Meta description: The Sanjay Gandhi National Park is nestled on the periphery of the massive urban metropolis of Mumbai. It seems incredible that you can take a safari to see lions and tigers so close to a big city. Discover more about this amazing National Park, and book a safari today.

Sanjay Gandhi National Park Safari 

 It isn't very common for city dwellers to get the opportunity to see wild animals. In Mumbai, the wildlife is on their doorstep. Within half and hours drive of the ity centre, the people of Mumbai can take a safari to see lions and tigers. These big cats live in Mumbai, in and area that covers 20% of the city. It sounds amazing, but there they are, in their own Mumbai neighbourhood. So do the neighbourly thing, pay them a visit, and who knows, a tiger might repay the kindness, and come to tea. 

 Best Time for Sanjay Gandhi National Park Safari 

November-February - Winter Season: The ideal time for bird watching. 

April-May - Summer Season: Although the weather is hot, these are the best months to see a larger variety of wild animals. 

July-October - Monsoon Season: The heavy rains wash away the heat and dust, rejuvenating the forest with vibrant, lush, green colours. 

 Animals to Spot on Sanjay Gandhi National Park Safaris 

 During the summer months, you are more likely to see spotted deer, Indian flying foxes, Indian hares, porcupines, and crocodiles. 

In the winter, bird watchers will have a higher chance of spotting birds like the Shikra, Black Kite, Crested Honey Buzzard, and Crested Serpent Eagles. 

On a lion and tiger safari, you will obviously be able to spot lions and tigers. 

 Sanjay Gandhi National Park Safari Timings 

 9am to 130pm and 2.30pm to 4.30pm 

All safaris are in a caged bus, and last 30 minutes. 

 Sanjay Gandhi National Park Safari Cost 

Tiger Safari: Adults 70 INR, Children 28 INR 

Tiger and Lion Safari: Adults 81 INR, Children 32 INR

The Fortieth

 

I went to a fortieth today. my mum's brother's wife's sister's husband died forty days ago, so it was his fortieth. It was a large gathering of family and friends and by the looks of it lots of passer-by's who were interested in the free grub. It was a mixed gathering of Shia and Sunni but segregated too, women inside and men out in the street.

Persian carpets stretched out across the road with a narrow strip of cotton cloth in the middle travelling the length of the carpet, on which the food would be placed. A canopy had been erected above the carpets to protect people from the glare of the late afternoon sun.

Before the food there was a Shia cleric who would lead the prayers for the dead and give a sermon. It was about the importance of prayer and as is usually the case with Shia clerics, he brought the talk round to the matyrdom of Imam Hussain and his voice broke a few times. Then the prayers. Fruit was brought out and words from the Quran were recited over them.

As the time for breaking the fast drew near, it was the month of Ramadan, large trays of fruit were placed before a long line of seated people who flanked both sides of the white cotton cloth. There was a tray in front of me and a minute before the call to prayer someone asked for some fruit. The tray was lifted. It was filled with dates, bunches of bananas and sliced segments of apples and peaches. As it started moving away from me people began grabbing for the fruit like frenzied monkeys. I reached for a date and decided to settle for that. The man sitting next to me had about 8 bananas in his plate. I didn't even have a plate. I looked around and noticed how some people had piles of fruit while others had none. I was amazed at the time but realised later that these were the people who had come off the streets.

As the call to prayer rang out I had my date and then reached out for a banana from the man with all the bananas on my right. He didn't object. I noticed the boy on my left wasn't eating. It was a mixed gathering and the Shia's break their fast 10 minutes later than the Sunnis. Don't ask me why because I have no idea. Ten minutes later he and the other Shia's broke their fast. A man came round and distributed the naan, placing them on a plate between the diners. The man to my right had finished his bananas and he grabbed 3 of the seven naans in front of him. Someone opposite me grabbed another 3 and someone else went for the last one. I looked on in wonder at these antics. I mean, it wasn't as if they were going to run out of naans or anything else for that matter. There was an old man directly opposite me who was dismayed at the disappearance of the naans. He managed to get one of the three naans from the man sitting next to him and then proceeded to fold it up and hide it in his clothing. He then asked for another naan from a passing waiter, and placed it on his plate with great reverence.

When the bowls of chicken curry arrived the old man was very animated, calling for a bowl to be placed before him but to his consternation one was placed a few people to his right and another a few people to his left. He was about to complain loudly when a bowl piled higher than the others was passed to him and he joyfully began piling his plate with large chunks of curried chicken. I was too busy watching him to realise that everyone else was helping themselves too. When a bowl was eventually passed to me there was a small piece of chicken neck swimming in a curry sauce. I made a start on that hoping they wouldn't be long with the refills. But when they came they were quickly dispatched too. I waited until things settled down and reached for a vacant bowl and helped myself to a chicken wing. All through the meal I watched the old man opposite me and wondered where he was putting his food. I helped myself to one of my neighbour's naans. He did have 3 after all. I noticed he has acquired another 3 from somewhere and was using them to work his way through a pile of chicken. How could these people eat so much?

And then the sweet rice arrived. People were still on their first course so it sat for a while but I did notice the old man eyeing it from time to time. He had finished off his naan and he was now busy separating the bones from the meat of his remaining chicken pieces. He then reached for the tray of sweet rice and scooped a mountain of rice on top of the chicken. After that I just couldn't look.

Rocky: A Eulogy

 

Rocky died on October 18. He was ten years old. He was a happy and friendly dog. He had two brown patches around his eyes like a mask. The brown fur continued along his back to his tail like a superhero’s cloak. Rocky’s superpower was kindness. He loved small fluffy animals, be they chicks, bunnies or kittens, and they loved him. Two days before he died, I saw four kittens curled up next to him keeping him company.

I buried him in the garden, his face turned towards our front door. Later that day my daughter and I listened to a Japanese song that played at the start of a Japanese drama series called Midnight Diner. We couldn’t understand the words so we read a translation of the lyrics:

That white breath of yours

Now drifts with the wind

Within the clouds in the sky

Little by little it dissipates

“That’s Rocky,” I said.

My daughter started to cry. I had tears in my eyes too. We sat side by side listening to the rest of the song in silence. In the evening we watched the final episode of Midnight Diner, and said goodbye to Rocky.

Chameleons

Smile

"Smile", she said
And turned the sides of my mouth
Up with her fingers.
"You don't smile", she said.
"I do". I replied.
"Well not very often", she responded.
"But I do,
I smile when I look at you,
I smile when I think of you,
And I smile when I love you.
Even if there isn't a smile on my lips,
There's always a smile in my heart."

Loneliness

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/may/28/emily-white-loneliness

This article really strikes a chord. Even though I am not in the same situation as Emily White. I live at home with my parents and daughter. Except for when I am chatting with my daughter, I usually feel lonely. This is probably due to the alien culture I live in. A culture that I find impossible to identify  with. Eventually, as in the case of Emily you lose yourself.


I wrote this poem a while back. I think it goes someway to describe this feeling.

Did you say you know me?

Then perhaps you can tell me who I am.

I knew who I was before

But now when I pass myself on the street

I pass me by without recognizing myself.

Some stranger who happened to walk past.

No I don’t think you know me.

Perhaps you knew me once

But no one knows me now.

No one can remember who I am.

Am I me or someone else?

I can’t even remember my name.

Yet you look very familiar

But I doubt we’ve ever met.

I would have remembered if we had.

If you know me then I must know you

But I don’t remember you or me

So perhaps you could introduce us both.

22 August 2000

Night Write

This is a bit of experimental writing. I wrote this with the lights off in bed in the middle of the night. I wrote the original with a pencil on a note book. The note book was lined but as I could not see the lines I wrote from left to right without considering them. The result was writing that sloped in various directions and sometimes lines intermingled with each other. I am left handed and I treated my left arm like a phantom arm and let it write whatever it wanted. The results are interesting.

Writing in the dark cannot see what is

Being written, the rain falls and washes

All away, the wind sighs

And remembers

Past faults.

Cannot change them now need to look

Ahead but keep looking back, break

Eye contact release myself from the hypnotic stare

Of hindsight’s little sister

Crowing its presence making me limp

And pliable.

Lost in my thoughts, my dreams,

Unable to move frozen in time,

Lost in space, the edges of sanity

The realm of despair,

The shards of collapse

When buildings fall from the tremors of the past

Lost to the world, lost to myself, never to be heard from

Again, never to smile, never to sing, never to say

What ails me and how you could have helped.

Silence breaks the quiet of my thoughts

It shrieks the command to obey, to become unheard

To rot in the stench of my own thoughts

To sleep in the smothering sheets of this bed

To close my heart to the music of songbirds

And the roar of a plane overhead.

To hold my tongue for eternity until it falls off from disuse,

Useless appendage, unwanted, unused

A slate washed clean by a mindless ogre

No sound, no words, no ideas

Nothing to say, nothing to hear

Everything to fear

Rust sets in, the tongue cannot be loosened

No ideas emerge from the crowded mind

No one to share them with, no one to hear them.

Sleep eludes me, a game of hide and seek

Lurking in the dark creases of my room it creeps

Round my bed in tiptoes darting away when I reach

For it, out of sight, untouchable

I wish I was a million miles

Away, not here, enclosed by these four walls,

Contained, secured. I wish I was free

To roam the spaces between the spaces

The cavities within cavities,

Floating up into the heavens

Watch the earth from up high,

I wish I could fly

Far away from here and have sweet dreams, best

In the world. I lapse into silence. There is nothing left,

Nothing to dream of, nothing

To believe in, nothing to live for, nothing.

The darkness has enveloped me at last.

Tired, but the hand still moves like an independent entity

That does not obey the rules of the rest of me

Desperate to communicate something of which I am unaware

Tiring one minute and then

Spurting forward with such force and power that scares

Me, a monstrous hand that refuses to be

Stilled, that revels in the darkness of its new found freedom

To write that which the eye cannot see

But the mind understands

And the hand reproduces

Could it be that the hand wishes to speak

Without the interference of the mind?