India Chapter 6: Elco Market

Elco Market is a bustling market that lines the sides of an entire street in Mumbai. Many things are sold there including my favourite accessory – earrings :D

I have an extensive collection now – every colour…so many styles..I do love my earrings >_< They're really cheap - a good pair can be bought for as little as 40 rupees (50p!). If you know how to bargain, that could go down to 20 rupees. This woman was bargaining - I didn't see the point though - he was selling earrings for just 10 rupees

There was quite a lot of underwear

Hm, not really my style though.. ¬__¬

This little man was scurrying around – at first I thought my eyes were deceiving me because he was running around so quickly. He noticed me taking a picture of him and he shouted not to and carried on running around. I think that was because he’s Muslim and it was the month of Ramadan – I’d been asked by a few Muslims not to take their picture during this time.

He certainly wanted attention though – he kept running back and forth across the road – I thought he was going to get run over :| I have to admit, I was slightly freaked out by him! :|

At around 5:30pm Muslims broke their fast for the day. We noticed some of them praying in a small road at this time. Luckily they didn’t notice me taking this picture of them ;)

Just a few seconds away there was a little temple in the street. Not only was it a holy month for Muslims, but also a holy time for Hindus

One of the guys were urging us to sit down there and pray with them but I couldn’t stand the smell of the fire – it was really overpowering and giving me a weird headache so I took some pictures and left.

At this point I remembered a clothes shop that I went to last time, and I knew it was nearby. It’s called The Miss, and on my last trip I bought some beautiful Indian outfits from there. The owner was a lovely man who had called me his favourite customer! I wondered if he remembered me..

As soon as we walked in he immediately recognised me and told a worker to get us some drinks. It’s quite amazing the way people are treated in shops in Mumbai – they’re always so accomodating and helpful, and they go the extra mile to please their customers. While Meera tried on a sari, I told him we couldn’t stay long because we were meeting someone soon, and because I wanted to go to the Pani Puri Centre downstairs to eat Papdi chaat.

Papdi chaat is one of my favourite Indian foods and the Pani Puri Centre is renowned for being one of the best places for it in Mumbai. Without even telling me he ordered it into the shop for us :o

It was an odd experience – eating papdi chaat in an exclusive boutique while customers stared at us, and while Meera had half a sari on.

When I took the above shot, one of the workers gawked at me and asked me why I was taking a picture. I had to explain to him that I had waited 9 months to eat this! He said most people come to India to take pictures of the Taj Mahal, and I wanted pictures of a common Indian food.

Close up :D

I’m tired of resizing and uploading for now, so.. more later! :)

India Chapter 5: Shooting From The Inside

I love shooting from windows. It’s just so much ‘safer’ knowing your subjects can’t really do much about it ;) In Mumbai I shot a fair amount in this way. Here are just some of the pictures.

A girl peering into the window in the rain..

She was looking in while it was pouring. Click on the shot for a more in-depth description. I rolled down the window and gave her some money, as I did with all children who came to the car begging. (Colour version)

These people were taking shelter in the road when it had suddenly begun to rain

I’m not sure why I liked this next shot – it must be the pink brolly ¬__¬

I loved this sign which was outside a church

I think these guys were a bit baffled as to why I was taking pictures from the car. Indian drivers are rubbish by the way, and this proves it – they’re not taught to keep their eye on the road!

I noticed these kids cleaning car windows

I have no idea how the girl noticed me – I was sitting in the back seat and was quite far away. It amazes me how these children can be walking amongst cars in the awful Mumbai traffic. I’m far too scared to cross busy roads there – it really is quite a hazard! People drive like maniacs and there are no zebra crossings – in fact there are no places for people to cross. Pedestrians are not really catered for.

These two looked so happy :)

I spotted a she-male parading the streets ¬__¬

He spotted me back and came over

Not exactly shooting through a window but from the inside of a rickshaw. The sun was setting at this time and although it’s probably not very noticeable, the sky was a lovely red

Us inside the rickshaw :D

The rickshaw guy must have noticed us snapping away mindlessly and he actually took us to a completely different place :( When I didn’t recognise the surroundings we asked him to drop us off and it was pitch black by this time and we didn’t have a clue where we were :| He also ripped us off but we were pretty lucky to get away safely! We found out later that he had actually driven us in completely the opposite direction to where we had told him we had wanted to go.. dodginess.

Jesus is quite popular in Mumbai

We drove past this man slumped outside a cemetery in the rain..it’s funny how people walk past such people without raising an eyebrow or paying attention to them

The 6th shot from the top was cropped, but the rest aren’t. I’ve been trying to shoot without having to crop later, and I’m doing pretty well! Now all I have to do is work on the camera settings :P