First up. Confession time — yours truly always harboured a secret wish to become a cartographer. The sheer thrill of discovering a place via a map made me look forward to Geography class the most while in school. Soon enough, this hobby became a mini obsession and the bookshelf at home started getting stacked with massive logbook-sized titles sourced from all corners of India and the world. During my research adventures in the past, chiefly at the Asiatic Society Library, poring over maps offered tremendous visual insight into how the city was shaped over centuries. The shape of ancient maps and how their creators perceived the world made for several 'wow' moments.

Recently, at a social gathering of Bombaywallahs, I happened to be a silent observer at an engaging conversation between two such minds — while one was "typically old school" as she admitted, the other, an out-of-towner, had adopted the city as her own with time. The point of discussion was about the merit in including accompanying maps for a book about Bombay in this age of Google maps.