Mumbai, monsoon, magic

Mumbai, Monsoon, Magic

We are in the middle of October. Monsoon is acting as a reluctant bride, sulking and demurring to leave the parental home. As much as we love the monsoon magic of Mumbai, watching the fury of the southwest monsoon pouring rains with thunder and lightning in the middle of October appears surreal. There is nothing unseasonal about thick streaks of water pouring from the sky endlessly. One moment we are under a canopy of blue sky and in next it morphs into the brooding, thick slate-grey clouds, the way life alters at times; wholly, suddenly, dramatically.

Mumbai’s romance with the monsoon begins in the month of June with an uneasy and apprehensive wait with everyone constantly looking at the sky for clouds mounting the city’s skyline.

Sitting on a park bench after my walk, I gaze towards the blue sky and the Arabian Sea and imagine the advanced guard of the monsoon about to herald its arrival. I almost smell the scent of the rain; visualize southwest wind cresting the waves.

Rains are a part of the annual calendar of Mumbai. The city loves rains as much as it does cricket, movies, and chilled beer. Rains wash away the city’s dirt, grime, and sins. It unfolds an exhilarating display of freshly washed, sparklingly clean Victoria Terminus, wet and empty Marine Drive amidst windswept baby palms, and millions of umbrellas bobbing up & down outside Churchgate.

The Arabian Sea gets a gift of life that harsh summer had snatched away. The rains bring respite from perennial humidity and allow us simple souls to open old stock of whiskey. Friends heatedly debate plans to visit waterfalls in Aravalli hills.

In return for such glory, the people of Mumbai are willing to suffer the pain of late trains, the ignominy of wet cloths and soaked socks, bed roads, muddy puddles, snarled traffic, and leaky roofs. Much as we want to romance the rains, we know that it will take over and twist our lives. But we are ready to take chaff with the wheat, good with the ugly. Life is like that.

Mumbai prepares for the rains as a student prepares for an exam. Municipality announces the calendar of the fury of rains and high tides for the monsoon season. You will find a clipping of this news stuck on the refrigerator of every home in the city. By end of May, old umbrellas are dusted and brought down from the attic. House is inspected for any leakage and attended if there is one.

Unlike Paris, Mumbai is not the city of awnings. So all shops and restaurants put up blue tarpaulin awnings by the season. Slums too use a blue tarp to cover huts and makeshift homes. If you are landing at Mumbai airport by early June, your eyes will feast on a sea of these blue tarp awnings. It is as if the city changing its skin.

Rains provide new lease of life to me as well. My restless soul gets a reprieve from the torment of summer. Joyously, I watch the majestic and awe-inspiring fury of rains from my window as monsoon settles in. The sea beyond the lush green railway colony below churns as if to seek release from the tyranny of its destiny. I marvel at the grand design of the changing season, breathing in the subtle scents of the new rains.

I am lucky. I attain nirvana every monsoon.

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