Mumbai (Fri 20th - Thurs 26th March)

Indian Railways is the biggest employer in the world with 1.6 million staff and you cannot come to India without experiencing at least one train journey. Our hotel in Delhi booked us on the Friday 16 hour overnight express train to Mumbai. We were under the impression that we would be travelling first or at the very least second class with our own sleeper. When we boarded the train we realised that the hotel had been less than honest and found ourselves sharing a coach with about 60 other people. Admittedly we did have a bunk and air conditioning but they were the only pluses. The dirty toilets and cockroaches didn't help either. We did manage to get some sleep but were more than happy to escape the train early Saturday morning and catch a taxi to our hotel.

To be honest a week in Mumbai is far too long for the average sightseeing tourist but the logistics of staying somewhere else on route was just too complicated. We got round this problem by staying 3 days in a cheaper hotel in the tourist area of Colaba, sightseeing, and then checking into the 5 star Taj President hotel spending most of the time by the hotel pool or eating in their Italian and Thai restaurant - enjoying a very non-Indian experience.

After the horrors of the north we were a little apprehensive about Mumbai so it came as a pleasant surprise to find a city with real roads and pavements and shops that you would be happy to enter. It is also on the coast which gives it an extra dimension. Although there are slum areas on the outskirts of the city, the centre and tourist areas are a vast improvement on Delhi and Rajasthan. It is still very crowded (17 million) and a bit chaotic but there are no cows cluttering up the streets and the rickshaws have been replaced by black and yellow cabs (55,000 to be exact !)

On our first day we took a 3 hour taxi ride round some of the main tourist sights of the city including the Gateway of India, the Jain Temple, the Ghandi Museum (where he lived for 17 years), Marine Drive, Chowpatti Beach, Malabar Point and some local parks. Our second day was spent in the Prince of Wales Museum or Chhatrapati Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya as it is now officially called (just slips off the tongue). The third day we took a cab to Victoria Terminus (or Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus) the main railway station in Mumbai built by the Raj.The architectural style was described by one journalist as "Victorian-Gothic-Saracenic-Italienate-Oriental-St Pancras-Baroque".

We had afternoon tea one day at the poshest hotel in Mumbai, the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower. It was one of the two hotels attacked by terrorists last November but it was only closed for 40 days and is now back in business.That same evening we had dinner at the nearby Leopolds, one of the most popular restaurants in the city which also came under attack. You can still see the bullet holes inside the restaurant.

Our only other excursion was a "slum tour" of Dharavi in northern Mumbai. This maze of dilapidated shacks and narrow smelly alleyways is home to more than 1 million people. An average of 15,000 share a single toilet. However it is also home to about 15,000 businesses mainly recycling soap, aluminium cans, plastic, cardboard and many other things. We walked through both the industrial and residential areas and although it was depressing you had to admire the attitude and hard work of most of the people we saw. Returning to our 5 star hotel was a rather weird experience.

Finally a few other observations on life in India.

·You are pestered by beggars all the time not only in the street but also in the back of taxis. Frankly I don't have a lot of sympathy for them. Most of them are professional beggars. It is usually either a women with a baby in her arms or more likely a child under 10 who has been sent to beg by his/her parents and told not to return home until they have collected a certain amount of money.

·Since the attacks in November India has become more security conscious.You see armed police/security guards at many shops, ATM machines, hotels and restaurants. It may sound a bit over the top but it does make you feel very safe and I have never felt in danger or under threat at any time in our stay here.

·It is fairly unusual to see women in western dress of jeans and tee-shirt. The vast majority of women wear the sari for almost every occasion. It is the opposite with men with most wearing western garb and only a few in the traditional gear.

They say you either love or hate India. Hate is probably too strong a word for my feelings but let's say I cannot see myself returning in the near future and I definitely would never ever want to live in this country. If we had visited the country at the beginning of our trip then we might have been more receptive and had a more positive experience but after 6 months travelling we were a bit travel weary and India is hard work when you are counting the days to your return.