[Reader-list] Everybody's day Out!

[Zainab Bawa]

26 September 2004
Worli Sea Face
5:30 PM

Day Out For All!

Today is a Sunday. Worli Sea Face is ultra-crowded on Sundays. I have landed 
here early today, I mean early by Sunday-standards! I sat down a little away 
from the place where I usually sit. It is sunny, hot, humid and not yet very 
crowded. On my left, there are two young boys who are working out logistical 
details of a project. One of them is enthusiastic and is pushing his friend 
to get done with the detailing soon. Both of them seem to be enjoying their 
workspace here – it helps them think ‘in the open’. After they are done, 
they go over for a walk and start discussing happenings in their personal 
lives.

Joggers are here today, but in sparse numbers. One of the joggers is wearing 
white canvas shoes, like the kind I used to wear in school for PT. These 
have become rare in the age of Nike and Reebok. There is a pregnant woman 
and her husband is walking her along with a friend of theirs. She is very 
happy and content and she is also expectant (obviously!).

Babies’ Day Out – The Balloon Man and his little clients: Today is Babies’ 
Day Out at Worli Sea Face. Kids are running and jumping. They are in a world 
of their own.
Sitting opposite me is a man selling balloons. He is blowing balloons and 
setting up his display. There are four types of balloons – the round 
apple-shaped ones, cylindrical balloons, Mickey Mouse shaped ones and the 
heart shaped balloons. The balloon man is in no hurry. As he is blowing the 
balloons and setting up his display, he makes the familiar sound and call of 
the balloon man which involves rubbing his palms hard on the blown balloon 
surface. This makes a screeching sound – ‘keetch-keetch-screech’ type. Many 
people get irritated with this noise. Today, as the balloon man was making 
this sound, a group of youngsters walking on the sea face in unison put 
their hands on their ears and uttered irritated squeals.
I hadn’t noticed the balloon man all along. I was even oblivious of the 
sounds. A little girl aged three, dressed in a yellow frock was walking 
smoothly along the sea face with two men accompanying. Suddenly, she got 
into this mad fit and ran towards the balloon man. She had recognized him 
and was delighted with the sight of the balloons. She strongly desired to 
have one when one of the men pulled her away. Her mad fit drew my attention. 
Goodness, children recognize the balloon man even today? Instantly, another 
little girl of about age three, dressed in a green frock, ran towards the 
balloon man and picked one piece. Her father paid the balloon man while the 
little girl had already begun her play.
The balloon man is an important part in the life of this city’s children. I 
don’t know whether his popularity levels have gone down in today’s times, 
but the scenes I saw today made me realize that children still express joy 
when they see balloons. Balloons, even now, evoke that sense of wonder, awe 
and desire in them – what are these astral things, light and soar in the 
sky? Maybe some things don’t lose out their value even in changing times!
A few minutes before the balloon man was done with his display and ready to 
go around, a little kid came and stood before him. He held out a Mickey 
Mouse balloon which the child accepted and began its play. The balloon man 
and the children share a distinct relationship with each other. There is an 
element of mutual understanding between them. So also between the Jhoolewala 
and his little fastidious customers. Kids have their own constructs and 
practices of relationships with different distinct peoples in the city. 
Perhaps for the child it is not the city which it processes – it processes 
certain universal symbols and peoples which it has already gotten familiar 
and acquainted with in its immediate environment.
There were quite a few balloon sellers at the sea face today. And they had 
customers too!

Parents’ Day Out – instructions and lessons to babies: I find a lot of 
parents here today. These parents belong to the genre of those having little 
kids between the ages of one and three – the young parents. Dads are 
particularly prominent today. They are giving their babies lessons in 
walking and talking. One little girl passed by me and was struck when she 
saw the waters of the sea. She yelled loud to her mother, ‘mumm-mumm’ which 
in baby talk means water. She was delighted with the vast expanse of 
‘mumm-mumm’. Her mother affirmed her baby’s recognition by repeating 
‘mumm-mumm’ and then asked her baby to walk along. Some fathers were helping 
their children walk, protecting them from falling. Some were giving cycling 
lessons to their babies. These men appeared engrossed and content. Maybe 
Sunday is the day for parenting for them and the sea face is an apt place 
and space for these little and warm relationships.

It is also pregnant mothers’ day out today. Apart from the one I had spotted 
earlier, there were quite a few when I went walking around later. All of 
them were escorted by their husbands. Sunday and the sea face is a special 
occasion. Men use this time to be with their partners after the rushes of 
office and work through the week. All kinds of couples are here today – the 
middle class, the upper middle-class, the conservative, the liberal – all 
kinds! It’s also families’ day out today and again, all kinds of families – 
Goan, Christian, Parsi, Maharashtrian, South Indian, etc. The sea face is 
some kind of space, though I cannot call it a meeting place because people 
stick to themselves and don’t really go out of the way to interact with 
‘others’.

I was trying to make analyses through the hordes of people. I felt that 
Sunday is a day for weekly walks and jogs for some couples. I remember Dad, 
Mom, Simmin and me coming here for Sunday evening walk quite regularly.

Transformations: The Sunday mela of hawkers with jhoolas, roasting of corn, 
and what not is not here anymore. But it exists in different forms. The 
hawkers have now moved to places away from the main track. One such place is 
the pavement at the turning which is both entry and exit to the sea face. 
People patronize the jhoolewala and the food stalls there in large numbers. 
The other place which I discovered today through a long and deliberate walk 
today is the fag end of the sea face. Here, there are active and persistent 
stall owners and sellers – the familiar coconut water seller, bhel-puri and 
pani-puri guys, corn fellows with their handcarts and ice-cream men. Thus, 
hawkers have now been relegated to very specific places – they have been 
shifted from the spaces of ‘centre of attraction’ to the ‘side-ways and far 
back’.

Upavan : This fag end of Worli Sea Face is now an interesting location on 
the overall seafront. A little park has been constructed here. It is named 
‘Mini Forest’ or ‘Upavan’ in Hindi. There is a clear list of what you are 
NOT supposed to do in the park i.e. you cannot indulge in commercial 
photography here, cannot sleep here, no playing radios or loud music, no 
selling eatables inside the park, no dogs allowed in, and some more. The 
park is sponsored and maintained by a private company. There is a little 
office with security guards in there. I glanced through the park from the 
outside. Do you call this park a ‘privately owned’ or a ‘privately 
maintained’ space? Who owns the park? I find the presence of this park 
interesting. It is a ‘meant-for-public-space’ on a public space. Can you 
call it an encroachment? What realms of legality does this fall in?
The designers have tried to create a forest-like atmosphere inside. After 
all, it has to live up to its name! There are little banana plantations 
interspersed with young sapling plantations of various kinds of trees. The 
park has a little Kuch Kuch Hota Hai type structure in between i.e. a little 
open space with four poles and a roof over it, like the kinds you see in the 
Yash Chopra films in which the hero and heroine take shelter during heavy 
rains (after they are already drenched) and background music starts to play 
for romance and effect! The name Mini Forest really amused me – attempted 
jungle in a concrete jungle!
There were some people sitting inside our Mini Forest. Some of them were 
facing the sea and enjoying the atmosphere. Some joggers were taking rest in 
here after having jogged for a while and stretch.

This evening, after having sat down for an hour, I decided to go for a walk. 
I walked all along, in an attempt to feel the atmosphere. One breed which I 
noticed prominently while walking was that of sahelis (female friends). A 
lot of them seemed like office colleagues. They were sitting facing the sea 
and discussing personal lives. While counseling was going on between them at 
one level, at another level, the sahelis were walking and having a good 
time. It is their day out also today.

Maharashtrian bais were plenty too today. I wonder whether they are regulars 
or is this just a season of Ganesh devotees from everywhere who are here in 
the city for ten days? I also wondered whether these bais belong to the 
genre of ultra-important maids in rich men’s houses. Most of them were 
pretty well dressed and had adorned gold jewellery. There were also Shiv 
Sainik type youths around here today. Worli is home of several 
Maharashtrians and Ganesh festival is celebrated with pomp and glory here.

As evening wore on, the crowds increased. People were leisurely sitting at 
the sea face. Dog owners had come out to walk their dogs. Senior citizens 
had formed their little groupings, this time in little corner between the 
crowds as against their usual prominence and presence on weekdays. Perhaps 
these regular senior citizens were sharing space with visitors – chalo, inko 
bhi aaj mazaa karne dete hai!

While I walking out, I noticed more and more people arriving at the sea 
face. Wow! It is everybody’s day out today!

Scene of the Day: This one is very special, belonging to the babies’ and 
dogs’ day out category. A couple was walking their little dog. I don’t know 
what breed you call this, but its’ this very, very short black dog, bulky 
and it walks like a little baby. On the other side, there was a family 
consisting of father, mother grandmother and little year and a half old 
baby. The baby was fascinated with the doggie – she was wondering about this 
creature which has four legs. Immediately, the baby got down on her knees 
and two hands and began imitating the dog’s walk. The family and the dog 
owner couple helped facilitate the game between the two. At one point, both 
the baby and the doggie came face to face with each other and the doggie who 
got intimidated gave a snarl in the baby’s face to which the father 
immediately pulled his child away. Then the baby once again drew close to 
the dog. She was continuously imitating the dog’s walk on her knees and 
hands. Both would come close and either the dog owners would pull their 
doggie away or the dad would pull his child away – kids know no boundaries. 
They are a delight, a quintessential part of the everyday cinema! This 
little baby had unknowingly introduced the two unknown families, 
unintentionally creating a meeting place!

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