I’ve been to India eleven times, but have never written about it. This past February I spent an entire month in Mumbai, exploring widely and taking plenty of pictures, so I decided it was high time for a blog post about the place. Here it is!

Language: Marathi, Hindi, English | Population: 18-23M | Currency: Rupee

I’m sure everyone reading this post has heard of Mumbai. Most of you can find it on a map. Some of you may have been there, which puts me at a slight disadvantage. It’s easier when blogging about places people aren’t familiar with, like Malawi, or Bangladesh, or El Salvador: If you haven’t been there, you have to take the author’s word for it. But for many of you India is no stranger, so I need to keep on my toes.

In my favor, I suppose, is that most visitors to India usually just step in and quickly out of Mumbai, if at all, en route to India’s mountains or temples or beaches or deserts. Mumbai gets a day or two of their time at the most, and what can you learn in a day or two?

A woman walks past some of the fresh bounty on display in Mumbai

An entire month only in Mumbai is not something most visitors want, even if they have an entire month to spare. But it was something I wanted. Ever since my first visit in 1987 I’ve been waiting for a chance to stay longer. I loved India when I first got there—what 23-year old backpacker freshly sprung from university wouldn’t?—it’s so exotic, so romantic, so otherworldly; so incredibly and indisputably different. Each time I’ve visited since then I’ve felt the same way, I’ve yearned to stay longer and dig deeper. This time I finally did it.

It didn’t go exactly as planned, though. My month in Mumbai was exotic and fascinating, but also tiring and frustrating. With hindsight I shouldn’t have been surprised. A pattern has emerged over the years with me and India. I’m happy and excited when I arrive, but fed up when I leave, vowing never to return. Time goes by, and soon enough I’ve forgotten the frustration and bedlam and pollution and dysfunction, and remember only the charm and exoticism of the place, and can’t wait to get back. This time was no different. I was happy to arrive, a little happier to leave, and on the way to the airport I decided it was probably my last trip to India.

Don’t get me wrong: Mumbai is extremely interesting and exotic, and my month was full to bursting, but it can be a maddening, and disheartening place. And it’s entirely a mess of its own making. I was trapped in a world of chaos and disorder, but oddly happy to be there at the same time. “Love/Hate” is how I’d describe it, the same as always. I thought this time might be different, that an entire month would somehow iron out all the wrinkles and leave me with a born-again love for Mumbai and India. But it didn’t. I’m back to the Love/Hate thing, just like always.

Here’s my story.

A fruit seller on a quiet street in Vile Parle chats to his friend between customers

Local morning street scene in the Andheri neighborhood

Mumbai, on the west coast of India, circled in red

Mumbai was once a cluster of seven distinct islands, but over the years they’ve been joined through land reclamation and engineering projects. Most of the districts are still named after their original islands, such as Parel, Worli, Colaba, and Mahim. It’s mostly flat as a pancake and sits at sea level. Malabar Hill, the highest point in the city center, is only 50 meters high (164 feet).

Mumbai – The lay of the land

Mumbai is the capital of the state of Maharashtra, and the financial center and the largest city in India. Most locals still call the city “Bombay”, its colonial name until it officially changed in 1995. Mumbai stretches out in a long finger of land jutting out into the Indian Ocean in a sort of inverted pyramid, wide at the top, and narrow at the bottom. It’s a “north-south” place: most major roads and nearly all railways run north-south. The northern districts and suburbs make up a wide geographic area, while the southern tip is thin and very compact, narrowing to only 1.5 kilometers (less than a mile).

My rented Airbnb room was in Vile Parle East, near the railway station. Follow the black arrow above

The population of Mumbai proper is around 14 million, but the Mumbai Metropolitan Region has over 23 million inhabitants, making it one of the world’s largest megacities. It feels like it, too. Actually, it feels even larger than that. Compared with Tokyo, Mexico City, Istanbul, and other megacities, to me Mumbai seems more crowded, larger, and more hectic. A mega megacity.

A grape seller takes his time in a quiet street in the Bandra district. Calm and quiet places like this are few and far between in Mumbai

Generally speaking, the densest collection of colonial-era British East India “Raj” buildings and monuments—the sites people are familiar with, if they’re familiar with Mumbai at all—is found in the south of the city, particularly in Fort, Kala Ghoda, Colaba, Byculla, and the delightfully-named Apollo Bunder. That’s where you see the Victorian Gothic Revival buildings, and the grand arcaded buildings, plazas and public greens. There are lovely shaded, tree-lined streets, and magnificent stylish brick and stone buildings. It’s a pleasure wandering around the backstreets of Colaba and Fort admiring the cool apartment blocks. Outside of the busiest times of day, those neighborhoods are calm and quiet and pleasant.

Mumbai Top Sites

Mumbai can be an intense place to spend time, but if you’re just there for a few days the city offers a few outstanding attractions:

Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya Museum, (CSMVS) documents the history of India from prehistoric to modern times. The building has recently been renovated.
Gateway of India: Mumbai’s most iconic monument overlooking the Arabian Sea. It’s a little over-hyped in my opinion, but still worth a look.
Elephanta Caves: A UNESCO World Heritage site featuring ancient rock-cut temples on an island. There’s an atmospheric and fun ferry between the island and the docks near the Gateway to India
Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT): A stunning UNESCO site showcasing Victorian Gothic architecture. Not to be missed.
Taj Mahal Palace Hotel: A historic, luxurious hotel adjacent to the Gateway. If you’re feeling flush it’s a luxurious and comfortable place to stay. If you can’t afford a whole night, there are plenty of options for a meal and a drink in one of the hotel’s many restaurants and bars.
Mani Bhavan Gandhi Sangrahalaya: A former Mumbai residence of Mahatma Gandhi in an attractive, leafy neighborhood; now a small museum.
Marine Drive: A 3-kilometer coastal promenade perfect for evening strolls, also known as the “Queen’s Necklace” due to the string of lights alongside the promenade.
Juhu Beach & Chowpatty Beach: Popular spots for street food like pav bhaji and bhel puri. Excellent for people watching, too.
Hanging Gardens: Terraced gardens offering panoramic views of the city​

There is plenty of online tourist info covering Mumbai. Here are a few links to get you started:

Lonely Planet – https://www.lonelyplanet.com/articles/top-things-to-do-in-mumbai
Mumbai City – https://mumbaicity.gov.in/en/tourism/tourist-places/
Wikipedia – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tourist_attractions_in_Mumbai

As you travel farther north the colonial buildings give way to modern concrete and cinder block buildings from the 1930s and 1940s. Throughout the city you find Hindu temples, Buddhist temples, mosques, churches, Sikh Gurdwaras, even a few synagogues.

One of many mosques in the Masjid neighborhood. India claims to have 200 million Muslims, which makes up the largest minority religious group in India, after Hindus (photo by John Ives)

An interesting juxtaposition of buildings in Mahim

Road work big and small is a daily hazard in Mumbai. There are no cones, no fences, no one directing traffic, just holes, piles of brick and broken pavement

A bicycle repairman helps a man get his machine back on the road. There are more cars and scooters than ever on Mumbai roads, but the bicycle is still a trusty form of transportation for many

My Plan in Mumbai

I’d already seen the major things to see in Mumbai on previous visits, so this time I wanted to simply wander the neighborhoods on foot without any concrete plans or lists of things to see or do. I bought a monthly train pass, bought a local SIM card for internet access, downloaded the maps I needed, and steeled myself for adventure. My lodging in the northern suburb of Vile Parle meant a fair amount of daily north-south train travel, so I tended to leave in the morning and spend the entire day out exploring, returning home around 3:00 p.m. or 4:00 pm.

(Two photos above) Fruit and veg for sale on the street in Vile Parle West

Nowhere are the streets of Mumbai more crowded and chaotic than in the Masjid district under and around the JJ Flyover motorway overpass. It’s exotic mayhem 24-7 in that neck of the woods

Hungry snackers cut through the street food section of the Cross Maidan Garden in Churchgate

A man takes a risk looking down at his phone while walking along one of the small streets in Masjid. Mumbaikars seem oblivious to the crowds; I always had to be on high alert

It wasn’t exactly easy, though. Exploring Mumbai isn’t like exploring Paris, or Orlando, or Vancouver. It’s hot and humid and polluted. Getting hit by a car or auto rickshaw or bicycle or motorbike is a legitimate and near-constant danger. Clear and safe sidewalks are in short supply. You need to be careful with the food and water, and people with high sensitivity to air pollution and dust will have problems. You have to like big cities and be comfortable in large crowds. To get the most of the city—indeed, to enjoy it at all, and to survive—you have to put in the effort, be patient, be tough, and keep an open mind. Many Mumbaikars have positive, interesting things to say, and are proud of their city; their stories and imprints are there, you just need to look.

Mumbai Neighborhoods

There are distinct neighborhoods and districts in Mumbai, but in actual fact the city is all jumbled together. There isn’t really a “fancy and posh” part of town, or a “rundown and poor” part of town, or anywhere that’s entirely old or entirely new. It makes exploring challenging, as things change so constantly it’s tough to gather an overall impression. I found the trick to discovering the various neighborhood flavors was to limit the number of districts I explored, and to return to the same places multiple times on different days, and during different times of the day.

Here are a few neighborhoods I concentrated on.

Fort, Cuffe Parade, and Colaba make up the southernmost districts of Mumbai, and it’s where you find most of the British colonial architecture and grand heritage buildings. Churchgate and Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus railway stations are there. The large stretch of park space known as the Maidan is there, serving as the main venue for cricket in the city. The wonderful buildings that house the India Supreme Court, University of Mumbai, the David Sassoon Library and the Western Railway headquarters are there. The south is also the heart of the financial district, and hosts several of the city’s most exclusive hotels. I saw surprisingly few foreign faces in Mumbai, but the ones I did see tended to be in those southern areas of town.

A player stands ready for action during a cricket match on Mumbai’s Maidan, a rare large swath of green space in central Mumbai

St. Thomas’ Anglican Cathedral in the Fort district. The first service was held on Christmas day, 1718. There are an estimated 28 million Christians in India, and around 350,000 in Mumbai. The British East India Company built the cathedral, but Christianity was introduced to India long before by Saint Thomas the Apostle in 52 CE

Grant Road and Dadar are just north of Fort. The Grant Road railway station is one of the city’s oldest, and is a major rail hub, busy day and night in a madhouse scramble as people move from platform to platform. There are a lot of old movie cinemas there, as well as a densely populated residential area with lovely, leafy shaded streets. Jains and Parsi and Irani Zoroastrians call the area home. There’s a lot of good food and plenty of restaurants and street grub. A little farther east is Crawford Market, a bustling British-built covered building dating from 1869. An insanely dense and chaotic Muslim neighborhood centers around the Masjid railway station, intersected by the JJ Flyover overpass.

This looker was tucked into one of the many soft, leafy streets of the Grant Road neighborhood

Mumbai is changing fast, but you still find plenty of neighborhoods like this one, with old and new(er) tucked in together

Bandra, Santa Cruz and Juhu Beach are a little farther north still, posher areas home to many of the famous Bollywood movie stars and personalities. The most important Christian church is also here, the Basilica of Our Lady of the Mount, more locally known as Mount St Mary Church. Juhu hugs the coast and is among the most expensive and affluent areas of the metropolitan region. Juhu Beach is a well-known attraction in Mumbai, and one of the most popular beaches for tourists and the local public. The beaches in Mumbai are the only places in the city where you actually feel a sense of open space, and where you can go to walk without having to constantly dodge and weave around people and obstacles. In the 1980s and ’90s the beach was filthy, but it’s been cleaned and is now quite attractive.

Chowpatty Beach and the highrises of Girgaon as seen from a little park on Malabar Hill. The beaches in Mumbai have been cleaned and tidied in recent years

Two women hunt for treasures on Versova Beach, north of where I was staying in Vile Parle. Highway construction (background) gets in the way of the views of the Arabian Sea

Family fun at Versova Beach

A woman and girl walk down a shady line in Government Colony in Bandra, a residential area housing mainly state government employees. The district is in the middle of a 100-acre transformation to redevelop low-density housing into high-rise apartments and modern infrastructure, displacing the people who live there now

Two girls have fun in a park in Thane, northern Mumbai

A patient cat hoping things will eventually go his way. This lady was selling fish in an alley off a main road in the Marine Lines district

My Favourite Things

Mumbai is in India! Pound for pound, India is still the most exotic, colourful and bizarre place on the planet. There’s really nothing like it. Mumbai doesn’t have the jungles and forts and beaches and mountains, but it’s still India, exotic, nutty and mysterious. Mumbai is a magnet for people from every corner of India who come to find work, or make it big in the Bollywood movies, or start a business, or become bigwig financial gurus. They come and they bring with them their food and culture and behaviours and set up shop in Mumbai. Walking around is a real adventure as the country unfolds in front of you. You often hear a county’s largest city described as something unrepresentative of the rest of the country; “Oh, Bangkok isn’t really Thailand.” But Mumbai absolutely is India, at every corner.

The chaos and mayhem and colours of India are seen at every turn. Like it or hate it, it’s impossible to deny the country is exotic and unique

I found this pleasant street in the Government Colony in the Bandra neighborhood. The once quiet and calm neighborhood of social housing is fast transforming into modern concrete towers and multi-storey condominiums

A wedding party picks its way through the crowds in Andheri

The street life is amazing. It can be stressful navigating the crazy cars and motorcycles and people and construction and piles of garbage, but there’s an endless parade of sellers and stalls and displays to enjoy, all in full Kodachrome colour, more or less all the time. Just sit or stand in one spot and watch the parade go by. When you’re out on Mumbai streets you really get a sense for what a country with a population of 1.4 billion looks and feels like. The near continual presence of people surprised me: Tokyo, Mexico City, London, Istanbul, Los Angeles, and Bangkok all have their share of intensity and mayhem, but there are quiet places, too, parks and gardens, empty streets and lonely corners. Apart from the beach, I rarely came across anywhere like that in Mumbai, and if I did, the feeling of quiet and privacy was fleeting.

A cozy and secret doorway to a house tucked in an alley in the Pali Village neighborhood of Bandra West. Quiet, calm, and tranquil is hard to find in Mumbai

The food! “Indian food” in much of North America and Europe usually means Punjabi food—curries in a rich sauce, tandoori, butter chicken, dahl, and charred naan. But Punjabi food is only one style of cooking in India; in fact, Indians from other parts of India consider Punjabi food to be rich and heavy, a cuisine for special occasions. Lighter, simpler rice and vegetable-based Southern Indian food from Tamil Nadu and Kerala is widely available in Mumbai. So too is food from Gujarat, Goa, Bengal, and Assam. Mumbai has its own food, too, created by combining and substituting ingredients from all those other places into something unique. Mumbai shines especially bright in its street food scene. Sandwiches, dosas, samosas, chips, salty snacks, dumplings, and even full meals are available from the street at all hours.

(For a detailed look at Mumbai street food, check out Mark Wien’s excellent blog post, here: https://migrationology.com/mumbai-street-food/)

A snack seller in Vile Parle. These kind of shops are everywhere in Mumbai, selling fried foods, sweets, nuts and dried fruit, biscuits and who knows what else (well, Mumbaikars know)

A vendor presses sugarcane into juice. Sugarcane juice is very popular in Mumbai, sold on every corner in some neighborhoods. It’s very cheap, and is invariably tasty and thirst quenching

Some of the items available in a cafe in Dadar. Cheese straw?

English is very widely spoken in Mumbai—in India in general—simplifying nearly every aspect of functioning in the city. Almost everyone can speak a little English, and people with anything more than a high school education speak English fairly well. The “educated” classes are essentially fluent. Almost all signs and instructions are in English. Menus are always in English. Train information and station names are written in English. There are a half dozen daily English-language newspapers. Anyone you have to deal with in any sort of official capacity will speak English. If you’ve been on a trip through China, Russia, rural Brazil, or Ivory Coast, you’ll appreciate the unbridled joy of being able to speak the same language as the people you’re living with. Indians are unfailingly chatty and curious, and while the big city vibe dampens the locals’ openness a bit, as any big city does—everyone is too busy trying to make money and survive—there are still plenty of people to chat to.

They don’t mess around with the traffic rules in Mumbai. It’s a full time job for an army of enforcers keeping sidewalks, driveways and intersections clear of parked vehicles

You might not need a plumber when you’re in Mumbai, but if you do, you’ll be glad he speaks English. This guy was waiting for a call in the Thane neighborhood

Mumbai—and India in general—has an active press, and people read. Daily publications in Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Urdu, and other languages are available. English language newspapers and magazines, too, are widely available

A book stall on the sidewalk in Kala Ghoda. I’m not sure how attentive Indians are to copyright and international publishing regulations, but it’s no problem finding cheap English-language reading material in Mumbai

Architecture. There are a few cool skyscrapers and interesting office buildings in Mumbai, but I don’t believe the city punches much above its weight in terms of modern stuff. The old stuff is terrific, however. After Miami, Mumbai has the largest collection of Art Deco buildings in the world, mostly constructed during a massive building boom between the early 1930s and the 1950s. Most of the easily accessible buildings are in Fort, Apollo Bunder, Colaba, Dadar, and Mahim. When India was part of the British Empire (India became independent in 1947), art deco style was used primarily for office buildings, residential apartments, houses, and movie theaters. You can spend a couple of hours happily wandering around the southern stretches of the city looking at the beautiful buildings, forgiven for wondering where in the world the rest of mad Mumbai disappeared to.

One of the many groovy art deco buildings found around Mumbai. This one is someone’s apartment building in Dadar

There are many handsome office and civic buildings like this one in the Fort district. Most of the grand brick and granite and stone buildings in central Mumbai were built during the British colonial period

The Eros Cinema, an Art Deco cinema in Churchgate, is part of the Victorian Gothic and Art Deco of Mumbai, which was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2018. The cinema closed in 2017 but reopened in 2024 after restoration

Not every house in Mumbai is kept up. This fixer-upper in Juhu would have been a beauty at one time

A modest house with a beautiful facade on a corner in Mahalaxmi. You don’t see anywhere as many cows on the streets as you used to in the 1980s and ’90s, but they’re still there

The atrium of the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya Museum in Kala Ghoda. Difficult to pronounce but wonderful to visit, the museum documents the history of India from prehistoric to modern times, and is well worth a few hours. The building alone is worth the price of admission

The Old Oriental Building at the corner of Nagindas Master Road and M.G.Road is the oldest building in the Hutatma Chowk area. There’s still a fairly large shop that sells and fixes watches and pens, a cloth store, a mobile phone carrier, and a grocer in the building, plus handsome residential units above

The Western Railway headquarters is a heritage building in Churchgate, magically illuminated at night

There are still old crumbly more traditional Indian buildings here and there—Mughal-style homes and gardens—but they seem to be fast disappearing. Many of the important historical buildings are in good shape, but if there’s a program designed to protect and maintain everyday residential heritage buildings, it’s not working.

India is an enigma. It’s hard to explain, but India is just plain amazing! It’s tough to put your finger on why, exactly. I think it’s because it’s so unusual, yet when you’re there all the unusual things quickly become commonplace, which makes it more unusual. It’s wealthy, but poor; it’s traditional, yet devoid of tradition; it’s soft and gentle, but harsh and aggressive; Hinduism and Vedic philosophy is a lifetime-long study, but easily dismissed by Indians themselves; Indians are proud of India, but seem not to care about it.

My Less Favourite Things

Some of the things I love about Mumbai are the same things I dislike. Street life, for instance. Yes, it’s colourful, vibrant and exciting, but it’s also mind-bendingly frustrating and tiring. The streets are incredibly noisy. Cars and motorbikes honk continually, pay little attention to lanes and traffic lights, and park wherever they like. Mercifully the area I stayed in Vile Parle quietened down around 10:00 p.m. and stayed that way. But it all started again in the morning.

An Indian friend told me his teenage daughter was actually taught proactive aggressive horn-honking techniques in her driving lessons. When you see a car or person or cow or bicycle or anything alive and moving in front of you, honk!

Air pollution in Mumbai can be savage, particularly in winter. The AQI index was mostly between 150 – 175 when I was there, though it routinely went higher, including this day on February 15 when it hit a whopping 207

Pollution is a real problem. I love megacities, and most of them have their share of pollution problems—but Mumbai is in another class. In 1999, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) standardized an “air quality index scale”, or AQI, that measures various pollutants in the air, such as PM2.5, PM10, ozone, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide, and carbon monoxide, and converts them overall into an easy-to-understand scale. Mumbai’s AQI is 80-100, which is regarded as “unhealthy for sensitive groups”. But that’s just the average; it’s often much higher—it hit 207 on one day when I was there. Vancouver’s average AQI, for instance, is 10-12; London, 20-40, New York City, 30-40. Bangkok, which nobody would say is clean and fresh, has an average AQI of 60-80.

Bad air, and bad ground: Mumbai still has significant pollution problems

Mumbai’s AQI is much worse in the winter, when farmers in the north of India burn their crops to clear fields. There’s less wind and rain in the winter, so pollution gets trapped in the city. Building and road construction contribute to airborne dust and grit. You’re not likely to come down with any serious problems in just a month, but you’re definitely not doing yourself any favors, either.

These sorts of little streets are fun to walk down, even though you have to watch your step and beware of traffic and delivery men hauling carts. The big bonus is the streets are too packed to accommodate cars, so there’s less smoke and pollution

The crowded and bustling Muslim quarter in Masjid near the JJ Flyover

You need to keep your eyes open on Mumbai streets. In addition to the regular, everyday muck and chaos there’s near constant construction, leaving roads and pavements potholed, scarred, and crumbly

It’s sobering to learn that Mumbai is far from the most polluted city in India. Delhi claims that title, and there are several others high on the list before you get to Mumbai. Delhi’s average AQI is 180, but it’s reached over 500 on occasion!

Walking in the streets is a real problem. Not the psychological drama or emotional intensity that comes with being in the street, I mean the physical act of actually walking. There are man-eating potholes, road construction crews, sidewalks that end suddenly in piles of rubble or simply disappear. Vendors set up shop in the middle of the sidewalk, residents park their cars and scooters wherever they like, and city crews install pipes or wires and leave holes unfilled. Cars and motorbikes and scooters tear by in all directions. Miraculously I didn’t see a single accident when I was there—truly, a miracle—but I saw plenty of close calls, and was in several myself.

Economic growth hasn’t yet translated into consistently clean civic spaces. Mumbai beaches are much cleaner and well-used than they were back in the ’80s and ’90s, but there are still plenty of stretches where they’re dirty and trash-strewn, like this section of Dadar Beach

Getting in and Out of Mumbai

Unlike fussier countries (I’m talking to you, nations of Africa…), it’s a breeze getting in and out of India. Nearly everyone needs a visa, but they’re easy to get online for around twenty-five dollars. You get a PDF of your visa in your email inbox which you print out and present at arrival. I flew from Colombo, Sri Lanka, nonstop to Mumbai’s very comfortable and unexpectedly efficient but unpronounceable Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport. Immigration lines were reasonable. I wasn’t expecting any problems, and I didn’t get any.

If you’ve ever dealt with India officialdom you won’t be surprised to find silly bureaucratic requirements on the eVisa application form, like, Your father’s name, nationality, and place of birth; Your mother’s name, nationality, and place of birth; Your religion; Your visible identification marks; Educational qualifications; Countries you’ve visited in the past ten years…oh brother.

Getting Around

Moving around Mumbai is fun, easy, and straightforward, yet at the same time wildly complicated, challenging, and dangerous. You have a lot of options: private car, hired car and driver, suburban railway, metro (subway), taxi, auto-rickshaw, motorbike taxi, bus, and walking. Which methods you use depends greatly on where you’re staying, how adventurous you are, how much of a hurry you’re in, and your tolerance for risk. Riding the suburban train is the cheapest (after walking) and the most fun. But it’s a monster.

The Mumbai Suburban Railway system is the lifeline of the city, with a little over 400 kilometers of track carrying around ten million people a day. The carriages are large and open, with both seating and standing room, and secure straps and poles to hang on to.

Riding the rails. A relatively calm and quiet ride on the mad and crazy Mumbai Suburban Railway. I wanted a photo during rush hour, but it proved impossible—and foolhardy—to reach for my phone, so I settled for picture with a medium level of chaos

A woman buys a ticket at Bandra station. Many of the major railway station ticket counters in Mumbai are staffed 24/7

Entrance to the Vile Parle railway station. I can usually read the names of the train routes in Hindi, but was secretly grateful that the signs are displayed in English as well

There is a specific hierarchy of seating and ticketing: 2nd and 1st class; air conditioned and non-air conditioned; women’s only carriages, or “Ladies Compartments” (even entire women-only trains); separate seating for cancer patients, pregnant women and physically disabled passengers (which they call, “differently abled”). There are “slow” and “fast” trains (slow trains stop at every station). You can buy a single or return journey ticket, a Season Ticket (available as a monthly, quarterly, half-yearly, or yearly pass), or a Tourist Ticket. 2026 has seen the roll-out of the digital “RailOne” ticketing program, allowing for the purchase of tickets online through the India Rail app, though at the moment it’s only possible to download the app from the Indian app stores, and only if you have an Indian bank account.

For a more detailed and informative look at Mumbai’s local rail options, visit Chris Sutton’s excellent blog, “Trains to Beyond”, here.

Tickets are astoundingly cheap: a 2nd class journey of around 45 minutes from top to bottom costs 15 rupees—around 16 cents. I bought a one-month pass that allowed unlimited travel from Bhayandar to Churchgate, a distance of 43 kilometers (26.7 miles), for 280 rupees—$3.05. I got my money’s worth, too. I always hoped a ticket inspector would come around and demand to see my pass, but no one ever asked me for it.

My monthly ticket to ride the rails. Three bucks got me up and down the tracks the entire month I was there (and before I start receiving a flood of comments, no, that photo is not recent, alas)

Mumbai’s Central Station during a lull in activity

The train carriage doors remain permanently open for easy on-and-off access, which is cool and novel, but extremely dangerous. Current data shows a downward trend, but on average 6 or 7 people die every day on the rail network. “Super dense crush load” is the main culprit. Trains designed to carry 1,200 people routinely carry 5,000 during peak hours. People fall through the open doors of the moving train, or fall into the gap between the carriage and the platform, or get hit when walking across the tracks in between trains (“line crossing”), or crushed under foot. Heart attacks and other medical emergencies brought on by the heat and intense crowding apparently add to the numbers.

A man walks through Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus railway station. The nearly unpronounceable station is abbreviated as CSMT, (many people still refer to it by its colonial name, “VT”, Victoria Terminus)

Riding the train outside of peak periods is a much less chaotic experience—pleasant and fun, even. I quickly learned to avoid the train until after 10:30 a.m., and between 6:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. Roman gladiators could learn a thing or two from Mumbai rush-hour commuters —it’s combat. People push and shove as though they’re trying to escape a burning building.

The suburban railway network in Mumbai. My “home” station was Vile Parle, circled in black towards the north. Riding the trains in Mumbai is an experience you don’t soon forget

A woman takes advantage of a gloriously uncrowded train car to rest her barking dogs. If you avoid the train during the morning and evening rush hours, you’ll usually have a calm and fun experience riding the trains

Mumbai is busy building new metro (subway) lines, too. Currently there are four lines operational, and the city is busy trying to complete sections of several more lines that are partially operational. It’s surprising that for a country that’s so fond of using long, mystic, complicated names, the metro lines are unimaginatively called Line 1 (the Blue line), Line 2A (Yellow), Line 7 (Red), and Line 3 (Aqua). I rode the Aqua Line the most. Completed just in October, 2025, it’s the only line that’s almost completely underground (only the most northerly station is above ground), and it’s an absolute lifesaver when you want to avoid the ordinary railway madness. It’s modern, safe, and clean. Ridership is growing, but far fewer people use the line than the government had hoped for. Cost is one factor. Though still very cheap by western standards, the metro costs more than double the price of a train ticket. Despite the vast leap forward in comfort, safety, security, and convenience—it’s a truly world-class system, on par with anything anywhere—a rupee is a rupee in a city where most people struggle to get by. I was also told by several people that the stations aren’t located close enough to where people live, necessitating long walks on busy and dangerous roads.

This is Line 3, the “Aqua Line” of the fast-expanding Mumbai metro system. At the moment there are four fully operational lines of varying length, and several additional partially running lines. The government has grand plans for major expansion. Building new lines and track in a place like Mumbai is not a job for junior engineers

People wait for a bus in Vile Parle. Buses are ubiquitous and can a great way to get around depending on the time of day, and once you figure out the routing and numbering system

There is an army of public buses plying the Mumbai streets. Buses are easy to find, frequent, and ludicrously cheap, though they can be very slow depending on the time of day. They go everywhere, though they are most useful as a means of bridging the distance between railway stations. Old buses are slowly being replaced with more modern ones. I used the bus a few times, but in general found it more efficient simply to waste a bit of shoe leather and walk to a railway station rather than sit on a bus and fight through traffic.

Auto-rickshaws are ubiquitous and cheap. Called “tuk-tuk” in Thailand, auto-rickshaws, or simply “autos”, are similar three-wheeled contraptions, a little smaller and slightly more nimble. They’re very cheap and good value, and faster than the bus, though I still preferred the train, and would happily walk extra distance to get to a station. My philosophy was that it was better to stay out of the Mumbai traffic wherever possible. Some of the auto drivers are nuts.

A new Mumbai bus on the left, and an army of the clean and tidy old clunkers on the right

People

It’s not good practice to generalize about an entire group of people, but I’m going to do it anyway: It’s hard not to be fond of Indians. For a city the size of Mumbai that’s so chaotic and mad-scramble, Mumbaikars are friendly, matter-of-fact, cheerful and chatty. I’m sure there are nasty ones, but I never met any of them. “Where are you from? How do you like India?” is something you hear a dozen times a day. If you take the time to stop and talk to them, they will happily talk to you.

Actually, Mumbai is refreshingly free of hassle as far as locals are concerned. Spend time in the Indian tourist hotspots of Rajasthan, Kerala and Goa and learn a lesson in perseverance and commercial drive; tourist touts in those places will charm you out of your shirt. Scams abound. Then there are the villages, where you’ll be followed for hours by legions of children, and invited into homes for tea a dozen times an hour. Mumbaikars are too busy making money and surviving to give you that much attention.

Two friendly and curious guys setting up their streetside stall in Government Colony in Bandra

I met this cheerful group of people on the street near Grant Road. The man in the red shirt owns the shop, the two boys in black shirts are his sons, and the other guys are neighborhood friends

Banana sellers in Dadar. One banana costs 5 rupees – $.06 cents

As an Anglo-Saxon caucasian male, I experience tremendous privilege and deference. I was often moved to the front of a line, or was the first to be served in a group. Kids and adults alike usually beam and look genuinely tickled when I shake their hand or stop to talk. Everyone seems happy to pose for a photograph. I suspect non-white, non-male visitors don’t get the same treatment.

Indians in Mumbai can be brusque and direct with each other; there’s quite a lot of yelling and gesturing, and people who fancy themselves of a higher station can be rude and condescending to people “below” them. But fighting, hitting, violence, or serious angry outbursts were rare. Indeed, most people were busy joking with each other, play-fighting or teasing, or just laughing. Life in Mumbai can be harsh and unfair, but it’s life, and it goes on, so you might as well make the most of it is a mantra I assumed most people follow.

A junior resident in Cuffe Parade seemed unimpressed and suspicious of my presence in the neighborhood

A friendly worker at the Dadar flower market

A man catches a breeze from the Indian Ocean on the Chowpatty Seaface promenade. The Mumbai oceanfront is clean and well-managed, a dramatic improvement from the dirt and pollution in the 1980s and ’90s. At night the long string of streetlights along Marine Drive are illuminated giving it the nickname “The Queen’s Necklace”

A taxi driver catches 40 winks near Churchgate station. Be glad when the taxi drivers are at rest: they’re wild, dangerous and unpredictable when on the move

Food and Drink

Eating is a highlight of time spent in Mumbai. I love all varieties of Indian food, and Mumbai has a vast assortment of the stuff, found everywhere, and available at bargain-basement prices. You can eat a healthy and nutritious meal in a clean, tidy restaurant with attentive and courteous service for just a few dollars. Street food and take-away snacks cost even less. And there’s a lot of it. I did manage to get sick as a dog one night, poisoned from something I ate, so eating in Mumbai is not entirely without risk. Most of the street food appears fresh, so you can’t really tell just by looking at it. It’s a “take-your-chances” sort of place, but aside from that one episode, I was healthy the entire month I was there. And I ate a lot. Getting sick now and then when you travel is simply the cost of doing business, is the way I’ve come to look at it. It’s worth it.

Idli vada combo for breakfast. Idli (the white, puffy thing) is a slightly sour, steamed rice cake. The vada (round donut thing) is a deep-fried lentil fritter. You can add the coconut chutney to either, and enjoy spoonfuls of the accompanying sambar, the rich lentil and vegetable soup

Fruit and vegetables are found everywhere in tremendous variety, and are extremely cheap. But pesticides are widely used in Indian farming. India regulates pesticide use through the “Central Insecticides Board and Registration Committee under the Insecticides Act of 1968”, but people pointed out to me that the act is very loosely enforced which I found not at all surprising.

A cornucopia of vegetables await the discerning shopper in a Vile Parle street in north Mumbai. Every imaginable variety of fruit and vegetable seems to be available, in great abundance, all over. Indian farmers use a lot of pesticides and fertilizers, which may be a cause of increasing cancer rates, but it also ensures big, colourful, attractive vegetables

Alcohol is expensive. State governments rely heavily on alcohol taxes for revenue, and the taxes are high, accounting for more than half the cost of the product. There are bars in Mumbai, but they tend to be concentrated in certain areas, and keep a low profile. Indians overall seem to have an unfavorable view of alcohol, considering it a sort of evil vice, something for degenerates and shady people with poor morals. Men spend the rent and grocery money on booze, forcing the women to find work to make ends meet is the common criticism (that’s not unique to India). Regardless, a bottle of cold suds in Mumbai costs nearly the same as it does in Vancouver. I didn’t drink much, mainly because it bugged me that beer was so expensive compared with the cost of other drinks and food and basic necessities (I went to Vietnam and Japan after Mumbai, and made up for it there, alas).

Alcohol is expensive in India, leading to a thriving market in homemade rotgut, and a wide variety of cheap, locally-made (and nasty) domestic liquor. This guy might be sleeping some of it off

India is a terrific place for vegetarians, as much of the food is already vegetarian. Many followers of Hinduism avoid meat for religious reasons, and historically meat was expensive and difficult to store, so many Indians simply didn’t eat it. As the country gets wealthier meat consumption is on the rise, but it’s estimated that around 35% – 40% of Indians are vegetarians, which translates into many millions of eaters. I always try to go straight vegetarian when I’m in India, as I think there’s less chance of getting food poisoning when you stay away from meat, and it seems healthier, particularly once you’ve taken a stroll through the meat section of one of the markets.

Nighttime street snacks! This stall was just down the road from my Airbnb place. He sold a variety of toasted sandwiches and different sorts of stews, beans, breads and crispy snacks. I went regularly and usually saw the same group of neighborhood people hanging around eating and chatting

Lunchtime at a popular diner in Fort. I ordered the “South India thali”. It came with all-you-can-eat dal and rice, and a glass of buttermilk, all for 140 rupees (US$1.55)

The Qutba Snack Stall outside one of the busy entrances to Churchgate station. This place was busy every time I went past. Sustenance is never far away in Mumbai

A group of friends chat in the Cafe Colony Stores & Restaurant, an Irani-style cafe in Dadar. Though slowly dying out, these types of cafes are iconic to Mumbai’s culinary history, known for their old-world charm, bentwood chairs, and specific sourdough-like buns and tea. Irani cafes were founded by Zoroastrian Iranian immigrants fleeing Islamic persecution in Iran during the late 19th and early 20th centuries

Lunch this day was a chili and tomato uttapam, a fermented rice and lentil flat pancake-like dish from south India. It has a golden-brown, crispy exterior but is fluffy on the inside. Healthy and cheap, the uttapam was a favorite lunchtime choice

Overall, India is a cheap country to visit. Mumbai isn’t quite that simple. You can live the life of an enormously wealthy person in Mumbai—and there are plenty of them—or you can live the life of a desperately poor person—and there are plenty of those, too—and never the two shall meet. It’s not the case everywhere. Norway, for instance, is just plain expensive. There are degrees of wealth, of course, but you can’t expect to pay ten dollars for a coffee in one place, and fifteen cents in another. Conversely, in a country like Malawi you can’t live a life of global luxury, as the exclusive goods and services simply don’t exist, no matter how much money you have.

But both systems exist in Mumbai. You’re a rich guy and want to drive your Mercedes to a fancy restaurant to eat caviar and lobster? No problem. You’re lower income and only have forty cents for something to eat? Easy. Poor folks are confined to their own districts for goods and services, but wealthy residents can move in and out of both systems as they please. Most western visitors to India fall into the wealthy category, so we have access to both worlds as well. Live local and spend little one day, stay in a comfy hotel and eat white-tablecloth food the next. Accommodation can be expensive in Mumbai (more on that below), but after your lodging is taken care of, you can easily get by comfortably on $5-$10 a day if you stick to local restaurants and public transit. On days when you feel tired or sick or frazzled, why not escape India for a few hours and have a fancy meal followed by a cocktail in a modern hotel?

Snacks for sale at bargain prices. Luckily nearly every restaurant and snack shop lists their products and prices in English. The second item on the menu, the Vada Pav, is a favorite of pretty much every living person in Mumbai—mine, too. It’s a deep-fried potato dumpling stuffed inside a bread bun served with chutneys and a green chili pepper. Addictive! (the U.S. dollar was worth around 95 rupees when I was there)

You can find all the fancy brands in Mumbai: Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Dior, Balenciaga, Burberry, Valentino, Saint Laurent, Bottega Veneta, Jimmy Choo, Tory Burch, Rolls Royce, Bugatti, Mercedes…they’re all there, and people buy their stuff. If you have money and want to spend it, Mumbai is as good a place as anywhere. But the vast majority of the population is not rich. For them, it’s the regular restaurants, the normal clothing stores, the public trains and taxis, and the street-side fruit & vegetable sellers.

India’s GDP per capita (PPP) is around US$11,000. By way of comparison, Canada’s is around US$ 60,000. Norway is US$90,000 (Malawi’s is $1,600). But the numbers don’t tell the story (damned statistics). According to the 2026 Forbes World’s Billionaires List, India has 229 billionaires, ranking third globally behind the United States and China. The top 1% of the population of India holds over 40% of the total wealth and “owns” roughly 65-80% of the wealth. Conversely, the bottom 50% owns only about 3% of the wealth, with over 70% of the population earning less than $125 per month.

A woman asks for money on the street in Masjid. India has 229 billionaires, ranking third globally behind the United States and China. The number of desperately poor in India has dropped in the last decades, but there’s still a massive gap, and the poor still struggle

A lunchtime thali at a simple restaurant in Dadar. Set-plate meals like this are easy to find all over Mumbai, and usually cost a little less than two dollars

But there are some things that just can’t be found on the cheap. Mumbai is widely considered one of the most expensive real-estate markets in the world, which surprises a lot of people. In the Knight Frank Wealth Report, Mumbai ranked 18th most expensive city globally for prime residential real estate. That also makes it one of the least affordable cities, because land prices are so high relative to local income. Tourist accommodation is also expensive.

There are plenty of cheap dorm rooms and guest houses, and mid-range hotels aren’t bad value, but nowhere in Mumbai can you find the cheap and excellent-value rooms you can find in Thailand or Vietnam or Colombia or Tanzania. Density is the culprit. Consider, the New York Metro area is home to about 23.6 million people; Mumbai has only a slightly higher population at 26.6 million. But New Yorkers live in 34,500 square kilometers of space (13,320 square miles), while Mumbaikars are crammed into 6,355 square kilometers (2,453 square miles).

Accommodation

I booked a room in an Airbnb in the upper middle-class neighborhood of Vile Parle, north of the city center, in an apartment owned by a husband and wife who are both local family doctors. We shared the kitchen and living room, but I had my own room and bathroom. It was an excellent place to stay, clean and safe and surprisingly quiet considering how busy and bustling the neighborhood is.

My digs in a modern apartment building in Vile Parle. I had my own private bathroom, as well as access to the living room and kitchen. My room was clean and bright, and the building and neighborhood were excellent

I paid US$22 per day for my place, which sounds like a lot for just a single room in a place like India, but it was a good deal for Mumbai. For the same price you can get an almost palatial room with a balcony in most other parts of India, or in Thailand, Malawi, Colombia, or the Philippines, for that matter. But I was really lucky with my selection. I looked high and low for many weeks before choosing, and didn’t see much that was in my price range and habitable. Owners Prity and Suren employ full-time help (domestic help is very affordable in India; most Indians seem to have some), Ram, a young guy from Bihar who came every morning and spent the entire day cleaning, cooking, and running errands. He was a lovely guy, friendly and easy going. He also cleaned my room every day, which added to the value!

One of the main streets cutting north-south through the neighborhood of Vile Parle, where I stayed for the month. Vile Parle could be as busy and bustling as anywhere else, but it’s an upper middle-class, rather posh neighborhood, so things were fairly well maintained

You need to be choosy—there are a lot of lousy hotel rooms in Mumbai. There are vast differences in character, convenience and noise from neighborhood to neighborhood, and if you end up in a noisy, crowded, dirty place miles from the railway station, you’ll be unhappy. Airbnb and Booking.com and other sites show a lot of inventory, but you need to be fussy and do your research. Ask me, I’d be happy to help. Mumbai is a challenging enough place to be as it is.

The Verdict

Having slogged your way through this long post you’d be forgiven for thinking the negatives outweigh the positives. I suppose they do, but I really do like the city! I like the uniqueness of it, the exoticism and strangeness. I’m amazed that Mumbai actually functions, even thrives, in what to me seems to be chaos and disorganization. It works for the people who live there; or, rather, they make it work.

A woman feeds a calf at a crude pen in the Andheri neighborhood. Cows are important to Hindus, and people take care of them on the Mumbai streets, feeding and cleaning them

Would I stay again for a month in Mumbai? I don’t think so. At least not in the next few years. A month is maybe a bit too long. If I did, I’d stay farther south, perhaps in Grant Road, Mahim, or around Matunga Road. I loved my room in Vile Parle, and my hosts Prity and Suren were wonderfully welcoming and relaxed, but the mad scramble up and down the railway network each day took time and energy. Plus, the south is way more interesting.

There is so, so, so much potential for Mumbai. I sometimes imagine what India would be like if it developed into something modern, the way Japan or Malaysia or China or Korea has done. Imagine clean streets and sidewalks, cars driving in their lanes, cheerful sidewalk cafes and leafy, colourful public parks and gardens; a modern and safe suburban rail network, all of that wrapped around the fascinating history, culture, color and vibrancy of India itself. Wow! One day, maybe. I suppose they have other problems to fix first, before they start trying to spruce the place up for western backpackers.

I learned a lot about Mumbai, but somehow feel I know a lot less. Previous visits were much shorter, and usually came after spending time in other parts of India where things are far less developed, and where there’s less variety and choice. Mumbai always seemed to be so advanced, so far ahead of the rest of the country, and so rich in diversity and local color. I thrived there, even felt at home. But a one-month stay exposed a lot what had been hidden. By leaving the southern, central part of the city to explore more of the neighborhoods I saw a more sober side of Mumbai, and more of her warts and challenges. Time likely played a part, too. I’m older, and the world has changed.

It was disappointing, in a way, like growing up and realizing the things you loved in childhood aren’t really so enchanting. I gained a lot from my month, but lost something, too. But in the end, overall, it was worth it, because I know more.

And after all, that’s what I always try to tell people: you don’t go to a place to confirm the things you think you already know, you go to see what it’s really like. And I did just that. The reward of a month in Mumbai is simply having been witness to the place.

But never say never! You’ll just have to stay tuned!

(Photo by John Ives)

---

* Remember! I love receiving comments, but anything you write, including when you hit “Reply” to the email notifications, is public. You know who you are…

* If you liked this story why not read some of my other blog posts? They’re all  here.

* If you liked this post, why not subscribe? Sleep easy knowing you’ll never miss another story. Click on the “Follow” button, or contact me and ask to be put on the list.

* Follow me on Instagram, if you’re bothered. I’m @arjwilson.

• Instagram

---

“You should go to foreign countries to see the way normal people live there, not to see the spectacular things. Buy vegetables, get a haircut, explore a suburb, walk out of town on a plain road. Don’t look for the special, look for the banal.”