Mumbai, India

This afternoon Chad and I were taken for a ride around the Bandra area of the city where we're staying and playing. A real work out for the senses; the good, the bad and the ugly from a side street village of fishing shanties to the stately heritage mansions that have been passed down within families for generations. The occasional bull drawn wooden cart and ubiquitous rickshaws, little two-stroke engine jobs on three wheels with canvas tops painted shiny black, thousands of them. Of course the traffic is staggering. We turned up one street directly into three lanes of on-coming cars. The driver cooly stopped while they all went round us and we continued on. I can't tell you how glad I am not to be the person driving.

The site of the gig was simply a plot of land that I assume is used for all large outdoor concerts. The promoter did a great job of setting up a covered backstage area with dressing rooms, catering etc., all air conditioned and some indoor/outdoor stuff for ground cover. No time for soundcheck, so it was a quick meet and greet performance, a spray up of mosquito repellent and on stage. The venue was slightly smaller than the 25K original estimate but it was a jam packed 17,000+ gig, people who have waited a very long time for Mark Knopfler to come to their country and weren't reserved in showing it. A rocking show and one of it's many highlights was a jazz/blues B-3 solo from Matt in Baloney Again. After the final encore we hopped into the cars for a quick getaway to beat the traffic and back for another fab dinner at Masala Bay in the Taj Lands End Hotel where the chef encored his performance of the previous night with an Asian twist. A big wow.

So, it's on to Bangalore tomorrow morning with notes to follow.

So long,

Richard