Lynn’s Passage to India: A Whirlwind Three Days in Mumbai, From Vintage Markets to Golden Crocodile Jewelry

Day One: A Single Cow

I arrive in Mumbai from Paris at 1 a.m. I have never been to India before, and I am quickly overwhelmed by the airport—neon-lit! teeming with people!—but no matter. I am traveling with my guardian angel, Mr. Mickey Boardman, who has been to Mumbai, he shrugs, maybe 35 times, and is hardly intimidated by this barely controlled chaos.

When he first came here, Mickey tells me, he stepped out of the airport and thought, I am home. He is in India so often not just because he loves it, but because he works with Citta, a nonprofit organization that builds schools and hospitals in India; I am here because the designer Sabyasachi Mukherjee has invited us—and what seems like a few thousand other people—to celebrate the 25^th anniversary of his brand.

Sabyasachi, it turns out, is sort of the Ralph Lauren of India, if that designer made over-the-top wedding ensembles and high jewelry that drips and dangles with monumental stones. Sabyasachi’s gala fashion show is set for the next night, which means that this flying visit gives us approximately 72 hours to see a town of 233 square miles and 21 million people.

Then again, Mr. Mickey is the perfect guide for a maiden voyage to Mumbai, which by the way, everyone here calls Bombay. We are staying at the Taj Mahal Palace, a stupendous Victorian pile just across from the Gateway to India, a monumental arch on the Arabian Sea that was built in 1924. (Dior held a show here in 2023.) We stare at it every time we leave the hotel—tight security—lots of purse scanning—but never actually venture across the highway.

Instead, on our first morning, we walk a few blocks to Colaba Causeway, which could be dubbed the 34^th Street of Mumbai, or maybe the Orchard Street of yore. We are accosted by vendors offering all manner of floppy casual clothes in beautiful Indian cotton prints, and I actually like this stuff, but am quickly overwhelmed by the crush and the heat, so I buy nothing. But I have other plans.

Photo: Courtesy of Lynn Yaeger

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