Mumbai: practical tips

The monsoon, which here isn’t a season

From June to September, the monsoon hits this coast and it isn’t like rain you know: it’s months of constant water and specific days when an absurd amount falls. In July 2005 nearly a metre fell in twenty-four hours and the city stopped completely, with hundreds dead. It isn’t a historical curiosity: Mumbai floods every year to a greater or lesser degree, because it’s land reclaimed from the sea and the drainage can’t cope.

Translated into your trip: November to February is the season, no argument. That’s when the climate is genuinely pleasant and everything works. March to May is an exhausting humid heat. And in the monsoon, half the city isn’t available: the boats to Elephanta don’t sail, the coast roads are cut and there are days when the commuter trains stop and the whole city stays wherever it is.

If you come in those months, come knowing, leave margin and don’t chain tight flights. The only thing the monsoon improves is the mountains to the east, which go green and fill with waterfalls.

Alcohol, and dry days

The drinker’s permit really exists: in Maharashtra you technically need one to consume alcohol, you get it online or hotels arrange it, and in practice a foreigner will almost never be asked. But it exists, and now you know what it is if someone mentions it.

What will genuinely affect you are dry days: there are specific dates in the year, set by law (national holidays, election days and some religious festivals) on which no alcohol is served or sold anywhere in the state. Not in bars, not in hotels, not in shops.

If your farewell dinner falls on one of those dates, you’ll find out on the spot. Check if it matters to you.

And in general: drinking here is expensive compared with the rest of Southeast Asia, because state taxes are high, and that’s one reason the Bandra bar scene costs more than you’d expect.

Getting around, and the women’s carriages

Mumbai moves by commuter train, and you have to understand what that means. It’s the infrastructure holding the city up, it moves millions of people a day and it’s the only fast way along that tongue of land. You can ride it and it’s worth doing once, outside rush hour and on a short run.

Outside rush hour. That isn’t a recommendation, it’s the rule: at rush hour these trains are packed in a way that has to be seen, with people hanging from the doors, and it’s no place for someone with a suitcase, with children or without practice. There are women-only carriages, signposted and respected, and if you’re travelling alone they’re the comfortable option. For everything else, the app car or the black-and-yellow taxi, always allowing for traffic that’s among the worst in the world and for the fact that the new metro line skips it by running underneath.

And one thing that surprises people: Mumbai is a fairly safe city to walk at night in the central areas, more so than many European capitals.

The India basics, here

The same as the rest of the country applies and there’s nothing more to it. Bottled water always, seal intact, including for brushing your teeth. Street food here is among the best in India and it would be absurd to miss it: a queue of locals, made in front of you with fire, and high turnover. With that, go ahead. Bring rehydration salts from home just in case, and talk to your doctor about vaccines weeks in advance.

On manners: eat and give with your right hand, take your shoes off in temples and mosques and cover your head in Sikh shrines, and shoulders and knees covered outside tourist areas. A tip of around ten per cent if it isn’t on the bill.

And one Mumbai quirk compared with other Indian cities: commercial harassment of tourists here is notably lower. This is a working city, people are busy and nobody has time to chase you. It is, by a distance, the gentlest door into this country.