Terror in Mumbai

It's 9:36pm on Thanksgiving Day here in Mumbai, and even though no one here actually celebrates Thanksgiving, those of us who are American residents and have escaped being injured and are safe from the carnage that has wracked the city, have a lot to be thankful for. I doubt there are too many people left in the world who don't already know, but right about now marks 24 hours since Mumbai has been laid under seige by a group of terrorists of indeterminent origins who have attacked 10 different areas around the city, with the focus of their attacks being the 5-star Taj and Oberoi-Trident hotels where approximately 20-100 hostages are still being held.
I thought I would share my story of the last 48 hours for my friends and family and anyone else who might be interested and wondering about my safety. To get that question out of the way, I am currently safe in my neighborhood of Andheri, which is far North of the majority of the attacks in the city, although I must admit its a strange feeling to be actually feeling unease at walking the street, something I never though I would experience in my beloved country of India. Sure, discomfort at being stared at incessently, but actual fear of bodily harm . . . how can this be happening?
So without further ado, here's my story of the last 24 hours+. It's quite long, with a lot of back-story. I don't know why I wrote so much, I guess I just wanted to write . . .

Last night began like any other of my recent weeknights since I started living and working here in Mumbai almost a month ago.

To give some background, I live in Andheri, what could be called a "suburb" or Mumbai, but like a lot of other "suburbs" is really a monstorous part of a sprawling metropolis in its own right, the only thing making it a "suburb" being its relatively long distace from the venerable center of the city, with its historical colonial buildings, long since made part of Independent India, made up primarily of Central Mumbai and Colaba, the far southern reaches of the city, that cram the southern peninisula, giving Mumbai much of the look and feel of New York City with its similar geography and fantastic melting-pot of culture.
Every day I take the train to work, a distance of 22 kilometers (13.6 miles), and a grueling half-an-hour ride in bogies packed to the gills with fellow commuters. Riding the commuter rail lines, a service that transports around 6 million + people a day (the size of a small country) in Mumbai is an experience not for the faint of heart.

Literally, a flow of people begins to pour from the trains long before they come to a halt in the station. Inevitably, a collected, fit, and interchangable man with all the relaxed determination of somone who does it every day of his life, with his coconut-oiled hair, well-trimmed mustache, and tailored work-shirt flowing in the wind, hanging on with one precarious hand and one precarious foot to the train, begins the waterfall of humans as soon as it becomes physically possible to hit the ground running without breaking his ankles. A flow that is impossible to reverse until it has run its course proceeds to unfold, but with perfect efficency: when the strength of the flow is too weak to match the impending reversal, and the rushing waters of humans has reversed course, there is no hope in escaping the train for those who have not made it off, as the flow is equally intense in the other direction.



I have learned the ways of the train now after not making it aboard a few times, and not being

able to make an exit a few times, but instead being forced to make an escape one station too late.



Now I push and squeeze my way into the flows with the same intensity but lack of malevolence as my fellow Mumbaikers and almost always make my way aboard.

But I've also learned to optimize my travel times. I start work late, around 1pm, and I leave late, around 7pm. Its just how my work day goes and I like it, naturally being a late-riser. But every Mumbaiker knows that catching the train between 3pm and 8pm is truly ungodly and genuinely risky, with literally people dying everyday from being squeezed out of the open-aired bogies (door-less because they would never be able to close) onto the tracks below due to the surging crowds. So I've taken to attending art-openings and other events, taking care of errands, meeting friends for drinks, or just hanging out in South Mumbai, where I work, until after 9pm when the train's capacities, while still often packed to the point of not being able to move, is at least conceivably managable. I often end up in Colaba after work, an exciting district of Mumbai, in the furthest southern reaches of the city, where I end up at one of my favorite destinations, a place where I've made a lot of friends amongst the staff, and enjoy seeing Meher Baba's picture on the wall looking down at me with his glorious smile, Leopold's Cafe.

I got off work last night around 7pm, another enjoyable day at Chemould Prescott Road, the wonderfully impressive contemporary art gallery where I've been interning and feel blessed to work at. I made my way to Colaba, my default hang-out, and for some reason found myself with a serious hankering for McDonald's French-fries, a spectre that has been haunting me much to my McDonald's-loathing selve's chagrin these past few weeks. Chemical-dependency coddled from childhood by an ingenious corporate behemoth without scruples?

Most likely. But, a chemical-dependency none-the-less strong enough to conjure childhood emotions of comfort that trump even the great emotions stirred from reading Fast Food Nation and other truth bombs, as well as the burning shame of eating at such a cultural bulldozer in the midst of a flurry of potential cultural culinary discoveries all around me, that are quickly falling in the wake of the awesome power of McDonald's very own cultural destruction.



I induldged myself.



Mumbai had been rough on me lately.



Just last week I had felt as though I was dying. I honestly can't remember being that sick in my life. I was struck down for 3 days with a serious case of food poisining, add on top of that a fair amount of lonliness, add on to that being in a city with a serious lack of green space, and my great need for said green space, or better yet a great need for the beautiful beaches and oceans of the earth that I've been inhabiting for the past 6 years (graduate of University of Hawaii '07) . . . you get my point, I was depressed. Comfort fries were needed.



Earlier, while still at work, a message came on my cell phone that may very well have saved my life and definitely sealed my fate for the evening. So what did this all important message say:



"Drinks for expats tonight at Henry Tham's. You should come."



It was one of my few American friends in the city: a fellow expat, a relatively new friend, and also a recent removal from New York City. She also happens to be interning at a very wonderful contemporary art gallery that, like my gallery, shares a prominent position as one of the most important places to show in Mumbai. She's basically as close a friend as I have that is sharing in my experience in this city of 13 million.



I contemplated my moves for the evening as I sat popping another delicious poison stick of joy into my mouth (Mmmm beef tallow flavor substitues from a factory in New Jersey), ingenious science had once again resulted in the fry tasting exactly the same as a McDonald's fry anywhere else in the world. The ketchup, however, was spiced with some sort of chili, as all Indian McDonald's ketchup is. I was served by ridiculously joyous Indian McDonald's employees highly confused and perterbed by my methods of clearing my own tray (a worker actually grabbed my tray from me mid-dump to stop the affront of his clear failure of duty unfolding before his eyes, that of a patron having to clear his own tray).



It was about 8pm. I wasn't sure what time my friend wanted to meet at Henry Tham's, a place I'd never been, but that Google told me was right next to the Taj Hotel, but I didn't want to leave for home too late either, so I thought I'd make a quick stop at Leopold's right next door. Maybe I'd have a beer or some more food, I'd at least check in with my friends that worked there. I wanted to talk to my friend Thomson who was going to help me out with some shipping I needed done. He was the young floor manager who always dressed nice and looked slick in his matching purple tie and dress shirt. I'm sure Eric would be around too, he of the tight Indian graphic tee tucked into jeans with prominent belk-buckle uniform, a look that could well describe a multi-tude of endearing young Indian men unbelievably trying-too hard to look cool and instead looking like ungodly amalgamations of disasterously flamboyant teenagers in the seventies with terrible penchants for overindulgence in huge and horrible emroidery, but that he actually pulled off with a degree of hipness, aplomb, and respect (I think it was the lack of the ubiquitous bell-bottom cut to his jeans). I liked talking to him, and he was going to tell me when I could come by and get introduced to Greogory David Roberts, his friend of many years, the man who wrote the hugely popular novel, and by far one of my favorite reads of late, Shantaram. Maybe my friend Santosh from Kolkata would be around too: my favorite waiter with the wonderfully warm smile, who always loved to see me, and always seemed to be having a good time. Finally, I wondered if I would run into Farzad or his wife Shahnaz, the owners, fellow Baba-lovers, and recent new good friends of mine. I made my way across the street, saw Thomson right away. We chatted for a bit about shipping, he was wearing his usual slick outfit. "Impossible to send Beedees," he told me.

I said hi to Eric, today an orange shirt, slightly tighter than normal even, "He was just in yesterday, you just missed him." I told him not to worry about it.



Farzad and Shahnaz weren't around and neither was Santosh, or at least they weren't in view, and it occured to me I should get going to Henry Tham's. Eric asked me if I wanted to sit down. I almost plopped down and ordered a beer, my heavy bag egging me on, but I knew it would be hard to get up once I sat down. So I got going. I headed down the side street right to the back door of the Taj hotel, took a left and headed for Henry Tham's just around the corner.



I went inside and ordered a Gin and Tonic with my favorite gin, Bombay Saffire. I sat alone at the bar, reading transcripts of interviews with spiritual figures, and got into a discussion with a nice young waiter interested in spirituality that believed strongly in religious unity. We discussed whether there was a problem with reading transcripts of spiritual figures while drinking gin and tonics. I didn't see a problem with it, he was open to the idea.



Next, a bubbly American businessman was interested, "What's that your reading!?" A long discussion of art/spirituality/business/how amazing it was that I had been coming to India since I was 7 years-old ensued. We talked about our love/hate relationship with Mumbai with more of a focus on the love we had for all its quirks and its ability to show us something new and amazing every day.



I texted my friend, she said she was right across the street at a restaurant called Indigo, a very nice and upscale place frequented by wealthy westerners, often frequented by guests of the Taj staying right close-by. She wasn't planning on coming over for about another hour. Perhaps I should just join her and a friend there?



Sure.



I arrived at Indigo's, one of the many high class places of Mumbai I had become accustomed to visiting, places I might visit once in a while for a splurge before, but that had become common hang-outs for me now, not that I could really afford to eat at them actually, but places like the Oberoi-Trident, the Taj, Indigo's, etc. had become familiar to me as places that hosted events, talks, gallery openings, etc., or just simply as meeting places where I'd meet friends in the art community to share drinks, discussion, etc.



I found my friend upstairs and was promptly introduced to two new friends, one of which I would end up spending the whole night with as my fellow comrade as it would turn out. Interestingly enough, the other one of my new friends was from Israel, he had to split right away to catch a flight or something, but his presence brought on a discussion of Israel. We discussed problems in the Middle East for quite sometime, in particular the problems between Israel and Palestine, and how this tiny strip of land had contributed so enormously to world problems of recent times, in particular the growing threat of terrorism all over the world.



It very well could have been as those words were coming out of our mouths, that about 100 yards away from where we sat, terrorists were landing their boats at the Gateway of India monument and fanning out to storm the Taj Hotel, directly around the corner from where we sat, Leopold's cafe, also less than a block away, and where I had stood as prominent as could be only maybe half-an-hour previous. At the same time terrorists were fanning out to CST station to spray and kill members of the always crowded station with AK-47s and hand grenades. Later my heart would sink, as I would see pictures on the internet of pools of blood on the platform where I had crossed to catch a train only a week before. Other terrorists were storming the Oberoi-Trident hotel where two nights before I had attended a panel discussion on the current state of the Indian art market. And there we sat oblivious, eating our cheese and drinking our wine, spreading delicious butter on delicious morsels of bread.



Then the first reports started coming through. As luck would have it, while Indigo was usually relied on for its easy Wi-Fi access, and was known as a good place to come and surf and sip coffee, tonight it's internet happened to be down. All our news would come from text messgaes and cell phone calls.

The first thing we heard was that there was gunfire in the street. Close by, near the Taj. Somebody said it was some kind of gang warfare dispute. People weren't concerned. I wasn't concerned. No one was concerned. Sure it was bad to have shooting in the street, but crazy shit happened sometimes. Especially in Colaba. Mumbai had seen much worse. It would pass soon. We continued snacking, lighthearded comments without too much concern, "jeez, I hope its not serious." I imagined some idiots shooting at each other, maybe some isolated thugs that had beef with each other, nothing that was going to get out of hand.

People were coming and going to the restaurant without much concern. We were about ready to head back across the street to Henry Tham's but thought we'd just hang for a minute to see if any other details of these shootings unfolded. Maybe it wasn't so wise to step out yet with bullets whizzing by. Then reports slowly but steadily started to ratchet up. First it was a report about a blast at CST station. A blast at CST station? What the hell was going on? That is strange. Apparently not that serious though. Some small group of nuts with hand grenades.



People continued to leave the restaurant as they pleased.



At some point talk started coming in about terrorists, about shootings at Leopold's, a police car hijacked, opening fire on the streets, hostages taken at the Oberoi and the Taj, people gunned down indiscriminately at the metro theatre, targeting of UK and US passport holders. Bombs at Santa Cruz, bombs at Ville Parle. It was funny how it leaked in bit by bit, sometimes over-exagerated, sometimes under, and bit by bit the realization of how serious things were getting started to unfold. And bit by bit the restaurant started not letting people out so easily. Around midnight it was clear that we weren't going anywhere. When I looked up at the huge window next to the booth I was in and saw that it was suddenly blocked by a huge steel curtain along with every other window and door in the restaurant my body got a little cold. But I'll admit, I was a little excited, its kind of embarrasing now, to have that feeling, to realize what was happening right outside, lives being ended, families devastated, but at the moment I was excited by the prospect of having to deal with some serious shit.

Then they cut the lights, somebody realized that if they were targeting affluent places full of foreigners we might want to lay low, seem like nobodies home. They bolted all the doors, front, back, side, whatever, and most of us retreated to the upper level of the restaurant, away from windows and doors that could be fired at with bombs or guns. From the top level we could actually see over the steel curtains through the small windows at the top of the front wall of the restaurant. Huge firetrucks went by, police went by, those news cars with the huge sattelite things on top went by, I got just a little excited, thinking about what I would do if someone tried to storm the place, or what I would do if a bomb went off in front of the place. But for some reason I knew we were safe. I knew that there wouldn't be a full scale attack, I knew that the attacks were spread out to maximize fear but the efforts of storming places had already been decided and contained. Sure the place contained was right next-door, but it was contained.



I suppose I didn't really know, but I felt it, that we were safe as long as we didn't go anywhere, and probably even if we did. It occured to me that my friends and I, the three of us, were the only Americans in the place. Which was a little awkward to realize, that what was happening probably had a lot to do with our governments actions. In particular with one man's administration. . . .



At some point, everyone in the restaurant started talking to each other, finding out what each other had heard. We all realized we were in this thing together for the night. I smoked a cigarette in the bathroom with a couple from France. They seemed relaxed, but concerned in their eyes. A very elegant couple from Canada wasthere. They had a room in one of the top floors of the Taj, which was on fire and being bombed, and they had just got to India with highly important documents for their planned move to India. For all they knew all their things were burned to a crisp, passports, everything. They were smiling though, resigned to what may be.

There was a German man whose wife was a journalist and feeding us reliable information.



People were dying, for all I know my friends were dying. I could have been dying if I had sat down for that beer. I didn't think about these things at the time actually. It did hit me how serious things had become when I listened to TV reporting over a friends cell phone, but I sort of put it out of my head, its not that I denied anything, but I didn't want to get excited. Some of the poeople in the restaurant got a little excited. Some started raising their voices, saying things like "what are we going to do," a little panicky. But it didn't last. Everyone remained pretty calm. My friends had become quite concerned but I realized if anything was going to happen to us there was nothing gained by being a nervous wreck.



So I actually went to bed. A lot of us did. Especially the staff of the restaurant, who were incredibly relaxed. They never even acted like anything was amiss. They continued to serve us all night and into the morning, giving us food and water and free tea. They were the first to start napping and I figured yeah why not, I found an empty booth, laid down and got a solid 4 hours of sleep. Around 6am I woke up, the lights were turned on, we had a little breakfast, omlettes and toast were made on the house. At seven we started wondering if we were going to be cleared to go.



Word came that hostages were still being held and blasts were still going off in the Taj and Oberoi. I found out that two train stations on my line had been bombed, Ville Parle, the station before mine being one of them, but I put it out of my mind and I didn't think too much of it. So many different reports had come through, and like I said before, I knew that the incidents were sporadic and spread over the city which was scary, but nothing had been huge, buildings were not destroyed, trains were not destroyed, and with the exception of the Taj and Oberoi, large bands of gunmen were not roaming the streets. Word came at 8am that the cops had finally given us the green light to leave the restaurant.



The clack-clack-clack of the steel curtains being rolled back and the natural light pouring in to the restaurant was a welcome combination of sight and sound. It was thrilling and a bit scary and strange to step out into the street. It was hard to believe that I had really just had to be holed up for a night because of terrorist attacks. Had this really happened? Still I wondered, is this that serious, all the sudden, the streets I had enjoyed freely only hours before were now tainted. It was a terrible feeling, I suppressed it, I still am, thinking that India will transcend this, India doesn't grip to fear like America does, they get on quickly, but I couldn't stop that feeling in my chest that something terrible had happened. I smelled the smoke from the Taj right away, but I didn't look back, I didn't look much at all. Right next door to us a petrol station had been bombed but i didn't even see it, the streets were eerily empty, still, the usual bombardment of Bombay traffic was nowhere to be see. People were about, even some taxis were about, things were starting to get back to normal somewhat actually but everything was soft, so much quiter. I was suprised that I didn't want to look, I just wanted to go, get away from it. Colaba causeway was blocked with yellow cones, I didn't want to look down and see Leopold's, I didn't even want to see it, I didn't want to think that my friends might be shot, that I could have been shot, I guess that's when you know its serious, when you don't want to rubberneck, when you want to get away. But I wasn't sure what to do, should I go all the way home in a cab? It would be a rare opportunity to take a cab home and actually get there in less than 2 hours. Traffic would be non-existent.



Could I find a cab? Should I take the train? Was it safe to take the train? I'll be alone. Is that safe? I'm always the only white person I see on the train, I'm always the only white person at my massive station and neighborhood. Should I break with my friends? It felt kind of like the fellowship breaking up, we all went our seperate ways, someone thought I should stay in South Mumbai, not go alone, but I asked one of the military men about the trains and he said they were running and safe, it occurred to me that shit could break-out in South Mumbai, Hindu fundamentalists could riot, Mumbaikers were somewhat prone to rioting. It was probably best to get home, back to my friends and adopted family in Andheri. I decided to take the train. We said our goodbyes and assured each other we would call when we were home safe.



There was a cab parked on the other side of Colaba causeway. Parked cabs on Colaba causeway never go to Churchgate station. Its way too close for their trouble, they want tourists taking long trips to Bandra or Santa Cruz. Your only hope is to flag a moving taxi who's not invested in posting up for the big fish. But today I asked this cabbie and he looked at me, and he nodded his head. I could feel his sympathy, he wasn't going to deny someone trying to get out of Colaba. Mumbaikers say, when the shit goes down, we take care of each other. I got down at Churchgate and only then did I look back and see the smoke billowing out of the Taj, becoming more peaceful as it reached higher in the sky. I couldn't believe how sad I felt.



The Taj hotel is a symbol of Mumbai's independence, a beautiful, centuries old relic of a great story of pride: the legend being that a rich Parsi man of Mumbai, despite his great wealth, was denied entrance to one of the prestigous colonial hotels of the British simply because of his native origin. Inflamed, the man built the greatest hotel in Mumbai to this day, what is now known as the Taj. And there I finally saw it with my own eyes, smoke billowing from this great and beautiful symbol of independence. . . I couldn't believe my eyes. I didn't look for long.



The train ride was eery too. There was hardly anyone on board. I fell asleep on the train and woke up right at my station. I jumped off with no one in my way and noticed the big McDonald's that is right in front of the station with its steel curtains down, but the store open none-the-less, with people going inside through the side door. I guess they were afraid of being a target.



I found a rickshaw right away, and like in Colaba, what usually takes me 4 tries took one: the guy nodding slowly and surely when I said my destination. I could feel his sympathy too. He was Muslim. You can tell from the lack of Hindu decorations in the rickshaw and the style of beard. I got the sense that maybe he was worried too about what these attacks meant for him, and I could feel that he was happy to be able to show his love for me by taking me where I needed to go. He couldn't speak English very well but when he dropped me off he asked me where I was from and I said America. He smiled very sweetly and thought for a second and then asked how many rupees to the dollar in very broken English, it seemed like maybe the only small talk he could think of. I said 49 and he seemed happy. He earnestly put out his hand and told me his name. I shook his hand and told him mine, and I think we were both very happy to show each other brotherly love, to show that these attacks would not drive something between us even though he was a Muslim and I a westerner, that co-existence would go on in our beloved country with its foundation of tolerance.



Today has been an interesting day of reflection. I had no idea that I would come so close to terrorists attacks in India. I don't know what's going to happen now. I don't know what to feel. These places that were attacked are placed integral to my galleries operations, regular hangouts and venues deliberately targeted by the terrorists. The people I have started working with were directly targeted. I was targeted. We are targets. Just tonight I was supposed to attend an auction of artwork at the Taj. . . .

What is going to happen now? I suppose things will carry on and get back to normal faster than we may think being as this is India, and their resiliency against terrorism is unmatched. I hope we do. I'm ready to. But I can't believe how I feel. I will fight it, and I will defeat it, but tonight I was walking in my neighborhood alone, looking for an internet cafe, and I felt fear in my bones. By no means debilatating, but the logical fear that realistically, it might not be the best idea for me to be walking alone around Mumbai right now. People were looking at me, concerned. I could see it and feel it. . . .



In conclusion of this blog I just want to point to a transcript of an interview I read from CNN's Larry King Live last night. (Find it here.) To me, it was wonderful to read, wonderful to see on such a big stage. Larry had Deepak Chopra on, and he discussed very frankly how the response to this tradegy is going to have to be different from what has come before. He discussed how the idea of a "war on terror" must end because of its inherent status as an oxymoron. He discussed how its a sham, and how the whole impetus of it has only created more terrorists, and how Obama must take control of changing the rhetoric on this issue, how he must make use of his political capital and win the hearts and minds of moderate Muslims on the brink of falling into the rising tide of extremism, a tide that is fed by increasing marginalization of Muslim communites, a marginalization that will be fed by any unfair attacks perpatrated against innocent Muslims in India or any where else in the world. Obama has made a brief statement condemning the attacks but its time for him to step up, this is a big opportunity to take a stand.



This is a very precarious time, a time that could easily plunge India and the world into increasing chaos. It requires our utmost attention to be extremely careful in our retribution.



But more importantly than anything, my heart is with everyone that is suffering tonight. I don't even know if I've lost friends tonight, I haven't heard from everyone, but I already know of friends who have lost friends, and there is potential for serious fall out in the art world. So pray with me, pray with India for all those suffering and for the future to be bright. The good news is its all in God's hands. Whatever mysterious plans he's got cooked up, we can be sure that in the end, they're for the best.



Love from India,



Mikey