(Picture: Chappal shopping in Mumbai)
Ranjit and I got into this ritual of shopping in a different city for Raunak's birthday for the past 2 years. The excuse is Raunak's birthday and the hidden agenda is shopping for me. It all started one fine evening with us hunting for a faded blue denim dungarees for his birthday last year. After 3 hours of visiting all the regular shops, we sat down at Mehfil for dinner -- disappointed, exhausted, and hungry. We go there frequently. Great food and live ghazals! During our conversation, I told Ranjit that Hyderabad is not a great place for shopping and I wish we had more variety like Bangalore and other metros. Ranjit said "lets go". "Where?", I asked him. "Bangalore" he said, and off we went to Yatri Nivas to catch a bus to Bangalore. Called up home on our way and told my mother-in-law that we would be back the day after morning and we left. Of all our impulsive travel plans stories, this is my favorite. This captures what we ended up doing in Bangalore.
So this year, it was Mumbai. It was a short weekend trip and I probably went at the wrong time to all wrong places in the city. The point was to experience shopping that is unique to the place we visit. We took a lot of time to figure out the places and specific shops to go to, and as a result did a lot of walking in the sweltering heat. Could not carry on for long, and our adventure on the roads had to be cut short to head back to the hotel and watch the India Pakistan Champion's trophy match. India lost the match! What a wasted trip.
I don't believe that I did such a bad job with a city like Mumbai! The only thing that went well was my shoe shopping. Bought 7 pairs and this time, I am not going to keep the shoes in the rack for ages until I don't even remember I bought them. My goal is to wear all of them by the end of this month. Yeah we got stuff for Raunak too, but nothing unique. Definitely not like how it was in Bangalore.