the darkening waters would rise , engulf and drown the metropolis , they would wear down and flood low-lying sobo and everything in it : the fenced ovals , cricket pitches and maidans ; the brabourne stadium ; the well-kept bombay university grounds ; the stately victoria terminal ; the raj mahal and oberoi grand hotels ; the low-slung , tied together slums ( both legal and illegal ) ; the languid hashish and opium dens ; the official corruption ; the grinding poverty ; the opportunistic crime ; the goddamned everything that made goddamned mumbai the goddamned human cesspool many considered it to be .