Punish yourself. Go to Taraporewale Aquarium in Mumbai

Don't get me wrong. I am a pure Mumbaikar and I love this city but there are some things about the city (especially when they are over-hyped) that I simply cannot tolerate.  Taraporewala Aquarium is one of those things.  Anyone who was born and raised in Mumbai knows this aquarium. It was perhaps the only aquarium that we had ever seen in our childhood and sure at that time, it was great. We all enjoyed going there to see different kinds of fishes and sea animals. It will always remain as our childhood memories. 

But now things have changed. Many of you who are in Mumbai probably know that this aquarium was shutdown for some time and it was renovated (suppsedly) and re-opend in the first week of March 2015. There was a tremendous hype surrounding the renovation that it was now ultramodern and it was even compared to some of the international aquariums.

So - one fine day (a saturday), I decided to take my wife and kid to this aquarium, completely unaware of what was going to happen next. Since it was a weekend, I was expecting some rush and so I decided to pick an ODD time (about 1.30pm) to reach there. Let me walk you through what exactly happens over there 

1. If you want to go to this Aquarium, you have to pass through multiple stages/queues. The great (sarcasm) part about it though is that its like a video game. You don't know what's next, until you reach that stage. 
2. First queue is "Outside the gate" (literally on the road), and no points for guessing, the queue is long (and I mean really long - atleast about 200-300 people). And the security guard won't let you in until its full hour. They allow people to go in at full hour like 1pm, 2pm , 3pm etc. So - if you reached there at 1.10pm, you gotta wait outside for the next 50mins. That's 50 mins of waiting in hot Mumbai afternoon with your kids.Welcome to Taraporewale Aquarium.
3. So somehow you go through those 50 mins and you are finally allowed to go inside the gate. So what's next? You gotta buy tickets to get inside the aquarium...right? Here's the equation. # of people entering the date = 300. # counters = 2. Time to get ticket = "Depends on mood of people at counter". It took me about 40-45 mins just to get the tickets. And if you are wondering what happended to my wife and kid. They are waiting. Outside. No share. No place to sit. Kid is still excited (coz he's gonna get to see some fishes) But he doesn't know that things are just getting started. 
4. Now - normally you would expect that once you buy ticket, you go inside. Nah Nah. Doesn't happen over here. There is a 3rd queue. For entering the aquarium. And this one is the LONGEST of them all because there are people from previous slots trying to enter the aquarium (i.e. if  you entered in 2pm slot, there are people from 1pm slot trying to get inside the aquarium). It took us about 1 hour 20 mins to to through that queue and go inside aquarium. And the kid (who came to see fishes) is already frustrated. Oh - but never mind, this is not the end. There are still more queues. Still not frustrations waiting for you inside. 
5. So let's take a check-point here. You've already spent close to 2.5 hours and barely got inside the aquarium. On positive side, there is Shade. There is A.C. On the negative (or the normal) side, you are still in a queue. Even after entering the aquarium, you are not really allowed to roam around the way you please. You have to follow the queue. You are not allowed to 'wait' longer at a particular fish-tank. There will be security guards, bugging you and asking you to move ahead (in marathi - "Chala..pudhe chala..pudhe chala"). 
6. The aquarium itself is not very big. If you have visited any aquariums outside India (like singapore, USA, UK), this one would definitely look smaller. We went through the entire aquarium in about 20-25 mins. That's 2.5 hours of waiting in line and 30 mins of seeing fish. 
7. Coming to the fishes. I wasn't really impressed. I could be biased because I have seen aquariums in different countries. But when they said Newly renovated, best in class etc, I expected more. It definitely was disappointing. 
8. Oh and I forgot to mention. You are not allowed to take photographs inside the aquarium unless you pay for photography charges. I found that weird for 2 reasons. One - The charges are pretty high. For photography using Mobile phones its Rs 500 and for clicking good professional pictures it is about Rs 5K-10K. The ticket cost for entering the aquarium is Rs 60. So now you understand why it's weird? Second reason is - WHO WOULD WANT TO CLICK A PICTURE OF THEMSELVES AFTER WAITING FOR 2.5 HOURS????(i guess this one is self-explanatory). 

Here are my little suggestions to Taraporewale Aquarium team (if they even desire to make their visitor experience a pleasant one)

1. Please raise the ticket price. At least for weekends. With Rs 60 per ticket, it is just too cheap. Entire population of Mumbai would probably come there for this price. 
2. Please provide an option for buying tickets online. There is definitely a big chunk of people driven away by sheer inconvenience of getting inside the aquarium. This will at-least help them skip some of your queues. 
3. Provide a VIP Pass (Fast Pass) at a much higher price, so that those who can afford the convenience can atleast skip the major queues. 
4. Allow photography for free. Period. 

WOW- I didn't realize, but this post turned out to be longer that I originally thought. I would have to blame emotions for this. They don't come often, but when they do, they come in Burst mode !!! :-) 

Anyways - thank you for reading this post. Hope it reaches the Taraporewale Aquarium's management team and we can hope for some changes. Until then, you all stay blessed & have a wonderful day !