Sun 14 Dec Thane Mumbai
Hotel Vinyasa is in an urban area. We noted the street noise way into the night. Up at 7 am. Headed to the front desk and asked for a room on the other side of the hotel and on a higher floor. And so we moved from room 102 to room 207 - basically the same room (albeit only a one-pane window), but facing the hills (yaaay).
Breakfast service began at 8 - served out on the open roof deck, with a grand view of the Shivaji Nagar neighborhood and the hills to the west. According to the waitstaff, the breakfast choice seemed to be an omelet and tea. So we ordered and dug into ... yet another masala omelet. As we finished up, they started bringing out the Indian food. Too bad, so sad. Carol insisted on staying long enough to scarf down some poha.
A word about Thane. Today, Thane is a suburb of Mumbai, surrounded by the Yeoor and Parsik Hills (that area of darkness we passed on the way into town). The suburb is divided by the Thane creek that drains into the Arabian Sea. Thane (Thana) was the terminus of the first railway in India built from Mumbai in 1853. If you can picture heading from Yonkers to Manhattan by train, you have a sense of the spatial relationship. As the guidebook says: "Although the culture is predominantly Maharashtrian, there are influences of the cosmopolitan culture of Mumbai as well."
Not a cloud in the sky. Unlike when we first got to Mumbai the highs were in the mid 80s and the morning lows in the low 60s. A great day for being outside in Sanjay Gandhi National Park, a nature park with both wild panthers and Buddhist ruins. However, the entrance lies on the other side of Thane, 40 km away and a bear to get to by public transportation. The guidebooks and the hotel staff both suggest hiring a taxi for several hours to get there and tour the sights of this 40-mile square park. Mike balks.
So we walk around the neighborhood, headed toward the hills. Can we walk toward the crest without entering and see what lies beyond? Unlikely.
So out instead to see the synagogue in Thane. We walked out in the adjoining streets for a little bit, just to get our orientation, and find out which buses came back here from the Thane train station.
Thus oriented, we caught a rickshaw to the "Shaar Hashamaim synagogue, near the Civil Hospital." On the way we passed a Jewish cemetery. The driver found the synagogue reasonably efficiently.
This morning, Shaar Hashamaim was open and buzzing. Chanukah started next week, and Sisterhood was holding a holiday bazaar in the front room. Clothing, spices, food, gifts, and of course Chanukah candles were for sale. The sales ladies were just like any other coterie of Jewish women, but the Indian difference was everywhere. One bubbe was selling 250 gm packs of masala, entitled Mom's Magic. Only 200 R. But we already had enough masala, and you never know what the beagles at the American customs will pick to bark at. However, we sprung for hing (the seasoning asafoetida) that another vendor, Penina, was hawking. We bought some handmade knit kippot in vivid colors that were decorated plastic seed pearls, along with complementary-colored mirrored cloth bags. Who could resist a 50-pack of pink Chanukah candles for 100 R? Souvenir mission accomplished.
We wanted to see the temple sanctuary, which entailed a visit to the president of the synagogue in his offices, and a [mostly mandatory] donation of 500 R. This got us a 15 minute tour of the place, including opening of the ark, etc. The Jews forming the historic core of Shaar Hashamaim are the Bene Israel, the "older Jews", the ones who (as the story goes) date their lineage to a 175 BCE ocean voyage from Israel to escape Antiochus. In fact, in 1998, Thane municipal road workers stumbled across ruins of a 500-year-old Jewish cemetery. Today, forty percent of the Jews in India are said to live in Thane.
Shaar Hashamaim is less grand than the synagogue in Pune (which, along with the Mumbai synagogue, were the Sassoon synagogues and therefore the most opulent). Those Baghdadi Jews and community builders came to dominate the international commerce in this part of the world. But the Bene Israel have the more intriguing back story.
The Jewish cemetery Carol saw was perhaps a km away, so we left walking in that direction. Follow these directions: up the road, under the main highway, past Hotel Satkar, and it will be on your left. We finally found the cemetery, walked in and looked around. A very pleasant place, with mostly new graves. Many headstones had names that ended in "-kar", which turns out to be the linguistic equivalent of 'person from the town of X' (Shaul Punekar, for example).
For lunch we had a hankering to go back to the Fort section of Mumbai and eat at Apoorva Restaurant, the Bangalore eatery that was not open when we tried to visit during our first days in India. So we took a rickshaw for 50 R to the Thane Rwy Station to make the 35 km ride to CST Station in downtown Mumbai. After all, it was Sunday afternoon. How crowded could it be?
We were let off in the taxi line. What a madhouse of a station! Couldn't find the restrooms. Worse, the line for tickets was 15 minutes long. Interlopers bold pushed their way to the front of the line. Next to this line was a women-only line. Carol got into that one, and bought 2 10 R tickets while Mike in the men's line still had about 5 minutes to wait.
Off to the other line to wait for a train to pull in. It appeared that the trains were running late, and very crowded. The first train, a 1220 train (pulling in at 1250), was so crush-loaded that there was no point even trying to get on. The next train, a 1215 train (pulling in at 1305), was also very crowded. Carol dove into the crush, stumbled, but was pulled onto the car. She wedged herself onto the edge of a seat. Mike was still outside on the platform as the train started to move. So he grabbed onto the bars on the door, and hung on as the train pulled out. Eventually, the other passengers pulled him into the train. He caught Carol's eye to indicate that he was on the train.
What must it be like to be a weekday regular commuter?!? (This was Sunday, after all.)
And off we went. 25 km along, as the crowd was somewhat thinning, Mike was able to sit down.
At the end of the line, we got out. Unlike Mumbai Fort district during the week, on Sunday the transit station neighborhood was very quiet.
We walked to the Apoorva Restaurant, which we finally found. We ordered Buttermilk (35 R), Salted Lassi (45 R), Baby Pomfret Fry (225 R) (the regular sized pomfret was absurdly priced), Mutton Sukha (160 R), Appam with Chicken Stew (190 R). Total 655 R ($11), with tip 700 R. A real treat in pleasant surroundings.
Although Wikipedia pictures the bread called appam as something different from what we got, we were served what we would classify as flaky parothas, a South Indian specialty. We have fallen in love with flaky parothas, best envisioned as a flat bread that resembles puff pastry, although it is not.
A walk around the adjacent area revealed that is was once, and probably still currently is, a home for Parsis. We have developed a sixth sense in noting Zoroastrian symbolism in structures and signs.
Time to head for a going-away present for Carol, a last kesar pista falooda at the shop right near the Traveller's Inn, our first Indian lodgings. We encountered some young newly-arrived tourists up the street from the hostel and shared some advise from our font of five weeks of Indian experience.
As we were walking along a gentleman came up: "Hello Uncle and Auntie, don't you remember me?" A former taxi driver, perhaps? We talked for a while, but neither of us could remember him. When he started asking for some money for fixing his taxi, we gave him the bums' rush. Probably one of the venerated scam artists of travel in this part of the world. But he was GOOD at his scam. Rather endearingly, the gonif even had sternly reprimanded Mike even while he was spinning his sob story, for Mike putting his foot on a tile with a Hindu image while tying a shoelace - proof that even no-goodniks have morals.
The falooda itself turned out to be a tad sweet, but good as it was the previous month.
As we walked along, we found an internet place/ ticket office - right expensive at 50 R per hour or any portion thereof to get on (Sunday prices, they said). We needed to go online for a little bit, so we paid. Those young tourists were also here, trying (mostly unsuccessfully) to get a train or a bus to Goa ASAP (always a rush to get to Goa!). There was a travel agent working with them, but they felt that his prices were too high. We told them how to get to CST and try their luck at the main station.
The train trip back to Thane was uneventful. We splurged for 1st class tickets (280 R for two) - we were still freaked out by our inbound experience. As 1st class passengers, we had seats the whole way. (I suspect that some of our seatmates had not paid the extra.) We found the bus stand and got on one of the several bus routes going back to our neighborhood.
The end of this line, however, was about 1 km past our hotel (we had missed our stop). We got out and started walking back. After a while we saw a bustling market, with live and butchered meat for sale, and the whole gamut of vegetables and fruit. A detour through the market, and then out for a few more blocks of walking. Here off to the left was the multi-colored sign for Hotel Vinyasa. Carol had spotted it before as we passed on the bus. And so we finally were at the hotel.
We really weren't hungry for dinner. However, as we walked again on our street we saw a cane juice vendor and ordered two large cups (15 R each). Thus sated, we went back to our room, and watched TV for the last time in India.
Hotel Vinyasa is in an urban area. We noted the street noise way into the night. Up at 7 am. Headed to the front desk and asked for a room on the other side of the hotel and on a higher floor. And so we moved from room 102 to room 207 - basically the same room (albeit only a one-pane window), but facing the hills (yaaay).
Breakfast service began at 8 - served out on the open roof deck, with a grand view of the Shivaji Nagar neighborhood and the hills to the west. According to the waitstaff, the breakfast choice seemed to be an omelet and tea. So we ordered and dug into ... yet another masala omelet. As we finished up, they started bringing out the Indian food. Too bad, so sad. Carol insisted on staying long enough to scarf down some poha.
A word about Thane. Today, Thane is a suburb of Mumbai, surrounded by the Yeoor and Parsik Hills (that area of darkness we passed on the way into town). The suburb is divided by the Thane creek that drains into the Arabian Sea. Thane (Thana) was the terminus of the first railway in India built from Mumbai in 1853. If you can picture heading from Yonkers to Manhattan by train, you have a sense of the spatial relationship. As the guidebook says: "Although the culture is predominantly Maharashtrian, there are influences of the cosmopolitan culture of Mumbai as well."
Not a cloud in the sky. Unlike when we first got to Mumbai the highs were in the mid 80s and the morning lows in the low 60s. A great day for being outside in Sanjay Gandhi National Park, a nature park with both wild panthers and Buddhist ruins. However, the entrance lies on the other side of Thane, 40 km away and a bear to get to by public transportation. The guidebooks and the hotel staff both suggest hiring a taxi for several hours to get there and tour the sights of this 40-mile square park. Mike balks.
So we walk around the neighborhood, headed toward the hills. Can we walk toward the crest without entering and see what lies beyond? Unlikely.
So out instead to see the synagogue in Thane. We walked out in the adjoining streets for a little bit, just to get our orientation, and find out which buses came back here from the Thane train station.
Thus oriented, we caught a rickshaw to the "Shaar Hashamaim synagogue, near the Civil Hospital." On the way we passed a Jewish cemetery. The driver found the synagogue reasonably efficiently.
This morning, Shaar Hashamaim was open and buzzing. Chanukah started next week, and Sisterhood was holding a holiday bazaar in the front room. Clothing, spices, food, gifts, and of course Chanukah candles were for sale. The sales ladies were just like any other coterie of Jewish women, but the Indian difference was everywhere. One bubbe was selling 250 gm packs of masala, entitled Mom's Magic. Only 200 R. But we already had enough masala, and you never know what the beagles at the American customs will pick to bark at. However, we sprung for hing (the seasoning asafoetida) that another vendor, Penina, was hawking. We bought some handmade knit kippot in vivid colors that were decorated plastic seed pearls, along with complementary-colored mirrored cloth bags. Who could resist a 50-pack of pink Chanukah candles for 100 R? Souvenir mission accomplished.
We wanted to see the temple sanctuary, which entailed a visit to the president of the synagogue in his offices, and a [mostly mandatory] donation of 500 R. This got us a 15 minute tour of the place, including opening of the ark, etc. The Jews forming the historic core of Shaar Hashamaim are the Bene Israel, the "older Jews", the ones who (as the story goes) date their lineage to a 175 BCE ocean voyage from Israel to escape Antiochus. In fact, in 1998, Thane municipal road workers stumbled across ruins of a 500-year-old Jewish cemetery. Today, forty percent of the Jews in India are said to live in Thane.
Shaar Hashamaim is less grand than the synagogue in Pune (which, along with the Mumbai synagogue, were the Sassoon synagogues and therefore the most opulent). Those Baghdadi Jews and community builders came to dominate the international commerce in this part of the world. But the Bene Israel have the more intriguing back story.
The Jewish cemetery Carol saw was perhaps a km away, so we left walking in that direction. Follow these directions: up the road, under the main highway, past Hotel Satkar, and it will be on your left. We finally found the cemetery, walked in and looked around. A very pleasant place, with mostly new graves. Many headstones had names that ended in "-kar", which turns out to be the linguistic equivalent of 'person from the town of X' (Shaul Punekar, for example).
For lunch we had a hankering to go back to the Fort section of Mumbai and eat at Apoorva Restaurant, the Bangalore eatery that was not open when we tried to visit during our first days in India. So we took a rickshaw for 50 R to the Thane Rwy Station to make the 35 km ride to CST Station in downtown Mumbai. After all, it was Sunday afternoon. How crowded could it be?
We were let off in the taxi line. What a madhouse of a station! Couldn't find the restrooms. Worse, the line for tickets was 15 minutes long. Interlopers bold pushed their way to the front of the line. Next to this line was a women-only line. Carol got into that one, and bought 2 10 R tickets while Mike in the men's line still had about 5 minutes to wait.
Off to the other line to wait for a train to pull in. It appeared that the trains were running late, and very crowded. The first train, a 1220 train (pulling in at 1250), was so crush-loaded that there was no point even trying to get on. The next train, a 1215 train (pulling in at 1305), was also very crowded. Carol dove into the crush, stumbled, but was pulled onto the car. She wedged herself onto the edge of a seat. Mike was still outside on the platform as the train started to move. So he grabbed onto the bars on the door, and hung on as the train pulled out. Eventually, the other passengers pulled him into the train. He caught Carol's eye to indicate that he was on the train.
What must it be like to be a weekday regular commuter?!? (This was Sunday, after all.)
And off we went. 25 km along, as the crowd was somewhat thinning, Mike was able to sit down.
At the end of the line, we got out. Unlike Mumbai Fort district during the week, on Sunday the transit station neighborhood was very quiet.
We walked to the Apoorva Restaurant, which we finally found. We ordered Buttermilk (35 R), Salted Lassi (45 R), Baby Pomfret Fry (225 R) (the regular sized pomfret was absurdly priced), Mutton Sukha (160 R), Appam with Chicken Stew (190 R). Total 655 R ($11), with tip 700 R. A real treat in pleasant surroundings.
Although Wikipedia pictures the bread called appam as something different from what we got, we were served what we would classify as flaky parothas, a South Indian specialty. We have fallen in love with flaky parothas, best envisioned as a flat bread that resembles puff pastry, although it is not.
A walk around the adjacent area revealed that is was once, and probably still currently is, a home for Parsis. We have developed a sixth sense in noting Zoroastrian symbolism in structures and signs.
Time to head for a going-away present for Carol, a last kesar pista falooda at the shop right near the Traveller's Inn, our first Indian lodgings. We encountered some young newly-arrived tourists up the street from the hostel and shared some advise from our font of five weeks of Indian experience.
As we were walking along a gentleman came up: "Hello Uncle and Auntie, don't you remember me?" A former taxi driver, perhaps? We talked for a while, but neither of us could remember him. When he started asking for some money for fixing his taxi, we gave him the bums' rush. Probably one of the venerated scam artists of travel in this part of the world. But he was GOOD at his scam. Rather endearingly, the gonif even had sternly reprimanded Mike even while he was spinning his sob story, for Mike putting his foot on a tile with a Hindu image while tying a shoelace - proof that even no-goodniks have morals.
The falooda itself turned out to be a tad sweet, but good as it was the previous month.
As we walked along, we found an internet place/ ticket office - right expensive at 50 R per hour or any portion thereof to get on (Sunday prices, they said). We needed to go online for a little bit, so we paid. Those young tourists were also here, trying (mostly unsuccessfully) to get a train or a bus to Goa ASAP (always a rush to get to Goa!). There was a travel agent working with them, but they felt that his prices were too high. We told them how to get to CST and try their luck at the main station.
The train trip back to Thane was uneventful. We splurged for 1st class tickets (280 R for two) - we were still freaked out by our inbound experience. As 1st class passengers, we had seats the whole way. (I suspect that some of our seatmates had not paid the extra.) We found the bus stand and got on one of the several bus routes going back to our neighborhood.
The end of this line, however, was about 1 km past our hotel (we had missed our stop). We got out and started walking back. After a while we saw a bustling market, with live and butchered meat for sale, and the whole gamut of vegetables and fruit. A detour through the market, and then out for a few more blocks of walking. Here off to the left was the multi-colored sign for Hotel Vinyasa. Carol had spotted it before as we passed on the bus. And so we finally were at the hotel.
We really weren't hungry for dinner. However, as we walked again on our street we saw a cane juice vendor and ordered two large cups (15 R each). Thus sated, we went back to our room, and watched TV for the last time in India.
