Mumbai without a guide is like a glass ceiling. You can see the sky, you know it is there, but you won`t be able to reach it, ever.

If you are keen on adventure, and have a talent for documentaries and trust the digital information, so clearly described by other travelers, even if you read tomes about each and every corner of Bombay, you do need a guide, believe me! Especially in case you want to socialize with people and see the way they live and work, walk into and get to know each corner of the slums, markets and neighbourhoods, full of silk, saris and aromatic herbs, street food and ghats, where people wash clothes in open air.
A well-trained tour guide has the best knowledge.
There might be quite a lot of guides in the irresistible Mumbai, but none compares to…Zeeshan.

All began with a question we asked, the concierge of the hotel recommended us Be the Local. It`s a tourist agency in Dharavi Slum, with students as young employees, who, through “ know it all about Mumbai” services, earn a wage which help them continue their studies.

At the appointed time in the morning, a few minutes before our meeting, Zeeshan entered our lives. With his terrific charm, with a Bollywood starlike charisma (look at the picture, am I exaggerating in any respect? ☺), one of the first tour guides to work for Be the Local. He was born and brought up in Dharavi, where he lives with his family (his parents, a brother and a sister).
He plays cricket and he is now studying to join the Marines and talks about the place where he was born and spent his childhood, like nobody else: with humour, exuberance, passion and the declared desire that tourists  “would get rid of prejudices and see the truth enlightened by the real life.”

Haven`t you fallen in love yet? ☺