Juhu Beach (Vidya S)

Serene by the day and celestial by the night, is the beach which borders my city Mumbai. Juhu Beach!!!

It stretches from Andheri till Santacruz. If you are new to the city and you have not visited Juhu Beach then I must say that you are missing something in life and if you are a Mumbaite or in Aamchi Mumbai terms Mumbaikar and you haven’t visited it yet then I must that you are pretty much ignorant about this city’s beauty.

Juhu Beach which happens to be in the suburbs is one of the very famous beaches. It’s also the venue for many get together. This is also a landmark for many. There are many 5-star hotels which have come up and become famous because of this beach.

Thanks to this beach the real estate rate of this place has also appreciated a lot. As 65 year old Mrs. D’Cunha says, “There are only three thing that God made very rare, first is a 24 carat Diamond, Second is a good biy and the third is a house near the sea. Get hold of at least one of these” May be this is the reason for the constant rise in the real estate prices. Juhu is one of the costiliest and one of the polished areas of the city.

Apart from this, the other reason of this being on constant hike would that there are many film stars staying in the vicinity. Amitabh Bachchan, Hrithik Roshan, Fardeen Khan, etc to name a few.

This is one place which provides relief to your senses. Early in the morning there are people coming to the beach for their jogging, some people bring their pet dog for its nature’s call. There is also ‘Laughing Clubs’ formed by people, wherein anybody and everybody is invited. There’s senior citizen’s club, Rugby club, football club, cricket club, etc. the mornings are really energetic. It’s also said that it’s really good to jog in the sand as it is good for your hips, back, calves and ankles. So many health conscious people come in, for an early morning jog or even a walk.

In the evening this place takes a different avatar altogether. It is so colourful with all the feri-wallahs, so beautiful with the sun setting down, so blissful with so many children playing. It’s all together a different experience which everybody should experience and enjoy at least once in their life time. You may find everybody from tonga-wallahs to instant photographers, from chat stalls to couple romancing. This place is also known as the ‘lover’s paradise’. You in a relationship, finding a place to spend a romantic place to spend an evening with your partner, Juhu Beach is the place to be. This place is also one of the places for tourist’s interest.

There are the very famous pav-bhaji-ka-thelas and buddi-ke-baal which originated and are found over here. You have these ballon-wallahs and game shows happening in the evening to entertain and delight the people in the evening. There are also horse-back ride and also camel-back ride, there are also giant wheels. This place is a complete entertainer for an evening.

The best of these is the soothing water which keeps on flowing. The waves that come to the shore and goes away silently that gives a feeling that the waves are taking away your day’s worries, tensions and sorrows leaving you with a soothing and calm feeling.

I found some children playing in the waves, trying to go deeper but restricted by their parents. This particular 15 year old, named Akash came with his group of friends to celebrate his joy of clearing his 1oth standard says, “Today I got my results and cleared it with 84% and so my friends and me thought of celebrating this event and what better pace can we think off than Juhu Beach”. When asked what he likes the most about this place and he quickly replies saying that, “after some fun and dip in the water pav-bhaji is the need of the hour.” You may also find evening joggers, men and women out on an evening stroll.

But wait wait wait….. As every coin has two sides…..so does this place.

In the afternoons, the beach is relatively less crowded, but still you’ll find chanawallahs selling chanas, and there are artists making sand carvings to give social messages. But all that looks rosy is not always the way it is. As they say all that glitters is not gold. Though this place sound so cheerful and wonderful, it’s not always this way. I the afternoons this place is just not safe for girls. As this place a relatively empty in the afternoon, there are cases of eve teasing and even rape happening over there. Though there is security provisions done, but it doesn’t really come in on time.

And apart from this another problem faced by this place is, it has become very dirty, thanks to the visitors to this ace. They come here, eat, throw away the waste and litter the place and go away. Though the BMC is trying to improve the situation by imposing fines and cleaning up the place, but the present scenario remains that it has a lot of filth.

Having said that, people do not stop going to places of beauty like this, after all ‘a thing of beauty is a joy forever’.

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References:-

• http://www.indianholiday.com/india-photo-gallery/mumbai/tourist-attractions-7.html

• http://brightnmorningstar.org/