A quiet week at work, which was odd because it was the point at which the first part of the project went into operation. A significant milestone, although it was very low key and the circumstances meant that not that much actually changed. However, the principal was important and worth celebrating.

We managed to get out of work by 6:30 at the latest each day, which is another form of success of course. Not that we actually did that much with our extra time.

We did manage to get to the cinema one evening to see Sucker Punch, a new film by the director of 300 and Watchmen. The cinema was really very plush, with the superior seats being pretty much like reclinable armchairs. There were a few surprises - the Indian national anthem playing before the film started (with everybody standing), and the intermission at the end of the first reel (I assume). The break wasn't at a natural break point, just at a random stage about halfway through. During the intermission people came round to take drinks / food orders, which felt strange.

I still haven't fully got the geography of the city fully sorted in my head - I know the routes from the hotel to the office, from the office to the shopping centre / cinema and from the shopping centre to the hotel. However, I haven't managed to reconcile those three routes yet as it feels like we go in precisely the wrong direction to get from the shopping centre back to the hotel (maybe there's some sort of wormhole). The journey back after the cinema trip confused matters yet further when we took yet another 'clearly wrong' direction which seemed to get us back without problems. So much for my sense of direction.

Wednesday we went out for a lunchtime meal to the Copper Chimney restaurant (a very nice place) and saw the beginning of the cricket semi-final between India and Pakistan. I am told that several companies announced Wednesday as a half day holiday (by an Indian woman who works for the company and was keen to get the same policy implemented). When India won the game (at about 10:30 pm) there were plenty of fireworks and car horns going off.

Friday evening I walked a reasonable way back from the office to the hotel. That was because I had a phone meeting until 6:30 and my colleague needed to leave at 6:00 as he was off to Singapore for the long weekend. The taxi drivers directly outside the office were suggesting a price of 400 rupees, which was exorbitant so I decided to walk a way until I came across another cab. Many weren't prepared to stop so I had actually walked more than halfway before I managed to get one. Whilst I would like to do that trip again at some point (with camera, of course), I don't want to do it in a suit - ridiculously warm and also very obvious.

Saturday was quiet(ish). Breakfast was packed solid, full of people who were clearly going to the cricket final (I had looked but the minimum prices on reseller sites were $1,200). I mostly stayed in my room to begin with, then went for lunch at the local coffee shop (which was showing the cricket and had several people outside watching through the window - it's quite expensive for locals). I then went off to the shopping centre as I'd been told there was a sports bar there that would be good to watch the match at. Predictably, of course, it was packed. Also, any shop with a TV in the window (or even vaguely visible from outside) had groups of people standing outside watching. In the end I decided to have a walk back to the hotel. This only took about half an hour, but I was quite tired once I'd got back because of the heat. I decided to watch the rest of the match from the comfort of my room. With victory for India (at nearly 11pm) came the fireworks and noise. I tried to go up to the Point of View bar on the 30th floor to get a better look (my room didn't seem to face where most of the fireworks were going off), but the bar had been closed.

One of the things I did during the week was use Flickr to find groups around Mumbai. One of these is a group that seems to meet up every Sunday morning to go somewhere for photographs. I had arranged to go with them to a place that's actually relatively local to the hotel - Sewri mud flats which have flamingoes. 7am was the time for the meeting, so the alarm was set for 6 and a local taxi got me there on time (early, actually, but that isn't exactly news:)). It took a bit of time for everybody to get together - however did people manage before mobile phones? - but the 20 or so of us walked down to the ruins of a local fort, straight through the middle of what is pretty much a slum area. Even that early in the morning there was still a reasonable amount of activity, and with numbers comes courage so I felt pretty at ease grabbing photos. The old fort itself was a super example of the benefit of doing something like this. It was something I would never have known was there, isn't mentioned in the guidebooks, and probably wasn't somewhere I would have felt comfortable going to on my own. However, with a group of friendly co-enthusiasts it was a lot of fun. One local boy kept running around being very photogenic, and I suspect that there were lots of shots taken of him by the group. Just away from the fort itself there was a guy dressed in orange robes and smoking something that seemed to be making him very happy. I reckon he had a lot of photos taken as well.

The view out from the fort was quite impressive, especially with the mud and the bright light giving a pretty monochromatic effect (certainly the pink of the flamingoes wasn't obvious). From the fort we walked down to the jetty to try to get a better view of the birds. There were quite a few boats down here, stuck in the mud, and nobody seemed to have any compunction about just getting on to one of the ships near the end of the jetty to get shots. Actually the view from there was pretty good - sea, mud flats, flamingoes and cityscape all coming together nicely. You could even see that the flamingoes were in fact pink (when there were enough of them together). We walked back through the slums, taking more photos and then I got a taxi back to the hotel just before the end of breakfast. Click on the blog header to get to the photos.

Getting into breakfast one of the regular servers asked if I was looking tired because of the cricket. I said that I'd been out taking photos of the flamingoes. Apparently some of the restaurant staff from the hotel had been working at the match, and he'd been one of them. Turns out it was a long day for them - 7am start and a 4am finish. How they managed to then be at work on the Sunday morning I really don't know. Those who'd worked there had all been given a small replica world cup, he said.

Monday is a holiday as well (or at least it is for my client - it turns out that different businesses have the ability to pick and choose their public holidays to some extent). I had heard lots of different things about the day, from it being a very family day to there being parades. I had heard, in particular, that there was a procession of people dressed in their best starting at 8am in central Mumbai, so it was another early start. I can't, in all honesty, say that I was particularly successful. First we had lots of confusion between the taxi driver and myself as to where I was trying to get to. Then, when I finally did get to where I think I was meant to get to it turned out to be somewhat different to what I was expecting. It was in one of the poorer parts of town and whilst the women were dressed in their best clothing it was pretty much a queue for people to get into a temple of some sort (Hindu, I expect as it is the Hindu New Year). They were literally queueing around the block, which isn't the ideal format for getting nice photographs. To be honest, the setting really wasn't doing anything for me - frankly I've seen more than enough of the poor parts of Mumbai. I had hoped that this would be an opportunity to see a different, more pleasant side of the city and to see that it was essentially the same, albeit better dressed, was something of a disappointment. I got a couple of decent snaps, but people in long queues are rarely at their most accommodating or cheerful so I retreated back to the hotel quite quickly.

It's now lunchtime and my next decision is whether to venture out again or stay in the comfort with my books, photos and games, and maybe even catch up on some sleep.

Text of an article written for the camera club

It is, I believe, customary to start any piece of travel writing by saying that 'xxx is a place of contrasts'. I would hate to go against tradition, especially when it is so appropriate, so:

Mumbai is a city of contrasts. Incredible wealth is yards away from indefensible poverty. New buildings are being constructed at an exceptional rate while most are unloved and falling down (according to a news report 34 buildings have actually collapsed in the last two years within the city, several with people still living in them). The city is full of cars, but within easy range is a hill fort area which allows no motor vehicles at all. On the pavement in front of a shop selling gold you may well find a small boy selling sandals. There are magnificent beaches, but nothing would persuade me to go into the sea (locals don't have the same problem). It is a deeply religious city, although it hasn't chosen one yet - you'll find small well tended shrines all over the place, as well as churches and temples. Public holidays are selected from each of the main religions. (At the moment cricket is probably the leading religion.) Only one thing has not had a contrast - the weather has been in the upper 30s pretty much every day and dry. Even that is only because I haven't been here long enough - in July there will be more rain in this city than London has in a whole year (and London is not a notoriously dry city).

The main things that have struck me about the city:

• The traffic. The government has clearly spent a lot on trying to make sure that roads are wide, with well-marked lanes, well signposted and with plenty of traffic lights. Drivers are advised to drive carefully and without excessive use of the horn. That money was all wasted. Cars drive frighteningly close together, the concept of lanes appears completely foreign, traffic lights are treated as being, at best, advisory and the use of the horn is as close to compulsory as makes no odds. Many lorries actively request horns be used. Weaving between the cars are pedestrians, push bikes and motor bikes (often with 3 or 4 people on them, women often as sidesaddle passengers), and the roads are shared with cows, handcarts and cattle carts.

• The poverty. When I first arrived I was in a top 5 star hotel. Directly opposite it across the road was the entrance to a slum area that was essentially just shacks made of bits of wood panelling stacked together. My assumption was that that was about as low as it was going to get. I was wrong. Since changing hotels my new drive to work takes me past an area that is essentially just tents over the pavements, where the people live, cooking on open fires. Opposite them it's even tougher, because there are still tents, but there's far less pavement so the living area is much smaller. And of course there's also the area that would presumably lovce to be in the fortunate position of the above groups, where there are entire families just living in the shadow of the underpass, with nothing to cover them. When we go past at 8:15 there's a young man dressed in shorts who is soaping himself down, a small shrine and an entire family that is just starting to get up. This is tough to see, and I hope it never becomes commonplace. I haven't yet been able to bring myself to take photographs of the people on the lowest few levels of the ladder.

• The colours. Women (in particular) dress in spectacular colours and nearly always look smart (even those who live on the streets).The market stalls are also full of colour, both natural from the fruit and flowers and man-made from plastic toys. One of the recent festivals is called Holi, and the main feature is people covering themselves and others in coloured dust and water.

My time here is only halfway through (and it's looking like I may need to come back at some point). It's pretty exhausting here, and I'll admit to feeling a bit Mumbai-ed out. This isn't a tourist city - other places in India are far prettier. That's not to say that there aren't pretty parts - there's quite a few old Victorian buildings that have been well preserved and the park areas such as Matheran are beautiful and tranquil. I'm looking forward to my family coming out and am hugely grateful to technology (Skype is a godsend, the internet and e-mail means I can keep in touch with friends and family, whilst my Kindle allows me to carry a library with no weight, and also download British newspapers to stay in touch with what's happening in the UK) which has made the whole experience a lot easier than it would otherwise have been.

What has made the experience worthwhile though, without a doubt, has been the opportunity to take photos that I would never have had the chance to take at home. As with fishing, the photos I haven't managed to take would have been the best ones (the person who can get a photo to be taken purely by blinking may make a fortune). However, I've got quite a few that I'm really happy with, and that I shall doubtless subject you to on my return.

If you want to see more of my photos, feel free to go to my Flickr account (www.flickr.com/photos/jonathaf). I'm also writing a more detailed blog of my activities and experiences (jonathaf-india.blogspot.com), should you be interested. My e-mail is jonathaf@runbox.com if anyone wants to get in touch.

I look forward to seeing all of you again soon.