Mumbai just doesn't come that naturally to people I guess, especially those born before 1995 and have grown up always referring the city as Bombay. Mumbai always takes an intented effort...
The nomenclature besides the point, in the plethora of articles published today, this more or less sums up the state of mind.
Friday, December 26, 2008
A non-Bombay Bombayite
Posted by ecofatigue at 12:20 AM
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3 comments:
I always wonder why do I always say 'mumbai' naturally and not bombay! I remember, in my childhood my father had explained me about this mumbai, bambai and bombay thing. He used to say It is mumbai originally, but they call it bambai in hindi and bombay in english. And i used to ask why only mumbai's name has translations in these languages, if not mine or yours? He had no answer.
I still feel for all maharashtrians it was always Mumbai. But number of people knowing it by name bambai and Bombay for various reasons is more!
I think more people know it as Bombay because Bombay was never about just Maharashtrians...it had different names in different languages and everyone was ok with that arrangemement.Everyone respected all names.
one name was never fiercely imposed upon anyone, until '95. Sadly, other cities have gone through similar fate, with a section of people fondly abiding by the name they grew up calling their city.
Totally !! I was born in Calcutta, will always go back to Calcutta and hopefully be there till the end! People can just change the names of cities but what they cannot take away from us is the evergreen essence of that city within us. Every (city loving) individual has his or her own perception about a city and why they love it so much. Delve deeper into it and it becomes such a wonderful observation how many individuals love the same city - but for different reasons - different perceptions, and these perceptions put together is the essence of the city, may it be Mumbai or Bombay and Kolkata or Calcutta.
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