Our Blog

Dear readers and fellow travellers, Today marks International Women’s Day! (Though in Reality, every day is Women’s Day.) We asked our girls who run the Reality Tours Mumbai office what the day means to them. Here’s what our formidable ladies have to say: Evelyn, Reservations Manager Every day is Women’s Day! I don’t think this day […]

My name is Balaji and I am 27 years old. I live in Dharavi and have worked as a tour guide at Reality Tours and Travel for over 5 years now. As a local from the slum, I have a lot to say about my neighbourhood – the way it has changed with time and […]

My name is Manoj Ramesh Medwal and I was born and brought up in Mumbai. My parents both come from Delhi and I have one elder brother and one younger one. We live together with my mum. My elder brother is married and has two wonderful children. I’m really proud to be a nice uncle. We […]

My name is Shehnaz and I am working as a tour guide at Reality Tours and Travel. My family is originally from Bihar but my father moved to Delhi about 25 years ago to work and sustain the family. I was born in Delhi in a middle-class family and we are six siblings. My father […]

Since 1984 ‘Technology, Entertainment, Design’ (more commonly known the world over as ‘TED’) have been sharing ‘ideas worth spreading’ relating to all things, from education to business, science to development. In the last 30 years, they’ve shared over 2,400 talks in more than 100 languages which have been viewed 500 million times. These talks are a regular […]

For the past two years, I have had the privilege of working in Dharavi: the heart of Mumbai, its center of small scale enterprise, and “one of the largest ‘slums’ in Asia”. Dharavi is an incredibly unique area that outsiders rarely get the opportunity to work in and learn from for such an extended period […]

Earlier this year our Operations Executive, Mayur Parmar, had the opportunity to join Jagriti Yatra, a 15-day, 8,000 kilometre journey around India. The trip brings 450 young Indians together on a train to learn about our country. The journey is punctured by stops to learn from local leaders who are building India through innovative enterprise. […]

Kaveri and Hasnain, two graduates from Reality Gives’ Youth Empowerment Program, recently joined youth from the French NGO Global Potential for a four day leadership course in our partner village, Chinchoti. Global Potential is an 18 month leadership and entrepreneurship program for youth from underserved communities. A key aspect of their program is a 45 […]

1. Definitive Guide to Riding Mumbai Trains (With Pictures) Mumbai’s local railway is aptly nicknamed the “lifeline of the city.” Mumbai is one of the densest cities in the world and the trains are its saving grace, transporting a staggering 6.9 million people per day. Trains can get so overcrowded during peak hours that it […]

On January 4, 2016 Reality Tours and Travel celebrated 10 years of working in Dharavi. To mark the occasion, we’ve created a video that looks at the different ways in which we have impacted some of the lives of the tens of thousands of people who have been a part of our story. As a […]

Please introduce yourself. Where did you grow up? What were you doing before joining Reality Tours? My name is Ravi Mishra. I grew up in Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh but I ran away from home when I was 13 because of issues at home. I picked a train at random and ended up in Navi […]

Suraj, one of our senior guides, recently wrote an article about Dharavi for the German magazine, Masala, a publication that aims to build an intercultural bridge from India to Germany. What is a slum? I have met many people from all around Mumbai and the world and when I ask them this question, 90 per […]