Mazgoan. Mumbai.

There’s a charm to it. A craziness that I hope is not found elsewhere in the world. A momentum that is independent of external forces.  A sense of direction. A purpose. With various facets of life co-existing side by side. An air that lends itself a lingering a mark of all that has been. And pictures that narrate a story. A different one each time. Gullies that take you into brazen places. Bakeries engulfed in wafts of mouth-watering preparations. Cobbled streets in these modern times. And jhopris right next to towering edifices. Unorganised traffic. Vendors selling chana batata, fruits, chaat and popcorn made in sand along those crooked roads. Potholes, gutters, muck and overflowing sewage water. At the same time high rises towering up above you. People bustling in and out of each other and making their way purposefully winding through a sea of more people to come. The eyes of the buses stare and then stoop and once again stare and then stoop; intermittently. The trains slide in and out of stations. A place where I grew up with my school at an arm’s length away and the docks at a stone’s throw away from my house. And till today, I can hear the church bells ring at noon. Mazgoan. Mumbai – The city that is a synonym to life and still pulsates at every hour like I’ve always known it to…