Today has been a busy day with work (well, relatively speaking for my time here), which is why I'm not getting around to writing this until 4 pm. Work seems to be picking up - but not nearly to the point where I would be staying super late and missing out on exploring the city. Knock on wood that it continues to be like this...
Last night I had planned to go to a local club called The Blue Frog, which is a landmark in Mumbai for hosting great live music every night. I was going to go with Ami and a group of girls from the office, but we ended up rescheduling at the last minute to go on Thursday night, since the band on Thursday is supposed to be much better. That left Ami and I with no plans for tonight (as I had already turned down Paresh's invitation to go to a movie with him), so we decided to go to a play that Ami had been interested in seeing. It was a play that would be half in English, half in Hindi, so I figured I would enjoy at least half of the production :) The play started at 9, which was good because I had a call with some US colleagues that went until 7:30. Ami estimated the theater was about 40 minutes away, so I was able to get a quick workout in before we headed out - leaving the house around 8:10. Unfortunately, the drive took much longer than expected because of traffic, so we didn't get to the theater until 9:10, when the doors were already closed. It was disappointing, but that theater offers lots of great options, so we plan to go back for a different show (and give ourselves plenty of time to get there).
Since we were already out and hadn't eaten dinner, we decided to stay in the neighborhood of the theater to eat. The neighborhood is called Juhu, and Ami had been reading about different restaurant recommendations earlier this week, and she remembered the name of a restaurant called Aurus, but really didn't remember anything else about it aside from that she had thought it sounded good. We hail a tuk-tuk (auto rickshaw) and ask him to take us to Aurus. One of the most frustrating things about Mumbai as a city is that buildings aren't numbered on the streets! For example we looked up the address for the restaurant on my phone, and it just tells you the name of the building and the road it's on - I miss proper street addresses where you can generally estimate where on a stretch of road a particular address will fall. Instead, we went through the seemingly normal routine for Mumbai of driving for a little bit, stopping to ask pedestrians for directions, turning around, driving again, stopping to ask for directions, etc. Wash, rinse, repeat. On top of the fact that no addresses exist - many destinations don't have proper signage that announce their presence to people on the street. For example, Aurus doesn't have anything on the street indicating that it's a restaurant. All you can see is a big fence with security guards standing near an opening in the fence. Then once you walk through the opening, you see a sign announcing the restaurant, but that sign is completely blocked from view when you're on the street. Insufferable!
Once we were inside, however, we were rewarded with a wonderful dinner experience. The restaurant was on the coast, slightly elevated from the beach, overlooking the Arabian Sea. There were tall palm trees framing our view of the ocean and the moon and the stars - quite idyllic. The decor of the restaurant was very chic with white leather couches scattered around the patio, a few white-clothed tables, and one canopy-style table where you sit on pillows while you're eating. There was trance-like music playing softly in the background that managed to fuse with the sound of the waves. Everything was lit by candlelight.
While we were there, time stopped - we felt like we were on vacation on some remote island that has no clocks. It honestly felt like what I imagine a very high class opium den would be like. The food was delicious as well, and we sat there and lounged for a couple hours on a couch and just enjoyed the breeze and the scenery.
That ends the story of last night, but there's one additional observation I wanted to share with you. All throughout the city, I've been noticing that most toilets come with a hose that is right next to it in the stall - similar to a flexible shower head where you can hold it and move it around. Apparently these are an optional way to clean yourself after you've used the toilet - I've been referring to them as "DIY bidets." These are standard throughout India because most plumbing systems in the country can't handle toilet paper, so many people grow up using these and never using toilet paper. In fact, Ami told me that when her relatives visit her family in the US, they hate using toilet paper. Anyway, I found it interesitng so I thought that some of you may as well. I'll take a photo of one to show you what I mean.
That's all for now, folks. Keep sending me emails - I love getting them!!!
Last night I had planned to go to a local club called The Blue Frog, which is a landmark in Mumbai for hosting great live music every night. I was going to go with Ami and a group of girls from the office, but we ended up rescheduling at the last minute to go on Thursday night, since the band on Thursday is supposed to be much better. That left Ami and I with no plans for tonight (as I had already turned down Paresh's invitation to go to a movie with him), so we decided to go to a play that Ami had been interested in seeing. It was a play that would be half in English, half in Hindi, so I figured I would enjoy at least half of the production :) The play started at 9, which was good because I had a call with some US colleagues that went until 7:30. Ami estimated the theater was about 40 minutes away, so I was able to get a quick workout in before we headed out - leaving the house around 8:10. Unfortunately, the drive took much longer than expected because of traffic, so we didn't get to the theater until 9:10, when the doors were already closed. It was disappointing, but that theater offers lots of great options, so we plan to go back for a different show (and give ourselves plenty of time to get there).
Since we were already out and hadn't eaten dinner, we decided to stay in the neighborhood of the theater to eat. The neighborhood is called Juhu, and Ami had been reading about different restaurant recommendations earlier this week, and she remembered the name of a restaurant called Aurus, but really didn't remember anything else about it aside from that she had thought it sounded good. We hail a tuk-tuk (auto rickshaw) and ask him to take us to Aurus. One of the most frustrating things about Mumbai as a city is that buildings aren't numbered on the streets! For example we looked up the address for the restaurant on my phone, and it just tells you the name of the building and the road it's on - I miss proper street addresses where you can generally estimate where on a stretch of road a particular address will fall. Instead, we went through the seemingly normal routine for Mumbai of driving for a little bit, stopping to ask pedestrians for directions, turning around, driving again, stopping to ask for directions, etc. Wash, rinse, repeat. On top of the fact that no addresses exist - many destinations don't have proper signage that announce their presence to people on the street. For example, Aurus doesn't have anything on the street indicating that it's a restaurant. All you can see is a big fence with security guards standing near an opening in the fence. Then once you walk through the opening, you see a sign announcing the restaurant, but that sign is completely blocked from view when you're on the street. Insufferable!
Once we were inside, however, we were rewarded with a wonderful dinner experience. The restaurant was on the coast, slightly elevated from the beach, overlooking the Arabian Sea. There were tall palm trees framing our view of the ocean and the moon and the stars - quite idyllic. The decor of the restaurant was very chic with white leather couches scattered around the patio, a few white-clothed tables, and one canopy-style table where you sit on pillows while you're eating. There was trance-like music playing softly in the background that managed to fuse with the sound of the waves. Everything was lit by candlelight.
While we were there, time stopped - we felt like we were on vacation on some remote island that has no clocks. It honestly felt like what I imagine a very high class opium den would be like. The food was delicious as well, and we sat there and lounged for a couple hours on a couch and just enjoyed the breeze and the scenery.
That ends the story of last night, but there's one additional observation I wanted to share with you. All throughout the city, I've been noticing that most toilets come with a hose that is right next to it in the stall - similar to a flexible shower head where you can hold it and move it around. Apparently these are an optional way to clean yourself after you've used the toilet - I've been referring to them as "DIY bidets." These are standard throughout India because most plumbing systems in the country can't handle toilet paper, so many people grow up using these and never using toilet paper. In fact, Ami told me that when her relatives visit her family in the US, they hate using toilet paper. Anyway, I found it interesitng so I thought that some of you may as well. I'll take a photo of one to show you what I mean.
That's all for now, folks. Keep sending me emails - I love getting them!!!
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