Adventures in Bombay, Part 2

So when i last wrote, I was preparing to go on a road trip with Zahir to Lonavla. We left bright and early Saturday morning (his friend Burges picked us up at 7am) and met up with his girlfriend and her parents before heading up the Expressway. The drive was about 2 hours, and around 90 minutes into the drive, we stopped at a food court to grab a quick bite. As we were leaving, we stopped near the entrance, where there were random signs that caught our eye.


So naturally, we had to take one.


So Lonavla was pretty sweet. The weather was awesome. My cousin and his friends thought it was too hot, but to me, it was perfect. We spent much of the afternoon playing basketball outside, although the ball was sorta flat. But it was better than not having a ball at all.


In the evening, Burges and his girlfriend played badminton in the courtyard.


During the day, we ventured into town to buy supplies for the house. Even though Zahir and I were planning to head back to Bombay the next day, the rest of the crew is actually still up there and plan to be there until the 3rd. In fact, Zahir is packing as I write and is heading back up for a few days.
While we were shopping, we stopped for lunch. One of the funnier things I've seen in a long time occurred in the bathroom.

The toilet was fighting back.

In the evening, when it started to cool down, Burges was hellbent on starting a bonfire in the courtyard. The servants in charge of the cottage actually made the process extremely easy. They gave us a bowl and twigs. The flame was crazy, at least for the first few minutes.


The twigs just didn't want to hold the flame. We tried pouring some whiskey on the flame, but that was good for a two-second thrill.



Something I've wanted to do each of the years I've been here is photograph Marine Drive. We use the road everyday, but we've just never had the time to stop at night. So the last two nights, I've had my cousin stop the car along Marine Drive so that I could take photos.
The ring of lights along the long stretch of road is commonly known as the Queen's Necklace, and from elevated locations, looks spectacular. My cousins friend is going to try to get me onto the roof of her building along Marine Drive.
For now, I've photographed Marine Drive from each side. Since i didn't bring a tripod with me, I've had to try to handhold these long exposures. The longest I can do is one second.





I love it here. I know tourists are being warned to not come here, but if you ever have a chance, you should make the trip. It may not be my home, but when I'm here, I feel at home.
Today, I'm going to my dads' family's place to hang out with my cousin Sarah. One of my favorite aunts is coming to visit.
Tomorrow, I'm taking Sarah to Bandra to visit a couple more aunts.

I hope everybody has a safe New Years. Because of the events of last New Years and the terrorist attacks, most of the New Years parties over here have strict curfews of 12:30am. For those not familiar with the events from last year, there were multiple occurrences of molestation of women around Bombay. One occurred at The Gateway of India, and another happened in Juhu. Both were front page news for days.

The next time you hear from me, it will probably be 2009. I'm pretty satisfied with the way 2008 went. I'm sure 2009 will bring more new experiences. Old chapters will finally close and new chapters of my life will hopefully open up.

Take care,
Ali

Greetings From Mumbai

Well, that was quite the trip.
I got into Mumbai this morning at about 10am, roughly three and a half hours after I was supposed to land. The plane was ready to go, but believe it or not, the cabin crew was not.
My flight out of SFO on Wednesday was delayed because one of the alternate pilots was caught in bad weather coming to San Francisco.
I'm still amazed by the airport in Mumbai. It takes 3 minutes to get through Immigration, but 45 minutes for all your bags to get to baggage claim.
Today was sort of a chill day. Took calls from a lot of my aunts, who want to see me. Got a few meetings to strategically plan out.
Tomorrow morning, I going with my cousin Zahir on a one day road trip, so I should have some interesting photos from that. We have to get back for a big dinner Sunday night and a wedding reception on Monday. I'll probably have photos from that as well.

More later.

Ali

Stuart and John

This is my story on Stuart Gaffney and John Lewis. They got married on June 17th, 2008, at City Hall in San Francisco. They have been together for about 21 years and recently celebrated their one-month anniversary of their marriage.
The story spans around three weeks of the lives.

Discovering Polk Street

This is my neighborhood project on Polk Street in San Francisco. I didn't know much about the area going into this project, but I found out that Polk Street used to be the old gay neighborhood before the younger gay crowd migrated to The Castro about 20 years ago. I met some interesting people and learned something new about a part of San Francisco.


For a bigger version, go to:
http://alithanawalla.webng.com/PolkStreet_BIG/

Favorite Team, I Renounce You.

Sorry. Business is business.

Today. I got an email from a colleague, Matt Smith, asking me to answer a question for him. He gave me free reign to ramble. He knows me better than I thought.

Matt asked me if, and when, it's okay to renounce your favorite sports team. It's basically one of those things when you can't take it anymore. Or they just do something that either breaks your fan heart, or you think is the dumbest move possible.
Well, here is what I wrote for Matt:

I think it's okay to renounce your favorite sports team, but with a few conditions.
First, you can not, under any circumstances, return to rooting for that team. You can't grow up rooting for the Knicks, then renounce them because of Isiah Thomas, and then come back in five years when they start winning again. Once you give them up, they are as good as gone.
Second, you have to fully commit to the new team of interest. You must become part of their 'Nation.'
With that said, I will give my personal experience. And I will state for the record that if I hadn't renounced this team 10 years ago, I would have surely done so in the last four years.
Growing up in the Bay Area in the late 80's and early 90's, I was an Oakland A's fan. When you're a kid, you're influenced by your parents. My dad was (and still is) a huge A's fan, and he always liked Mark McGwire. So naturally, Big Mac became my favorite player. In 1996 and the beginning of 1997, there were grumblings that the A's were going to trade him. At the time, I didn't understand the business of the game. All I knew was that the A's were going to trade my favorite player. When they finally traded him to St. Louis, I was devastated. The fact that he gave St. Louis the thrill of watching the Great Home Run Chase of 98 and not the fans he grew up with in Oakland really hurt me. Not that that was his fault.
After the A's traded McGwire, I silently renounced my loyalty to the A's. I couldn't root for a team that traded my favorite player. Now, admittedly, I didn't have a backup team to fall back on. I guess you could say I was a free agent for about one year.
During the 1998 season, I spent a lot of my time with my best friend at the time, and he too was having a team loyalty crisis. He grew up in a Giants household, but at times, I knew him to be a fan of the Cubs, Mets and Yankees. It was his love of the Yankees that caught my eye. At the time, I wasn't aware of the hatred for the Bronx Bombers, but watching them on TV was awesome. So I stuck with the Yankees, and my best friend fell back to the Giants. But it was too late. I decided to stick with the Yankees.
Watching guys like Jeter and Tino and Bernie, they effectively signed me a Lifetime contract.
But, even if I hadn't renounced the A's after the Big Mac trade, chances are I would have kicked them to the curb in the last few years. I don't know how I'd be able to root for a team that continues to ship out, or elect not to re-sign, its best players, year after year. Rather than spend money they surely have, they trade players at the height of their popularity, or let players leave via free agency at the peak of their careers. Hudson and Mulder were traded at the height of the Big Three. Giambi and Tejada were allowed to walk away after winning MVP's. I don't know how A's fans continue to put up with the current management. This offseason, they traded away their two most popular players, Dan Haren and Nick Swisher. Were either close to free agency? No. Did either have a big contract? No. They were traded so that the A's could rebuild. Hello? Mr. Beane? Rebuild with Haren and Swisher!
So do I think a fan can renounce their team? Of course. But you better be damn sure about it. It needs to be a well thought-out decision. So if you're going to change loyalties, choose wisely. There is no bandwagon-jumping.


Take it easy,
Ali

I probably shouldn't have read that article...

The day before I was to leave Bombay, I read an article on MSNBC.com about the worst airports in the world. I was already upset about leaving my family (and the warm weather), so reading that Shivaji Airport in Bombay and Liberty Airport in Newark rank as two of the worst airports in the world in terms of delays, didn't make me feel much better.

And, they lived up to the hype. Security was nutty in Bombay. The check-in process took at least 45 minutes. Immigration took 20 minutes, and I swear I was behind two guys that were trying to hide something. Don't know what it was, but they kept checking with each other on the reason for their visit to Bombay. I think they settled on "Business."
With the two security checkpoints that we were required to go through to get to our plane, there should be no way that anyone is able to sneak anything on the plane that shouldn't be there...except the bottle of orange juice that I had in my bag that made it all the way to New Jersey before the secutiry screener there said I wasn't allowed to have it in my bag and promptly threw it away. Another funny thing: The lady that went through secutiry before me in New Jersey had her bag searched because the screeners though she had a 12 inch wrench in her bag. When they opened her bag and opened the box in question, they found a 12 inch wrench...a 12 inch chocolate wrench. I guess if they make chocolate cigars, they can make chocolate wrenches.
Anyway, back to Bombay. It took people so long to get through the security process in Bombay, that our flight get off the ground 30 minutes after the schedule departure. That wasn't good news for me considering that I had only a 90 minute stop in New Jersey.
As expected, we landed about 20 minutes late in Jersey, and as we were taxiing to the gate, the captain stopped the plane, turned off the engines and said that we were going to have to be towed into the gate. We were scheduled to land at 5:25am EST, and I didn't get off the plane until about 6:10. By the title I got through Customs, it was 6:25. And I still hadn't claimed my bags and rechecked them. I was hoping that Continental would throw us a bone and hold the 7am flight, but I guess that was asking a bit too much. Who am I kidding. They don't even give Economy class those travel toothpastes (only 1st class gets that) so why should I have expected them to hold a half empty flight made even more empty by the lack of passengers coming from Bombay.
So I got my bags and, at 7:15, went to the Transfer Desk only to find out that they 8:45 flight was booked. So I had to wait until 11:45. And as compensation for missing my flight, I was given a $12 food voucher good at any of the fine eating establishments in the airport, like McDonalds, Dunkin Donuts or Ben and Jerry's, which were about the only things up at 7:30am. Of course the Steak House isn't open when I have house money.

With all of the said, I am home. While I'm happy to be home, and excited to get back to school, I do already miss my family. It's a good feeling to wake up in the morning and see women in the house, especially two women that remind me so much of my mom. I've been back 24 hours and I already miss that.

I didn't have any time over the last few days, so I've got a backlog of photos to post.

On the 17th, I went to Bandra with Mumtaz Aunty, Sarah's mom to see her uncle(my grandmother's brother) and his wife. On the way back to Colaba in the evening, we drove by the Mahim slums. It's amazing that people can live in these conditions. Even more amazing is that across the road from these slums were beautiful condos.



Something That really irritated me(Zahir found my irritation to be amusing) was that in preparation for the 5th annual Mumbai Marathon, city workers were painting crosswalks on the road. Anybody that's been to Bombay, or seen video Bombay for that matter, knows that people cross wherever they need to. You just wait for an opening in the traffic, and cross. If you told people there that they needed to walk to the end of the block and cross there, they'd start laughing...then cross the road. I thought it was just a waste of money and time to paint crosswalks on roads in Bombay.


While Bombay may be one of the quickest developing countries in the world, there is still loads of poverty. The slums are eye-popping. I had to do a double take when I saw those kids playing the trash(bottom photo).



I think the funniest thing I saw was this poor fella sleepin' on the back of a parked ambulance. But when you're tired, you'll sleep just about anywhere. Maybe that's why we have couches in the labs.


I've got sunset photos from my last evening, but I will post them later. Time to go to bed. Back to the business of work and school in morning.

Take it easy,
Ali

Public Display of Affection is Prohibited - 1/15/2008

Seriously people. Read the sign. Where do you think we are? America?
This is the area just behind my aunt's house. There is a tiny wall in front of the water that people sit on at night. India sure has changed over the last few years. Years ago, it was unheard of for couples to hold hands in public, let alone show any sort of affection towards each other. It's gotten so out-of-hand that there are sex advice columns in the daily Mumbai Mirror.

So my trip is winding down. I haven't posted anything in a few days because, well, I haven't accomplished much since late last week. There were days where we didn't leave the house. I wasn't too happy about it either of those days, but we were waiting for things to be delivered, so we really had no choice. The days I did leave the house, there was nothing interesting to photograph.

On Friday, I finally got to meet my cousin Sana, whom I hadn't really seen since 2001. We saw each other for about an hour on my first of these solo trips in 05-06. Last year, we just couldn't coordinate properly. This year, her brother Zain and I made a point to get together with Sana at least once. She has a new baby, 7-month-old Uzair, to go along with 5-year-old Naba. Naba was your typical 5-year-old, full of energy and attempting to get away with anything. Uzair was your typical toddler, crawling everywhere. And he took to the camera. He kept reaching for it and looking at it. He was a natural in front of the camera. Ladies and gentlemen, meet Uzair.


Today, we ventured to Kharghar, once again, in search of a new residence for Rahim. And once again, we're on the fence about the place we looked at today. It's a multi-level row house, rather than the single-level flats we've been looking at. Nice place. Crazy owner. Interesting possibilities. There is a chance that if Rahim and his buddy decide to take this place, that the owner could sell the garage area to a business person and allow them to run a food stand, or dance classes, out of the bottom level of Rahim's apartment. It'd be like having an apartment on top of a restaurant, and having to go through said restaurant to enter and leave your apartment. I would hope that they would at least give him free dinner when he comes home.

Anyway, this place was in a back alley off the main road. As we were walking back to the car, I saw these kids playing in the middle of the road. Not exactly ideal conditions for children to be running around in if you ask me. Behind me, there was a large mound of gravel and rocks that a couple kids kept running up.


The drive home was accompanied by a beautiful sunset. I may tell a few people that they are my best friends, but the truth is, the Sunset is my real best friend. To those select few, I'm sorry, but the truth had to come out sooner rather than later. These guys were playing cricket along the lake. They have their very own McCovey Cove.


The drive features miles and miles of open land...and powerlines. Not quite sure what the powerlines are powering.


Then there was a long stretch where we were basically chasing the sun. Even our Family friend Tushar, who was driving, kept asking me if he should stop so I could take pictures. It was that awesome.


Alright, well, that's all I got for now. I hope this makes up for the lack of posts over the weekend. Hopefully I'll have a few more photos to show you guys before I leave Sunday night. Rahim is finally coming back to spend a few days here. Fortunately or unfortunately, it's the last two days I'm here. The Mumbai Marathon is Sunday morning. Going to try to get up early and get some action shots.

Take it easy,
Ali

PS - Whatever you do, don't waste your money on the new National Treasure movie with Nicolas Cage. Absolutely worthless. Plot was horrible, and it felt like they tried to take pieces of the Bourne series, the Ocean's series and the Indiana Jones' series and make one mega movie. But it failed horribly. Horribly! I joked with Zahir and his friend Harsh, that the best scene was the last scene, which had nothing to do with the story line.

I love me some Steak Sizzler - 1/9/2008

Weeks prior to my trip, I couldn't stop thinking about, or for that matter, talking about the Steak Sizzlers at Kobe in Bombay. When Zahir kept telling me that he'd pay me back for all the things I brought him, I told him to just take me to Kobe once or twice. That would more than make up for everything. Well, while we've talked about going to Kobe almost every night I've been here, Zahir's work schedule hasn't allowed him to get home early enough to go.
So when my cousin Zain (from my dad's family) said he wanted to take me out for dinner tonight and mentioned that there was another sizzler place, Yoko Sizzlers, in Fort near all the banks, I knew that was the place we had to go. I ordered the pepper steak. Ya, it's that good. They give a lot of fries and the piece of steak is pretty big, although you can't see it in the photo because there is a mountain of fries. You have to eat a lot of the fries before you can even start on the steak. So by the time you get to the steak, you've already eaten a lot. Eventually, and sadly, I had to sacrifice the fries in order to finish the steak, which I did. Good stuff. Now I Zahir and I have to go to Kobe next week. You can put good money on the fact that I will be skipping breakfast and lunch that day.


After Zain and I left Yoko, he took me for a joyride by the Gateway of India. Unfortunately, the Gateway is having some surgery done, so they've fenced the entire area off. But don't tell that to the horses pulling the Victorian carriages. Even though the biggest tourist attraction in the city is closed, they still have to work down there. This horse needed to refuel. Should have bought him a Yoko Sizzler.


One of the funnier things I've seen here (and I've seen some crazy things) happened while we were driving through downtown Colaba. In front of us was one of those horse-drawn carriages, going fairly slowly (maybe the horse was low on fuel?). All of a sudden, these two kids, one boy and one girl, probably no more than 10 years old each run by our slow-moving car. At first, I couldn't figure out where they were running to, but when they got to their destination, I couldn't help but laugh...and take photos.
They had caught up with the carriage, and grabbed onto a bar on the back of the carriage and pulled themselves onto the axle of the carriage.
Yep, they were hitchhiking on the back axle of a horse-drawn carriage.
I wish we could have stayed behind them to see how they got off the carriage.


So I'm looking forward to Friday Night. I'm finally going to get to see my cousin Sana, Zain's sister. She's 31, married and has two kids. She moved out of our big house a few years back, so the last two years when I've come here, I haven't had a chance to meet up with her. But Zain and I made a point of it to set something up with her tonight. She has a six month old baby boy, and anyone that knows me knows that I love kids, so I'm counting the minutes until Friday afternoon.

Alright, it's 1am. Zahir is still at work. I know! He's got a hard deadline which has to be met, so he's supposedly staying at the office until 4am to finish his work. This is what happens when you love you work. I forgot to mention that he left the house at about 11am, oh 14 hours ago. Talk about graveyard shift.

Time to go to sleep.

Take it easy,
Ali

P.S. - Big game for the Warriors tonight against the Blazers. Whoda'thunkit that the Warriors and the Blazers in January would be a big game.

A lil ole threat can't stop me - 1/7/2008

The chance that you guys are following the news in Bombay is slim to none, unless it was something major.
The news of a Buddhist monk being murdered in a town called Chembur, which is somewhere between here (Colaba) and Kharghar, was an incident that set up minor rioting/protesting in some small rural towns on Sunday. Things were lit on fire, but not a whole lot came of the protests.
This afternoon, we got a call from Rahim, saying that there were more riots today in Chembur, and that there may be some activity closer to us. We kept checking every news channel, but nobody was reporting any rioting anywhere. In fact, I've been checking the websites all evening, and still, no one is reporting anything.
Anyway, after Rahim called us to warn about possible riots in Bombay, my first natural instinct was to ask our family friend, Tushar, if he would take me to the major areas that we frequently go to so I could take pictures. And of course, the natural instinct of Shehnaz Aunty was to say 'NO.' She said to me, "What do I say to your dad if something happens to you? Where do I get another Ali?"
So I was under strict orders to stay in the house.
Until about 4pm when we needed to go to a section of town called Opera House to pay for a microwave that my aunt had ordered from the India Consumer Exhibition we had gone to on Sunday.
I guess the police felt like something might happen, so they were out directing traffic. And this was rush hour, so people were everywhere. It wasn't crazy, but it was crowded. After we paid for her microwave, we walked around and got some snacks from the stands on the side of the road. My aunt has always warned me not to take out my camera. She's scared someone will "flick" it. But I took it out while we were waiting for our orders to be made. Some people looked at me for a minute, trying to figure out what I was doing. Then I started taking photos of the guys making our food and they instantly took a liking to me. I started taking photos of this guy making this sweet thing which was covered in honey. They were fascinated by my camera and after I took each photo, I showed them the picture I had just taken. As I was walking away to go take more photos, the guy handed me a free sample. Pretty good stuff, although it was really sweet, even for me. My cousin told me the name of the food, but I forgot what it already. This photo is of the guy throwing the pastry into the honey batter.


After we got our orders from that side of the road, Samira and Tushar wanted to get some indian burgers from the other side of the road. That meant crossing a busy thoroughfare during rush hour. Kinda like frogger. The food they were getting was taking a while to make, so I told Shehnaz Aunty that I wanted to go back to the center divide and take photos of the traffic and chaos. She agreed, but of course, had to tell me to be careful because somebody riding in one of the buses might reach out the window and "flick" my camera.
Crossing the road is basically a timing thing. You've got to leave the center divide at the right time. The cars will not stop for you and they don't slow down. Usually, they miss your back foot by inches. If you slow up at the last second thinking your safe, you could very easily lose a foot.
I saw these girls getting ready to cross while a couple cars were bunched up around a bus. Tried to use the light from the headlights to rim light them.


This evening, Zahir and I wanted to go out and meet some of his friends. When we told Shehnaz Aunty we were leaving, she yelled at us and told that there was rioting going on and they we needed to stay home. Finally, she just let us go, saying that if something happens to us, she's not responsible. Well, to say the least, nothing happened. In fact, it was pretty dead outside. There weren't as many people out as there usually is. We met his friends at Barista, which is their coffee shop here.

For all the fuss about riots and whatnot, it was extremely quiet. Maybe it's the calm before the storm. I'm not sure. I guess we'll find out.

Alright, it's past 2am here. The BCS Title game is starting in a few hours. Debating whether or not to get up and listen to it on the internet. I said I would if LSU and OSU made it to the game, but now I'm thinking sleep might be more important.

Take it easy,
Ali

Streets of Bombay - 1/5/2008

So today, I spent the day with my cousin Zahir. We went to his relatively new office in Shivri, which is about 30 minutes from our house. The building is in a pretty rural area. The drive there takes you through an area that looks like slums. Now, my cousins will tell you that from the outside, these looks like slums, but on the inside, these 'buildings' are pretty well furnished. I guess when you see satellites on top of the roofs, you have to believe them on some level.


One thing you'll notice about this area is that there are a lot of kids. Most of them are unattended to.


Then there are the sights that still fascinate me. I love seeing the horse-drawn Victorian carriages. But seeing the bulls and cows that rule the roads is still one of my favorite things to observe when I come here.


A place I've always wanted to check out, but have never stopped to explore is the Central Library as you exit Colaba. Everytime we pass it in the car, I just stare at the steps. I keep telling myself that I can get some really cool photos using the steps, but every time we go by it, we're usually en route somewhere, so there is never time to stop. But at night, it's a damn cool sight to see it lit up and people treating the steps like a beach, just hanging out with friends.


Today was a fun day in terms of taking photos. I like take photos that give you guys a sense of what Bombay looks like. While it is one of those "up-and-coming cities," Bombay still has a lot of those rural characteristics, and I think they are interesting to see, especially for people that haven't been here. There is a combination of the rural, the modern and the classic. When you go to Churchgate, you are surrounded by all the Victorian buildings that the British built. There are a lot of state-out-the-art malls popping up everywhere. They are even modernizing Bandra, which I never thought would look good. But somehow, I'm impressed with what has become of the rural city. You get to see a lot of different things throughout Bombay. Every few blocks there is something different. Each area has its own characteristics. I enjoy seeing all these different settings and I love being able to bring you guys there, even if it is briefly.

I hope everybody has a good weekend. It's about 1:15am on Sunday, so it's about time to go to bed.

Take it easy,
Ali

Getting back to the business at hand...sports...

And specifically, why, for the last 10 years, I have not been a fan of the Oakland Athletics.
All those people that spent $20 on Nick Swisher jersey-shirts must now find a new player to support.
Just when Swisher was becoming a leader and a fan-favorite in Oakland, Billy Beane gets rid of him.
This is absurdity at its highest point.
With Danny Haren and Swisher, you had a chance to compete in the AL West, or at least for the AL Wild Card. But by trading away your two best players, you've conceded the 2008 season and probably the 2009 season.
I've never believed Beane when he has said that his #1 goal is to win. If his top priority was to win games (and ultimately World Series), he would not trade away Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder, Dan Haren and Nick Swisher at such young ages.
The Haren trade still baffles me. It's not like he was going to be a free agent after the 2008 season. Beane had locked him up for the next 4 seasons! And at a discounted price.
Sure, Beane may get some of baseball's best prospects in return for the established players he deals away. But is the point of baseball to develop players to a certain point, then deal them for as many prospects as you can? Or is the point of baseball to develop players to help you win Championships? I think it's the latter.
Until Beane can develop players and win with them, I wont jump on the bandwagon that says he is the best General Manager in baseball. Sorry, just not going to happen. He hasn't won anything in my eyes. Once he wins something with the owner-imposed salary cap and with his players, don't tell me he's a great GM. Yes, he's good at taking his star players and dealing them for the whole kit-and-kaboddle, but what does he have to show for it? At some point, you have to stop "building for the future" and let "the future" show that they can win. At some point, you have to stop pointing to one year, saying that this is our one chance and if we don't win this year, we'll blow everything up. Show some patience. Show some faith in your players.
A few years from now, after the A's still haven't won anything, he will probably take a Carlos Gonzalez or a Gio Gonzalez and flip them for a couple of up-and-coming prospects. And he will gain more praise. But for what? Being able to haggle three or four unproven players out of another GM.
I've said it for years, and I will continue to say it: Billy Beane is nothing until he wins a World Series.

Happy New Year - 1/3/2008

I wish I could say that I have some great photos to post, but I haven't been able to get out and shoot a lot of stuff. My family is very protective of me, making it hard to convince them to let me go out and photograph.
I've tried contacting the people running the project to cut down those trees, but they haven't responded. My cousin Zahir said he'd call some journalists he knows, but there's been some family issues that have arisen that have understandably made my requests his last priority.
I would have had one of the more amazing sunset photos, but a certain Aunt would not let my uncle pull the car over so that I could get out for 2 minutes to take the photo.

On the way back from Bandra on Sunday night, there was major, major traffic. We think we have bad traffic, but this takes the cake. It took two hours to get back to my house in Cuffe Parade. It shouldn't take more than an hour on a normal day.
Anyway, the point of this story is that the traffic was so bad that an Ambulance, with its lights flashing and sirens blarring, could not find room to get through. Cars had nowhere to go. They couldn't pull over to let the Ambulance to get to wherever it needed to go. We don't know if they had somebody in the Ambulance or if they were on the way to pick somebody up, but either way, the traffic may have prevented someone from living. Crazy stuff.

So it happened again. A woman was groped and molested on New Years Eve in Bombay. Last year, it was the big story. This year, it happened near Juhu Beach, which is one of the best beaches in the area. It happened as the women and their dates where leaving some 5-star hotel. A big group of men started talking trash to the women, so one of the girls cursed at him, then the group of men pounced on them. Somehow, there were two photographers from the Mumbai Mirror newspaper at the scene and one of them got a shot of one of the guys pulling up the dress of one of the girls.
The photographers took their photos to the police and helped lead to the arrest of several suspects, but now, amazingly, the two girls refuse to file police reports and want the police to leave them alone, meaning that the suspects in custody may be let out without punishment.

Surprisingly, Bombay wasn't very crowded on New Years Eve. Samira believes that around 75% of the people that are usually roaming around went out of town for the weekend.
After our New Years dinner, we went for a drive along Marine Drive, the major road along the water. We missed most of the fireworks while we were trying to get to Marine Drive.
We kept going past this car with these two small girls that were shouting 'Happy New Year,' so I took some photos of them. The funny part was, the girl in the backseat loved the camera, but the girl in the front seat would look at me, say 'Happy New Year' but then cover her face when I was taking photos.

Went to Churchgate today with my aunt and cousin to do some business stuff, shop and eat. Here are a couple picture of the many churches.



That's about it for now. Saw on CNN last night that oil prices are over $100 for the first time. Samira and I were talking about how much people are going to start complaining because gas prices are going to shoot up now. The reports last night already had prices going up 4 rupees per liter here.

Take it easy,
Ali