Wet Wet Weekend!

Date: 30th of June 2007

Time: It is so complicated because there is no solid reference to refer to.

Location: Few thousands of meters above the sea level, somewhere in space on an EgyptAir jetplane.

Incident:

Getting bored of sleeping on the same seat for 6 hours, -which was supposed to be the total duration of the journey- the pilot has announced that due to bad weather conditions the flight is expected to take one more hour. After some more time, the pilot said that if the weather conditions remain that bad we will land in Muscat!! I was very shocked. I did not know what I'd do if I land in Muscat. Luckily we were able to land in Mumbai. I finished the entrance procedures very quickly but it took so long to get my luggage, also because of weather conditions.

I was very surprised when I saw the sky. It was raining heavily. The reason behind my surprise was not the rain, since Akanksha & Deepak have told me earlier about monsoon season. I was surprised because it was raining at a temperature of 26c! For me it was much better than the previous day in Cairo with a temperature over 40c.

Unsurprisingly, I could not recognize anyone from Akanksha's family -who kindly volunteered to pick me up from the airport and also host me temporarily in Mumbai. They must have been waiting since 11:30am and now it is past 3 in the afternoon. I called Mrs Binty -Akanksha's mother- on the phone, first she asked me if I can take a taxi then we lost connection. A man has been helping me do the call, paying coins and even getting me a tok-tok -which is called Autorikshaw in India. I told him I need to exchange money first. He told me that I can pay in dollars. The tok-tok driver offered to take me to the address I showed him for 30 dollars. I refused and tried to call Mrs. Binty again. She told me that Mr. Nalin -Akanksha's father- is on the way to the airport, but since weather conditions are very bad it might take him one hour to get there. She said I can relax and have some coffee.

I went to exchange money at the airport to pay the man who helped me back. He paid me 3 rupees for the phone calls. I exchanged 20 dollars for 750 rupees. I gave 10 rupees to the man but he seemed so upset and asked for 100. Finally I paid him 20 rupees and went to sit at the arrival lounge. I started reading one of the 2 arabic books I brought with me when suddenly I heard a voice asking: "Are you Ahmed?" I answered: "Yes". It was Mr Nalin; a tall man in t-shirt, shorts and slippers. He had 2 papers with him, one of them contained my full name in big font and the other contained a picture of me that he got from Akanksha. He welcomed me and took me to the car. A boy that looked so young helped me with putting the luggage into the car.
Then he sat on the front right seat and started driving!

I thought that this was the normal weather in Mumbai, but as we got more into the city I realized what everybody meant by bad weather conditions. The streets were full of water like small pools which caused traffic chaos; in some streets cars had to use the opposite direction. I was observing the streets behind the car window which was full of rain drops. On the side streets the water level was so high that I saw people walking with water reaching their knees and even higher!

Wet streets of Mumbai

The car crossed the gate which encloses a couple of very high buildings. The car stopped in front of one of them and we went to take the lift. At the 18th floor we stopped. Mr Nalin tried to ring the bell but electricity was off. He made a phone call and shortly Mrs Binty opened the door. She welcomed me and introduced me to her daughter Akriti, and 2 of Akriti's friends. She also showed me the flat. The flat is neither too small nor too big. Every room had a small bathroom. I stayed at Akanksha's room; which had a big bed, a big library and a nice window view. The Mehtas family was very nice and caring. We had lunch, Mrs Binty and Shiv -Akriti's friend- told me about the story of Lord Ganesha which they had his figure in the dining room and beside the lift. Later on I recognized his picture everywhere; he has the face of an elephant. They also showed me the Mehtas wedding pictures and told me about Indian wedding rituals.


Lord Ganesha


In the evening they took me to an elegant restaurant where we had dinner. Akriti could not join because she was sick and so her friends stayed with her. After dinner we went back home. I followed the news and learned that water level in the streets is very high. It has not been higher than this except once 2 years ago when it was more than 900mm! The news said "It is a Wet Wet Weekend in Mumbai!" Normally, electricity doesn't go off but that day it went off for a long time. That night I slept for a long time due to jet lag.