$#@! Mumbai’s the rudest city in the world? Well, the Reader’s Digest survey of 35 cities in the world that has found amchi Mumbai to be lacking in politesse can stick a free gift with a year’s subscription up its office ventilator shaft!
Mumbaikars, according to the undigestable survey, apparently do not hold doors for others, help someone pick papers from the floor and thank their customers. Boo-hoo! All one can say is that unlike New Yorkers, who have come on tops in the ludicrous race of being the most polite citizens on Earth, Mumbaikars possess the chutzpah to slam doors on people’s faces, scatter papers on the floor and grunt something out in sort-of chaste Marathi-meets-English to lead a very happy life, thank you very much. And what can one expect from the city that has forgotten the art of road rage that it had once pioneered? New Yorkers, it seems, are the new Missionaries of Charity.
Former New York City mayor, Ed Koch, referring to life in the Big Apple after 9/11, explained the reason for such courtesy by stating that New Yorkers “understand the shortness of life” — something, dear former mayor, Mumbaikars are supposed to be completely unaware of since the Angry Young Man was replaced by the Big B, perhaps? But let’s not throw the pao bhaji tawa rightaway at the direction of the Reader’s Digest office, shall we? English manners aren’t good enough for it either, as London languishes with Paris in the 15th spot. The rudest town in Europe, Bucharest, is a notch politer than Mumbai — so what if the Ceausescus tried to instill table manners from their presidential castle till some 16 years ago. In Asia, Hong Kong was the city that was best equipped with doormen, paperpickers and grovelling storekeepeers.
While Mumbaikars may still give up their seats in buses to the elderly and allow people to smoke in bars and restaurants, they don’t stand a chance as, like in most Indian cities, they tend to stare at foreigners standing at street corners ticking off boxes in a list. As for the oh-so-polite Delhiites, they’re laughing so loud that you can’t even hear them swearing.
{{/usCountry}}While Mumbaikars may still give up their seats in buses to the elderly and allow people to smoke in bars and restaurants, they don’t stand a chance as, like in most Indian cities, they tend to stare at foreigners standing at street corners ticking off boxes in a list. As for the oh-so-polite Delhiites, they’re laughing so loud that you can’t even hear them swearing.
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