SLUMS

The cacophony of sound from outside - banging, drilling and soldering, went on all day and curiosity got the better of me - by the afternoon, I decided to investigate.  They had built a shed around the water tanks, in the car parking area under the apartment block, with an aluminium roof and padlocked door.  This little building fitted in neatly, partly obscured by the supporting pillars of the building.   I was told that it was necessary because of the monkeys.  A few days later, I noticed that the "left-over" aluminium sheeting, had now been attached to the watchman's shed, also in the undercroft, to create a porch and a chair with cushion had been placed in this new extension to his shack.  I wondered how long it would be before his living space was enlarged even more and how many other family members would join him, at present, he and wife lived there with his two daughters and grandparents, but the population varied, according to necessity.

The interesting thing is the close proximity of slums to the expensive dwellings of the rich.  As you fly into Mumbai, the first thing you notice is the huge slum which abuts the international runway, with mile upon mile of aluminium roofs, forming a patchwork of poverty.  Mumbai has 4 of the biggest slums in the world - they dominate the city and impose themselves in an inescapable way, just as they do all over India.  Gandhi once said that if the village died, so would India.  But it would seem that the village triumphs, whether it is in town or country, because  you can take the man out of the village but you can't take the village out of the man.