Bombay Nights Walk (30/31-05-23)

Bombay nights is a project about documenting the night life in my city. I would leave home after sunset and keep documenting this city till next day’s sunrise. The moment i step outside my home i would start documenting life with my camera. I have been documenting this city for 5 years now. I have always wondered how this city would feel during the night.  Honestly it took me by surprise. This city doesn’t sleep. There’s always something going on in the corners of this city. So my first few Bombay Nights walks were about me adjusting to documenting this city after midnight. You can’t shoot the same way you shoot during the day. I had to change my approach. I had to know my boundaries.

For this walk which was done on from 30th May 2023 (sunset) to 31st May 2023 (Sunrise). I Started from ‘kashimira’ at around 6:30pm on 30th May, and ended at ‘Sasson Dock’ at around 6:30am next morning. The walk was of 46kms. 

The first patch was 28kms Western Express highway from kashimra to Bandra Station. From Bandra i started waking towards the Dadar Flower Market which opens at 2am in the morning. Then I started to walk towards Sasson dock, During that journey i came across many interesting places, Markets, Temples, Mosques, CSMT etc. I concluded my walk at Sasson dock at 6:30am 31st May 2023. 

So as i stared walking i came across one interesting chair may be made for a giant haha 😛 

19:18pm

During this walk i was finding peace in mundane. Mumbai known for it’s chaos. It was a very tranquil experience for me to observe it’s calmness.

When someone invited me to their home to take a picture of their aquarium, I like how people open up to photographers in Mumbai in some way. Camera becomes a passport to enter lives of strangers.

The Rickshaw driver who was looking at a video in his phone, Gave me a very weird look after he noticed i was making a photo of him.

The digital signs i found very interesting while walking. I took photographs of many of them. 

Manual scavenging still exits in a big way. workers were cleaning sewage ahead of Monsoon season in Mumbai. 

Markets of Mumbai are always busy. One would find workers carrying big loads baskets of on their head. 

In one such Markets of Mumbai, One person really got angry on me for taking photographs of chicken. I’ll never know why.

One thing is it was a very hot and dry weather during this walk. One guy was really sleeping on the top of a car for some air i guess. 

03:38am

Mumbai has something for everyone. and it’s changing too. The Metro Project, Coastal road project will change how Mumbai once looked.

I ended my walk at ‘Sasson Dock’ at 6:30am in the morning. It was very crowdy since 31st may is the last day for fishing since the arrival of Monsoon season in coming weeks.

Thank you for reading.