1.00am Apollo Bunder

Beautiful breeze… such blissful relief after hot dusty north India. The sea(well the bay actually…), the lights, the pavement, the massage wallahs, the urchins, the junkies, and of course the cops…

Mumbai meri jaan, I'm in love with you all over again…

Was walking down the promenade when I saw an impromptu performance. A man who looked like a vagrant was sucking on his joint and expounding his views on life the universe and everything to a bunch of kids who had parked their bikes and were resting near the sea wall listening to him. Nandu(his name which we later learnt) is an extremely interesting fellow(if you as bored in life as I am). He exerts a masterly command over his brand of Pidgin English. He writes, or well at least recites, poetry. The kids are quite enthralled by him. They supply him with chai, charas, and sutta to keep him going and boy does he go!

In the few minutes that I sat around listening he went from Vinod Khanna-osho-dayavan (the movie)-cabinet minister in ABV govt TO Bush and Saddam. He also talks about history, philosophy and love. He has a regal air about him, threw away two cups of tea that were offered to him as they weren’t offered with enough respect.

Most of the kids see super entertainment value in him while some frankly think he is a genius… They use him to settle scores where he verbally abuses someone they don’t particularly like. They also pay for him to get into clubs at times….

After a brief moment of wondering whether Nandu is like the wise monk who sat in the city square spouting gibberish, I came to the conclusion that its mostly a case of diffuse cortical damage from long standing drug abuse;)

He is part of the cityscape in Colaba. Part of the bunch of random characters spawned by touristy Colaba, the kind that conned Shantaram(a.k.a Gregory Roberts who wrote a book that can at best be described as naïve)

In case anyone wants to confirm or disprove my conclusions on Nandu…. He can be found near the Gateway of India after 12 at night…. A scrawny fellow with his trouser legs rolled up a la Raj Kapoor in Awara…