INCREDIBLE India

There's a huge sense of optimism and purpose in India right now, which makes it a fabulous place to visit. And it's still reasonably affordable for South Africans.

- SUZY BROKENSHA

Billboards dot the streets of Mumbai apologising for the construction of the new underground. ‘Sorry for the inconvenience,’ they read, ‘but we’re busy building your future.’ And they are.

India feels like a country exploding into its own potential. Remember how it felt to be living in South Africa in 1994, and during the Soccer World Cup in 2010? All that optimism, all those sparkling new buses, the vuvuzelas, the innovative businesses popping up all over the place? The feeling that anything was possible? It feels like that, times a million.

On 14 July this year, India sent a spacecraft to the far side of the moon. If Chandrayaan-3 successfully lands there in August – and it looks like it will – India will be the fourth country in the world to do that, after the US, Russia and China. That spacecraft is a giant billboard too – it’s saying to the rest of the world: ‘We’ve got the tech, we’ve got the expertise, and we’re open for business.’

And they are.

Earlier this year, India overtook China as the most populated country in the world. There are currently about 1428627663 people living there, a startling number. It’s interesting because, while it seems that innovation is constantly stamped out in China, it is absolutely part of the fabric of India: every single one of those people has some sort of hustle going on. The energy is fabulous… and exhausting. At one point we were stuck in a Mumbai traffic jam so dense and unmoving that our taxi driver simply turned the engine off and went straight to sleep for 20 minutes or so. In the middle of the road. I knew exactly how he felt.