Bombay is the city I love – a city that like millions I have come to call my own. Decades ago when I came to this city, uprooted from the quiet leafy lanes of Pune, I resented its brashness, the rush and the noise. How I longed to go back to a life more laid back, when we could cycle to school and relax in the garden. Here in our tiny little flat with its two square foot of balcony with just enough room for the lone potted plant, I felt claustrophobic in a space that smelt of the neighbours’ curry.
Bombay was a city where people stood in a queue and waited for the bus. Mumbai is a city where people rush through red lights, drive on the wrong side of the road and crowd around a bus stop in a mad melee.
Bombay was a city where the summers were still cool and you, as a woman could walk around in shorts in the middle of the road at any time of day. Mumbai is a city where summer temperatures touch 40 and even shorts in the club can elicit long stares.
While much has changed in the Mumbai that was Bombay, there are still some things that are essentially Bombay – like the sultry summer afternoons when all you can do is sleep, the ease with which you can travel by public transport, the brun maska in Irani joints where crotchety owners tell you not to dawdle, the fish wallahs who stink up the lifts with fresh fish delivered to your door, the early morning rush that has everyone working double time, the crows that perch outside your window and caw raucously just as you’re falling asleep, the dabbawallahs who deliver your lunch day after day with surgical precision, the umbrellas that flip over in the strong monsoon winds, the roads that clog up at least once every rains, the Gateway of India with tourists that throng, the walks down Marine Drive that accommodate all.
But above all, there is the spirit of Bombay that exists in Mumbai, a devil may care attitude for all those who come to seek their fortunes in this city by the sea. The spirit that makes people wade through waist high water just to get to work, people who get back on their feet even after a bomb blast, people who don’t give a second glance at any VIP who whizzes past, people who walk purposefully on their way with no time to waste, who cherish a city that’s vibrant 24 hours of the day.
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Twenty- five Seven 
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