To Prove you are a Mumbaite

You say "town" and expect everyone to know that this means south of Churchgate.

You speak in a dialect of Hindi called 'Mumbaiya Hindi', which only Mumbaites can understand.

Your door has more than three locks.

Rs 500 worth of groceries fit in one paper bag.

Train timings (9.27, 10.49) are really important events of life.

You spend more time each month traveling than you spend at home.

You call an 8' x 10' clustered room a Hall.

You're paying Rs 10,000 for a 1 room flat, the size of walk-in closet and you think it's a "steal."

You have the following sets of friend: school friends, college friends, neighborhood friends, office friends and yes, train friends, a species unique only in Bombay.

Cabbies and bus conductors think you are from Mars if you call the roads by their Indian name, they are more familiar with Warden Road, Peddar  Road, Altamount Road.

Stock market quotes are the only other thing besides cricket which you follow passionately.

The first thing that you read in the Times of India is the " Bombay Times" supplement.

You take fashion seriously. You're suspicious of strangers who are actually nice to you.

Hookers, beggars and the homeless are invisible.

You compare Bombay to New York 's Manhattan instead of any other cities of India.

The most frequently used part of your car is the horn.

You insist on calling CST as VT, and Sahar and Santacruz airports instead of Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport.

You consider eye contact an act of overt aggression.

Your idea of personal space is no one actually standing on your toes.

Being truly alone makes you nervous.

You love wading through knee deep mucky water in the monsoons, and actually call it ''romantic'.

Only in Mumbai, you would get Chinese Dosa and Jain Chicken.
......Salaam Bombay......
Brig VA Subramanyam (Retd)