Monsoon in Mumbai-Updated Sunday morning with a couple more cricket pics and some sombre musing

As of 4 pm today 455mm of water had fallen on Mumbai in the past 24 hrs.
With deference to the folks suffering floods in England, this is on a whole other scale.
Sunday Morning update as reported by the Mumbai Mirror:
Total Rainfall: 991.6 mm
Fallen Trees: 41 (in Suburbs)
Snake Bites : 5
Landslides : 2
Electrocutions: 6
Evacuations: 1500
Dead:16
Film openings ruined: 9 (jeeze)

The slums are hit pretty hard.
According to the news this evening, 14 people drowned today and 6 were electrocuted when power lines fell into water in which they were wading.
This annual event is pretty tough on the most vulnerable .

People in more conventional streets and buildings don't get off easy either. Streets are flooded, buses and trains stop and the traffic jams are monumental. I escaped the worst of all this through the ingenuity of a clever driver and blind luck. I did however yell "stop" a couple of times and took these pictures.
The rain was warm and felt unlike anything I'd experienced before.
Most people seem to accept the monsoon ritual with good humour and the youngsters I saw didn't let it slow them down a bit.
That's it for today. I fly to the desert in Dubai early tomorrow and will swelter for the next 4 days.

Sitting in Mumbai airport on my way to Dubai, I've been thinking about yesterday and wanted to add a postscript:

Returning from our meetings yesterday, the driver took a detour to avoid the flooded main road. This took us through what can only be described as a squalid slum. There were 5 of us; 3 Indians and 2 westerners. My colleague, who had never been to India before was stunned and shocked. He went very quiet and pretty much remained so for the rest of the day. My Indian colleagues continued to chatter away whilst we inched along a one lane alley. Both sides were lined with makeshift structures of tarp and lumber. Faces peered out while children bailed filthy water out of doorways splashing into the street as the rain relentlessly fell.

In any other country in the world we would have encountered sullen, resentful stares and in many places would have been robbed.

Not in India.

Smiles, waves and whoops of delight as I took pictures of kids playing cricket in the street; that's the reception we got.

Ponder that Mr Business man.

I'd seen this before and to my shame I was largely unaffected. It took the reaction of my colleague to remind me how surreal all this was. Literally 100 meters away we were staying in the pampered luxury of The Intercontinental Grand Hotel.

I caught myself this morning irritably waving away a half naked child clutching at my hand outside the terminal, begging for pennies.

What the fuck is happening to me?

The poverty in India should humble all who visit and it does....the first time.

Like everything else, you get used to it and stop reflecting on how truly lucky we all are.

The sense of entitlement that inhabits the western mind is typified by the current "Paris Hilton" culture. CNN International had a looping story on the Larry King interview with Ms Hilton and not a word about the monsoon floods in India. There is an inner rot of our collective moral perspective.

Now I'm off to the Arab LasVegas and the shiny buildings and 5 star restaurants will soon banish all thoughts of the hovels outside my hotel window.

I have no idea what any of this means but it's got to mean something.

These Sunday morning ruminations are not meant to be preachy or self righteous.

I'm just unsettled for once by something that has nothing to do with me.

Or maybe it has everything to do with me.

Love to all
Hope this finds you happy and healthy
T