The mount Mary Church in Mumbai to me is one of those magical places that cannot be explained. It is a Catolic church in Bandra, Mumbai and the color blue that the church is painted in is one of the nicest you will ever see.
Let me be frank about something: I am not a Catolic. If I have to be really really frank I have to say that I do not believe in religion as an institution. I was raised a reformed Christian and every year I religiosly visit my community on Curacao, because it is as much a part of me as I am a part of the community (and my mom sees to it off course). I do belief in faith, honestly and the potential goodness of men. But at the same time I get enchanted by religious rituals. I like seeing the praying men at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, the Ganpati madness in Mumbai and crazy crowds gattering in Brazil for the Pope's visit.
The mount Mary church affects me. From the very first time, every time I set foot in this church I instantly lose my restlessness. I can sit there forever, enjoying the crowds and inhalating the peace. If I ever felt down, a few minutes in the Mount Mary church took care of this.
Apart from being a beautiful church, you get to pray to Mary in a very unique way. Outside the church there are many stalls where you can buy postcards, flowers and candles. But you can also buy wax body parts. If you want to pray before getting a kidney removed, you buy a wax kidney, pray and lit your kidney in front of the cross. It works like a reversed voodoo doll actually. But instead of using pins, we use ordinary fire.
After my father had his second major open heart operation and was facing a month recovery, I bought myself a wax heart, sunk into my prairs and lit the heart in front of Jesus' cross. It must have worked because he is still alive and kicking (and being the occasinal pain in the ass, I don't recall seeing that bodypart in the stall's collection by the way).
At the moment my mother is struggling with painfull knees, so I went upto one of the stalls and asked the guy if he has wax knees.
"No", he replies, "but I have full legs".
"Good", I answered, "can I please have a leg".
"Left or right", he asked.
"I don't know", I said, " give me both, just to be on the safe side".
The guy took some time finding a left and a right leg, I paid him 130 rupees fir the limbs and a few candles and I left.
When I got home I though at first that I was sold two random legs, but no! There is actually a left and a right leg and I have the photo's to prove it.
Som mom, stay put cause one of these days I am going to fix your knees ( or at least have a good time trying).
