In your city

The other day I was chatting with a friend of mine over a cup of tea. This friend is from Agra. ‘I am in love with the Taj Mahal. Its beauty is mesmerizing ’, I told her. ‘Yes it seems its beautiful’, she replied back. ‘What do you mean it seems to be beautiful? Haven’t you been there ever?’ I asked her being rather confused. ‘No, I actually haven’t,’ she promptly replied feeling very embarrassed. I was gob smacked. Taj Mahal is considered as one of the wonders of the world. She had lived in Agra for a good 23 years because she shifted her to Mumbai after her marriage. How come she has never visited the Taj Mahal ever? But then I thought to myself that how much do I know about the city that I live in?                                 

I belong to Pune and lived there for 26 years before I got married and moved to Mumbai. But it took me a film like ‘Bajirao Mastani ‘and my son’s history project to actually visit Shaniwaar Wada for the first time in 2016! Now Mumbai is my city. I am living here for the last 14 years, but how much of the city have I really seen? Exploring the city on weekends especially with children has mostly been theme parks, malls, movies and well-known shopping complexes.  Going out with friends has been more of watching movies or meeting at some lounge bar or sports bar. The mall culture started some 15 years back (at least in metros and ‘A’ class cities) but our cities are at least centuries old! So definitely there much is so much to see, learn and absorb which I thought I had completely missed. So I decided to do an interesting exercise and re-learning about my city, the city of dreams – Mumbai. Over the last two years, I have visited a couple of countries in Europe. Each time I land in a new country I get so excited and just can’t wait to get to the tourist center to catch hold of the city tour ride brochures. Every time I say to myself that these countries have so many things to explore and it’s a treat for the tourists like Libraries, museums, palaces, exotic gardens, Science centers, stadiums, shopping lanes, beaches, churches and so much more. Well, now I feel I was so ignorant about my own city! Mumbai has everything mentioned above and more to offer! So like an enthusiastic tourist, I decided to visit some tourist websites pertaining to Mumbai and its rich history. I made a laundry list of all the attractions and places of interest which the city has to offer. Some of these places I have visited while others I still to visit. In fact, 60% of the places mentioned in this list are yet to be visited by me or my family, here it goes:

Temples

Siddhivinayak Temple

Mahalaxmi Temple

Mumbradevi Temple (Mumbai has been named after this temple)

Jain Temple

ISKCON Temple

Science Centers/Museums/Gallery

Nehru Planetarium

Prince of Wales Museum

Chhatrapati Shivaji Sanghralaya

Jahangir Art Gallery

Monuments  

CST

Bandstand

Nariman Point

Gateway of India

Dhobi Ghat

Rajabai Clock Tower

Mumbai University

Walkeshwar

Prithvi Theater

R K Studio

Film City

Bandra Sea link

Gardens / Aquarium

Jijamata Udayan (to see penguins)

Taraporewala Aquarium

Phool Mandi

Hanging Garden

Rani chi Baug

Borivilli National Park

Festivals

Kala Ghoda festival

Ganesh Festival

Banganga Festival

Shopping markets

Elco Market

Crawford Market

Gandhi Market

Linking Road

Colaba Causeway

Chor Bazaar

Fashion Street

We mustn’t forget that Mumbai has the amazing places to eat. This list is endless! Our cities have so much of history to offer, it’s just that we are not aware of it. So my pledge for 2017 is that I will be visiting most of these places along with my family and try to cover as many as them breaking the list into monthly targets. And for you guys, why don’t you do the same with your city?