had to go through an agent because that I could have done 1 year back also. nevertheless, I go to the agent and he says give me whatever you have. I gave him all the documents and the affidavits I had got made. He threw all of them aside and said only one affidavit will be required and he will get it made and charge 200 Rs. extra for it. "Come the next day with your wife and these original documents to the passport office" he says, he fills the form for me. I go to the passport office at 10:10 the next day, he gives me a filled form and I and my wife sign wherever required. Then we straight away go to the 'babu' accepting the forms. We cross a long cue of around 50-60 people waiting for their turn (i immediately reminded me of my past one year where i was in their shoes a lot of times). The babu is waiting for me, I show him my form and the documents. He doesn't even looks at the original documents. I give him my wife's form and documents, fingers crossed, he says one original document is missing. I say "he he he, sir jee dekh lijiye na, original kahi kho gaya hai", he says "he he he, baggal ke counter par payment kar ke receipt le lo" and my work is done.

The agent calls me and tells me that the form has reached the samta police station (wow, in 2 days) and go there and give a 100 note to the cop and get your documents verified. I go to the police station and give the cop my receipt. He gives me 2 options; (1) pay 500 and all verifications will be done here and no cop will come to my house for further verification. (2) do not pay anything and wait for the cops to come to your house and then pay them there and then come to the station and then again pay me here. I take the first one and he fills all my forms and does everything for me, I make a few signatures and he smiles and the work is done.

Looks like I am learning slowly the tricks of the game called "Survival in the Maximum City"