Monday, February 16, 2009
A bike ride to the sea - a short adventure by Tim K
Monday was our final full day in the state of Kerala, a tropical paradise of coconut palms (Kera = coconut + la = land), banana trees (much smaller but sweeter than what we’re used to seeing US markets), and a broad assortment of other fruit and spice plants including pineapple, nutmeg, cashew, vanilla beans and other delectables. A rich variety of birdlife nest in the trees and fish the backwaters: the Indian cuckoo, or Kuyle, with its distinctive sweet call, Kingfisher, Kites, Cormorants, Herons, as well as the ever popular and noisy crow, and too many others to mention.
The days activities consist of a cooking class for the ladies in our group, presented by the matriarch and culinary goddess of the Philipkutty farm, featuring traditions and spices of the local region of southern India. The men, John, Gopi and myself, choose to take a bike ride through some of the local village area, lead by our guide Shagzil, and assisted by our boatman/escort. For the sake of comfort we decide to get an early start, so as to avoid thee heat and humidity of midday. Temperatures quickly reach the upper 80’s, with high humidity as a result of the vast network of backwaters.
We finish breakfast and meet Shagzil at 10:00, who has come across to our island via one of the small wooden boats. Shagzil and our boatman wheel out bicycles from a storage shed, and we make adjustments to more-or-less fit our height. The bikes are single speed but of good rugged construction to withstand the rocky terrain and typical village roads.
We cross by boat with our bikes onboard, our boatman using a sturdy bamboo pole to quietly push us across the narrow waterway, which in places have heavy overgrowth of water hyacinth – lovely but basically an invasive weed. On the other side we set off on a quiet, mostly paved road that weaves through coconut groves, and links the small farms that are worked by the village folk.
Two or three of the farms have large quantities of coconut “hair” or bark in various stages of production – from tangled masses to neat bales, that eventually result in evenly braided rope. The rope has many uses in and around the region as well as being a chief sustaining byproduct for villagers. We watch firsthand as Shagzil explains the process by which the rope is created, which includes a crude but efficient spinning wheel of sorts, consisting of a bicycle wheel driven by a small electric motor. An elderly woman feeds out the coconut straw and rope magically appears.
As we continue it soon becomes cleat that we’re getting closer to the local temple. Sung prayers and chants are broadcast over a PA system, which carry for a good distance throughout the area. Waking up to the sound of amplified prayer melodies before dawn, as experienced the last couple of mornings, can put one off at first, though some of the music can be eerily beautiful. In general, I prefer waking up at a more leisurely pace, along with the birds. As we pass the temple, the volume increases to a level on par with a cricket match. Further on we pass by a few nice homes behind gated fences, a stark contrast to the smaller simple farmhouses.
Soon we encounter higher volumes of traffic – pedestrian as well as vehicular – making it necessary to concentrate on safety more than sightseeing. Crowder buses also become a factor, forcing pedestrians and smaller vehicles to the extreme edge of the roadway. We pass the main business center of the village, with its vendors engaged in selling of fruits, vegetables and the usual assortment of staples. Beyond this commerce center is a bridge that connects the village to a larger hub, and eventually to the capitol city of Cochin.
We ascend the bridge, keeping as far to the left edge as possible. I’m acutely aware that we’re sharing the road with buses, cars, trucks, scooters and other assorted vehicles, and it’s hard to tell if the honking that occurs with frequency behind us is to tell us we’re in someone’s way, or a means to announce and warn of an approaching vehicle. Given that commercial vehicles routinely post “Please Honk” on the rear panel, it seems more likely that the honking is a courtesy rather than a reprimand.
Near the top of our ascent we pause to view the ship locks, an apparatus that regulates shipping traffic into and out of the lake. Our guide provides commentary, though hearing everything proves to be a challenge due to the traffic. We cross the bridge and take in the view of the water and land on either side.
The bridge descends to a landmass in the middle of the lake and eventually continues on to a second bridge similar to the first. We pause to catch our breath and discuss procedure. Shagzil explains that we can continue across the bridge, on the course we’re following, or begin a return route to our original base, which becomes the general consensus. Having discovered one of the few physical activities that I can tolerate and actually enjoy, I decide to continue, with our guide’s blessing. Feeling some responsibility for our safety, Shagzil offers suggestions on where to ride, and gets my assurance that I have phone numbers in case I get lost or need roadside assistance. I set off on my own with a slightly guilty sense of freedom. Going solo for a couple of hours seemed OK though.
I reach the far side of the lake in a few minutes and work my way through moderately heavy traffic as the road converges with other routes on the west side of the lake. I pedal for several minutes more and arrive at a juncture with a conventional traffic circle. The main arteries run to the left (south), and straight ahead (west). Shagzil suggested I take the southbound route for a pleasant ride. I decide to go straight.
Soon I hear the sound of drums and see a group of young men a short distance down the road, marching in procession surrounding an elephant. The elephant is adorned in simple red and white banners, and carries a rider under a colored canopy. There’s no other traffic as I pass the procession on the far right and ride ahead a few hundred feet so as to dismount and take my camera out of the backpack. Just before the group reaches me they turn off the road and enter a courtyard area, which I assume is part of some temple grounds. One of the marchers noticed me and motioned me to follow. I wave, hesitate for a moment and watch the parade disappear.
The road continues past coconut and banana trees, and a mixture of small buildings – corrugated metal shacks, more impressive tiled roof houses and small unassuming businesses.
I continue in a general westward direction, which seems like the right way to go. I haven’t fully admitted it to myself but I have a vague idea in the back of my head that I could ride west and, if I went far enough, I’d eventually reach land’s end and the Arabian Sea. I’d looked at maps the day before, when our group spent the day on a houseboat on the lake I’d crossed earlier. From memory it appeared that the distance to the ocean was no more than several miles. As long as the roads held up I’d have a good chance of getting there and back before too long I figure.
Many of the small roadside businesses are places of congregation, where young and old stand around in discussion. People routinely say “hello” and “hi, how are you?” on seeing this outsider riding through. Boys and girls in buses and walking along the road to or from school smile and wave enthusiastically.
Road construction signs appear and it looks like a detour is coming up. A sign reading “Use Diversion” with an arrow blocks the road. Behind the sign, the road is torn up, with big mounds of dirt where the roadway was. A flag-waving worker directs cars to the direction of the detour. Motorcycles and scooters appear to be going through. The man sees me and indicates with his flag that I can take the torn up route. I ride a short distance until I’m forced off the bike by the large mounds of dirt and sand.
Beyond the detour, the road soon becomes more congested with cars, and the buildings on either side of the road are now larger commercial buildings, more tightly spaced, some 2 or 3 floors. I concentrate on avoiding the numerous motorbikes and pedestrians that I have to weave in and out of. Immediately I reach the center of the small town, which is the usual beehive-like hub of activity and shops selling colorful merchandise. Just as quickly, the commerce dies down as I get past the center of town.
The road soon gets quieter again; with the occasional merchandise seller who waves and says “hello” I wonder if the Indian “namasté” greeting is less common in this part of the country. I try both to see if I could judge the response.
On several occasions a small group of 3 or 4 boys ride up alongside me and practice their English with a serious of questions “What is your name?” “Where are you from?” Where are you going?” “What is your wife’s name?” I’d interject some questions of my own to test their compression, which was always surprisingly good among the school aged youths. We ride for a while, the boys weaving around either side of me, and making conversation that results in a lot of laughter. I can’t help wondering what it was they find so amusing.
One boy is more vocal and does most of the talking for the group. I ask him how far it is to the water. The question was not clearly understood so I decided to rephrase it. “How far to the ocean – the sea?” Still not clear. Perhaps “sea” is ambiguous (“see”, “C”). I used my hand to indicate motion of the water. “The Arabian Sea?” Now it makes sense. “Oh yes, the Arabian Sea.” The boy thinks for a moment and replies, “4 – 5 kilometers?” This is encouraging enough – I try to assign mileage to the numbers and figure around 3 miles is a good guess. This is easily reachable in 30-40 minutes at a leisurely pace, even with bad roads. After a few more minutes they turn off of the main road. We say goodbye and I thank them for talking with me.
I ride for some 15-20 minutes, the heat now coming on strong with the sun near its highest point. The road curves one way and the next and I check my direction regularly by noting the shadows. I figure that as long as my shadow is to the right I’m heading west. I stop to drink from one of the three half-liter bottles of water I brought. I’ve just about drained the first.
Soon I stop at a small roadside market and say hello to the clerk behind a counter with the usual assortment of fruits and packaged chips and candy. I go through the same questions and get a blank stare. I try the hand gesture for moving water, which is more effective. “Oh, about 4 kilometers” he replies. I figure that I’d made better progress than this, but realistically, the boy earlier probably just made an educated guess. “Do I continue on this road?” I asked. “Yes, but turn right after 2 roads” he adds. I want to be sure I understand him correctly. “Not the next road, but the one after?” I ask. “Yes, down where you see that car there” the man replies.
Another man is standing nearby and overhears our conversation. “Here, let me show you” he says. Before I can tell him it isn’t necessary, he starts off and signals for me to follow. Several times before I’d find myself instinctively riding on the right-hand side of the road. My new escort waves me to fall in line behind him on the left, which I do. At the second road on the left he waves me off and I thank him for his help.
This road continues like the others, winding one way and the next, mostly through palms and other large shade trees. I’m grateful for shade as the sun is beating down mercilessly and my clothes are becoming drenched. After what seems like another 20 minutes I stop and asked a roadside vendor who tells me it’s about 2-1/2 kilometers. Either my understanding of a kilometer is off, or people are underestimating the distance. Later I consider that maybe I was going in a circuitous route that was indirect. I make several more turns and begin to become a little concerned that I might not be able to retrace my route back. I’d have to cross that bridge when I got to it.
More boys on bikes who, once again, aren’t sure where I’m going at first. I ask about the distance to the sea, which was a difficult concept. “1 or 2 kilometers?” I ask. Yes, they agree that it was surely 1 to 2 kilometers.This exchange continues for some time, and I started wondering if I’m ever going to reach the coast. Another three boys on bikes and the usual questions. 1/2 kilometer one says. They’re very pleased to have a visitor in their village and lead the way, pointing out highlights of the area. They leave the road at a small dirt drive that leads to a large church or temple. “Come see – very famous temple – very famous. I feel that I should at least give it a look so I walked around the exterior and make a mental note that I should spend a little more time looking at the inside on my way back – if it was allowed to outsiders. At the front of the church is a display of about 100 colorful umbrellas stuck in the sand, which is quite beautiful – a striking sight that I hadn’t seen before and I wanted to learn more, but I’m on a singular mission at this point. Regrettably I didn’t get back around to the temple. These areas of sand I take as a good sign that I’m was close to a beach. The .5 kilometers that I was told several times as the distance to the beach I eventually cover at least 4 more times.
Besides wondering if I’ll ever see that water, or just have to finally give up and turn around, I start wondering what sort of beach it actually might be. I hadn’t done any research on the coastline in this region, and realize that it might not be a nice sandy beach at all. It could just as easily be a beach of all rock, or a rocky cliff and steep drop-off unsuitable for a bike. It might be compromised of mangroves, swampy conditions, trash piles and toxic pollution flowing from nearby villages. Hopefully I’ll at least get a chance to find out.Soon the road comes to a complete dead-end, connecting to a road that runs perpendicular, or north-south generally. I could see down this road for quite a distance in both directions and didn’t see a clear reason to go one way or the other. This is probably the most perplexing decision of the ride – left, right or back the way I came. I’m also becoming acutely aware of the time and that soon the others will be wondering where I am.
I then notice two boys, probably in their early teens, waiting by the side of the road in a small bus shelter. “Hello guys” I say. “Do you know how I can get to the sea?” Without hesitation one of the boys gestures to a small path across the street, just yards from where I’m standing, that continues in the same direction I’m going. The path is hardly noticeable – just a dirt passageway between the palms.
I wonder if I might be crossing private land by taking the path, but the boy gives me an assuring nod. The path is flat, mostly sand mixed with dirt and passes behind or beside a couple of simple houses or farm structures. About 100 yards further I notice a low rock wall ahead and see that the palms appear to end abruptly all along the wall. I hear the unmistakable sound of surf and know that my quest will soon be over. Someone had propped a sturdy board from the ground to the top of the low wall, which I realize will be useful if I decided to take the bike to the other side. Halfway up the ramp it all comes into view: Clear blue sky and bright sunlight, illuminating an infinite sea of blue-green. The 3 or 4-foot high rock wall drops down to a pristine sandy beach. I’m in awe. The flood of emotion might have carried me out to sea.
I could have fallen to my knees and kissed the sand but it seemed too peaceful a setting for such melodramatics. Water gently swells and breaks on the sand – not the pounding surf of larger ocean beaches. I look around and see only a few people working around the area I had passed through. Up and down the beach there are a few distant boats but otherwise it appears quite deserted. I decide to quickly change into my bathing suit before I attract any more attention. There’s no time to waste. I don’t have a towel but it hardly matters since the air is so warm and the sun shines brightly. I stuff my shoes and shorts in the backpack and roll the bike up and over the wall where I can keep an eye on it. “Hello, where are you going?” says a voice. I turn to see four young boys looking up at me with great interest. “Hi. How are you?” I ask. “Fine” they reply. “What is your name?” “Where are you from?” “Where are you going?” they ask. I don’t want to seem rude and brush them off but I’m not interested in conversation at the moment so I change the topic. “Do you like to swim?” “Can you swim in the ocean – the sea?” They look puzzled, speak among themselves and laugh. “I’m going to go for a swim in the water, OK?”
I walk across the warm sand, the boys trailing after me. The water is almost like a tepid bath – no cold stinging shock – the perfect temperature. The sand is soft – no rocks or seashells along the shallow sea bottom. It’s exquisitely relaxing and peaceful, given especially that I’ve worked up quite a sweat to get here. I hear the boys yelling from the shore as I bob lazily in the water, letting the swells carry me in and out gently, waves cresting overhead. I keep an eye on my gear, though I can’t imagine any of these friendly youngsters getting mischievous and make off with my pack or bike. I decide to grab my camera and snap a few pictures. My new friends naturally get in on the act.I still can’t determine if swimming in the ocean is something they enjoy. “Do you like to go fishing in a boat?” That doesn’t go anywhere either. I get the impression that they regard the ocean as just something that’s there – no particular reason to swim around in it. I tell them that I’m going to swim a little more, before leaving soon. “Are you going to walk out to the middle of the sea?” a young boy asks. “Just a little ways.” I say. I splash around a bit, feeling a little uncomfortable about being watched. I splash some water back to the boys. They all laugh.
I could spend hours on the beach but I realize I need to be practical about getting back at a decent hour. An older boy comes up to me – I’d guess around a 12th grade student. His manner is extremely polite and curious. He asks a few questions and seems greatly interested in knowing about where I’m from and what America is like. “Do you have an ocean where you live?” “What is it like?” “How does it look?” “What do you do there?” “Where is your wife?” We talk for a short while. He wants to know everything. I tell him how much I like the area where he lives – beach and all – and how much I enjoyed talking to him. He wishes me well and I sling my pack over my shoulder and start to leave.
I carry the bike over some stones and roll it down the ramp. Some older family members of one of the farms have gathered at the wall to see what’s going on. An elderly man is saying something to me but I can’t make it out. He appears perplexed, as if he’s never seen a strange Anglo-American emerge from the sea before. I smile and say goodbye and namesté. A couple of other goodbyes and I’m heading back, with a little regret.
I ride for a while and see some boys that I might have met before. They ride with me for a while but we don’t say much. I’m trying to estimate how long it will take to get back, if I should try to call for a ride, or if I could somehow get a taxi or auto-rickshaw to give me a lift. The boy riding next to me is singing a Christmas song in English, which seems funny to me. I join him and we sing a couple of verses of Jingle Bells. As before, the boys pull off the road eventually, and yell goodbye and good luck.
It’s really hot now and I decide that I don’t want to ride all the way back. Besides not having any sunscreen to apply after my swim, I considered heat stroke a real possibility. Surely there will soon be an auto-rickshaw that I can hire. Some men are gathered around a truck with a fishing haul, including a couple of taxis. I tell the driver of one of the taxis that I’m looking for a ride. No response. The others are interested in showing me their catch, which appear to be tiny shrimp. After getting nowhere I say goodbye and head on.
A few taxis pass me and I realize that I might have a tough time getting a bicycle onboard one of the tiny vehicles. Several of the taxis pass by with passengers. Soon I see a couple of the 3-wheelers parked along the side of the road. I pull over and explain that I need a taxi for the bike and myself. This was met with some suspicion. I realize that I don’t know exactly where I’m going. “I need to get across the lake” This is met with a puzzled look. “Lake?” the man squints his trying to understand what I’m trying to tell him. We both wait a few seconds for some clarity that never comes. Once again there might be a language barrier. I recall from our guide that the Hindi work “lakh”, a large monetary sum, is pronounced “lake”. I try pantomiming a bridge going over a lake. This gets no more than a slight nod, as if to say “OK, my friend. Whatever you say.” I look to the man’s colleague who gives me a raised eyebrow. I’m sure he’s convinced I don’t have all of my faculties. I look around hoping to see a young student that might be able to help bridge our language barrier. I decide to continue further along and see if I have better luck closer to town.
I soon pass a row of small businesses and decide to see if I can get some information. A shopkeeper is reading a newspaper behind a small counter. I greet the man and realize his business is a small pharmacy. Surely he’ll be able to help me. I need to find out the name of the village where we started. If I can glance at a map I’ll see the village and be able to convey to a taxi driver where I need to go. “Namesté. Sir, I wonder if you might have a map of the area I could look at for a second.” Thankfully he understands me, and starts going through some drawers in search of a map. After several drawers and piles of papers I try to tell him that it’s OK if he doesn’t have a map, I was just wondering… “Please wait here,” says the man, who goes into a back room. After a minute he returns with another, younger man. I tell this man that it’s no problem if he has no map. The younger man replies, “Please wait, sir.” The two men go through a couple more boxes of papers and eventually I convince them to not pursue the matter any further. “Thank you so much” I say and carry on. I’ll ask a couple of taxi drivers about a map. Surely they carry road maps I figure.
Soon I’m back near the last center of commerce and a fair amount of traffic. I spot a small cluster of taxis in a dirt lot and decide to see who volunteers to transport me to the other side of “the lake”. I explain my predicament to one of the drivers and get the same look of bewilderment. Surely they’ve been to the lake and across the bridge just a few miles from here. I repeat “lake” and “bridge”, and search for some other clue as to where I’m trying to go. At this point I realize how ill prepared I really am, then remember the large church in the village. “St. Mary’s church?” I ask with hope. No clue. This is starting to feel like an episode of The Twilight Zone. At this point a group of 6 to 8 men have clustered around, either hoping to help solve the mystery, or just curious. I pick up a stick and draw a crude map with a kidney-shaped lake and a line crossing over. The men wait for more to the picture. I remember that the island, constructed many years ago, is entirely man-made and is thus an unnatural shape. I draw a trapezoid in the lake, resembling as closely as I can recall, the shape of the island that the farm we’re staying at is on. Still no sign of recognition. I’m becoming exasperated. I don’t what more I can say. I almost expect to be afforded the gracious “This is no problem sir” service and attitude that I’ve been spoiled with during our entire trip, but in this situation, it seems as though there is a problem.
Finally, I ask one of the drivers straight-on if he’ll transport me and the bike and I’ll tell him where to go. Surprisingly, this requires no further debate and the man presents his vehicle and an open palm, inviting me onboard. As expected, the bike doesn’t quite fit inside the tiny taxi, and my squeezing in behind the bike is something I wish I’d gotten a photo of. Immediately the cart is rolling down the road as I instruct the driver which directions to take. After a few minutes I get the feeling that he knows where we’re going, since we discussed the lake and bridge. We arrive at the detour and he exchanges words with the flagman. The detour he’s forced to take is brutal. The cart bounces along a dirt road with deep rivets and potholes. The bouncing slams me into the bike and against the steel frame of the vehicle. Several times I hit my head on the roof, fully expecting a minor contusion as a result. The detour somehow channels us into the middle of the roadwork, forcing the driver to turn back and retrace much of the route, in order to proceed further and bypass the road under construction. I’m amazed at how long the ride is, and wonder how bad it would be to be riding on the bike, considering the extreme discomfort of the auto-rickshaw ride.
I see familiar intersections and buildings and my spirits are comforted that I’m heading in the right direction at a good pace. Soon we approach the bridge and the driver turns to give me a chuckle as he points forward across the bridge. I’m amazed that he knows exactly where to go with little input from me. On the other side of the bridge I signal where he needs to turn but it seems unnecessary. St. Mary’s church appears after several turns and he slows the vehicle and pulls off in the church courtyard. I start telling him to keep going, as St. Mary’s was a point of reference, but I decide he’s taken me far enough and I can ride the remaining ¼ mile or so. I’m relieved to have the roller coaster ride at an end so I clamber out and carefully remove the bike, not wanting any additional scrapes to the interior of his vehicle. The driver looks at me with satisfaction, having delivered his fare exactly where I wanted to go, in spite of impossible communication obstacles. I mean to tell the man what a fine job he’s done getting me here.
I’m hoping I have enough rupees to pay him as he makes calculations on a small notepad. He jots down the total fair, which he underlines with his pen: 180 rupees (less than $4US). I’m in such disbelief and relief that I give him 3 100-rupee notes. I later wished that I’d added another 100 in consideration of the bike. I thank him a couple of times and head off for the short ride to the dock – total fare with tip about $6. I arrive at the dock and wait for the boatman to notice me, which he does after a few minutes. I return to our lodging at 4:00, 6 hrs. from the time we left this morning and take a much needed few minutes to relax, before our next adventure…
The days activities consist of a cooking class for the ladies in our group, presented by the matriarch and culinary goddess of the Philipkutty farm, featuring traditions and spices of the local region of southern India. The men, John, Gopi and myself, choose to take a bike ride through some of the local village area, lead by our guide Shagzil, and assisted by our boatman/escort. For the sake of comfort we decide to get an early start, so as to avoid thee heat and humidity of midday. Temperatures quickly reach the upper 80’s, with high humidity as a result of the vast network of backwaters.
We finish breakfast and meet Shagzil at 10:00, who has come across to our island via one of the small wooden boats. Shagzil and our boatman wheel out bicycles from a storage shed, and we make adjustments to more-or-less fit our height. The bikes are single speed but of good rugged construction to withstand the rocky terrain and typical village roads.
We cross by boat with our bikes onboard, our boatman using a sturdy bamboo pole to quietly push us across the narrow waterway, which in places have heavy overgrowth of water hyacinth – lovely but basically an invasive weed. On the other side we set off on a quiet, mostly paved road that weaves through coconut groves, and links the small farms that are worked by the village folk.
Two or three of the farms have large quantities of coconut “hair” or bark in various stages of production – from tangled masses to neat bales, that eventually result in evenly braided rope. The rope has many uses in and around the region as well as being a chief sustaining byproduct for villagers. We watch firsthand as Shagzil explains the process by which the rope is created, which includes a crude but efficient spinning wheel of sorts, consisting of a bicycle wheel driven by a small electric motor. An elderly woman feeds out the coconut straw and rope magically appears.
As we continue it soon becomes cleat that we’re getting closer to the local temple. Sung prayers and chants are broadcast over a PA system, which carry for a good distance throughout the area. Waking up to the sound of amplified prayer melodies before dawn, as experienced the last couple of mornings, can put one off at first, though some of the music can be eerily beautiful. In general, I prefer waking up at a more leisurely pace, along with the birds. As we pass the temple, the volume increases to a level on par with a cricket match. Further on we pass by a few nice homes behind gated fences, a stark contrast to the smaller simple farmhouses.
Soon we encounter higher volumes of traffic – pedestrian as well as vehicular – making it necessary to concentrate on safety more than sightseeing. Crowder buses also become a factor, forcing pedestrians and smaller vehicles to the extreme edge of the roadway. We pass the main business center of the village, with its vendors engaged in selling of fruits, vegetables and the usual assortment of staples. Beyond this commerce center is a bridge that connects the village to a larger hub, and eventually to the capitol city of Cochin.
We ascend the bridge, keeping as far to the left edge as possible. I’m acutely aware that we’re sharing the road with buses, cars, trucks, scooters and other assorted vehicles, and it’s hard to tell if the honking that occurs with frequency behind us is to tell us we’re in someone’s way, or a means to announce and warn of an approaching vehicle. Given that commercial vehicles routinely post “Please Honk” on the rear panel, it seems more likely that the honking is a courtesy rather than a reprimand.
Near the top of our ascent we pause to view the ship locks, an apparatus that regulates shipping traffic into and out of the lake. Our guide provides commentary, though hearing everything proves to be a challenge due to the traffic. We cross the bridge and take in the view of the water and land on either side.
The bridge descends to a landmass in the middle of the lake and eventually continues on to a second bridge similar to the first. We pause to catch our breath and discuss procedure. Shagzil explains that we can continue across the bridge, on the course we’re following, or begin a return route to our original base, which becomes the general consensus. Having discovered one of the few physical activities that I can tolerate and actually enjoy, I decide to continue, with our guide’s blessing. Feeling some responsibility for our safety, Shagzil offers suggestions on where to ride, and gets my assurance that I have phone numbers in case I get lost or need roadside assistance. I set off on my own with a slightly guilty sense of freedom. Going solo for a couple of hours seemed OK though.
I reach the far side of the lake in a few minutes and work my way through moderately heavy traffic as the road converges with other routes on the west side of the lake. I pedal for several minutes more and arrive at a juncture with a conventional traffic circle. The main arteries run to the left (south), and straight ahead (west). Shagzil suggested I take the southbound route for a pleasant ride. I decide to go straight.
Soon I hear the sound of drums and see a group of young men a short distance down the road, marching in procession surrounding an elephant. The elephant is adorned in simple red and white banners, and carries a rider under a colored canopy. There’s no other traffic as I pass the procession on the far right and ride ahead a few hundred feet so as to dismount and take my camera out of the backpack. Just before the group reaches me they turn off the road and enter a courtyard area, which I assume is part of some temple grounds. One of the marchers noticed me and motioned me to follow. I wave, hesitate for a moment and watch the parade disappear.
The road continues past coconut and banana trees, and a mixture of small buildings – corrugated metal shacks, more impressive tiled roof houses and small unassuming businesses.
I continue in a general westward direction, which seems like the right way to go. I haven’t fully admitted it to myself but I have a vague idea in the back of my head that I could ride west and, if I went far enough, I’d eventually reach land’s end and the Arabian Sea. I’d looked at maps the day before, when our group spent the day on a houseboat on the lake I’d crossed earlier. From memory it appeared that the distance to the ocean was no more than several miles. As long as the roads held up I’d have a good chance of getting there and back before too long I figure.
Many of the small roadside businesses are places of congregation, where young and old stand around in discussion. People routinely say “hello” and “hi, how are you?” on seeing this outsider riding through. Boys and girls in buses and walking along the road to or from school smile and wave enthusiastically.
Road construction signs appear and it looks like a detour is coming up. A sign reading “Use Diversion” with an arrow blocks the road. Behind the sign, the road is torn up, with big mounds of dirt where the roadway was. A flag-waving worker directs cars to the direction of the detour. Motorcycles and scooters appear to be going through. The man sees me and indicates with his flag that I can take the torn up route. I ride a short distance until I’m forced off the bike by the large mounds of dirt and sand.
Beyond the detour, the road soon becomes more congested with cars, and the buildings on either side of the road are now larger commercial buildings, more tightly spaced, some 2 or 3 floors. I concentrate on avoiding the numerous motorbikes and pedestrians that I have to weave in and out of. Immediately I reach the center of the small town, which is the usual beehive-like hub of activity and shops selling colorful merchandise. Just as quickly, the commerce dies down as I get past the center of town.
The road soon gets quieter again; with the occasional merchandise seller who waves and says “hello” I wonder if the Indian “namasté” greeting is less common in this part of the country. I try both to see if I could judge the response.
On several occasions a small group of 3 or 4 boys ride up alongside me and practice their English with a serious of questions “What is your name?” “Where are you from?” Where are you going?” “What is your wife’s name?” I’d interject some questions of my own to test their compression, which was always surprisingly good among the school aged youths. We ride for a while, the boys weaving around either side of me, and making conversation that results in a lot of laughter. I can’t help wondering what it was they find so amusing.
One boy is more vocal and does most of the talking for the group. I ask him how far it is to the water. The question was not clearly understood so I decided to rephrase it. “How far to the ocean – the sea?” Still not clear. Perhaps “sea” is ambiguous (“see”, “C”). I used my hand to indicate motion of the water. “The Arabian Sea?” Now it makes sense. “Oh yes, the Arabian Sea.” The boy thinks for a moment and replies, “4 – 5 kilometers?” This is encouraging enough – I try to assign mileage to the numbers and figure around 3 miles is a good guess. This is easily reachable in 30-40 minutes at a leisurely pace, even with bad roads. After a few more minutes they turn off of the main road. We say goodbye and I thank them for talking with me.
I ride for some 15-20 minutes, the heat now coming on strong with the sun near its highest point. The road curves one way and the next and I check my direction regularly by noting the shadows. I figure that as long as my shadow is to the right I’m heading west. I stop to drink from one of the three half-liter bottles of water I brought. I’ve just about drained the first.
Soon I stop at a small roadside market and say hello to the clerk behind a counter with the usual assortment of fruits and packaged chips and candy. I go through the same questions and get a blank stare. I try the hand gesture for moving water, which is more effective. “Oh, about 4 kilometers” he replies. I figure that I’d made better progress than this, but realistically, the boy earlier probably just made an educated guess. “Do I continue on this road?” I asked. “Yes, but turn right after 2 roads” he adds. I want to be sure I understand him correctly. “Not the next road, but the one after?” I ask. “Yes, down where you see that car there” the man replies.
Another man is standing nearby and overhears our conversation. “Here, let me show you” he says. Before I can tell him it isn’t necessary, he starts off and signals for me to follow. Several times before I’d find myself instinctively riding on the right-hand side of the road. My new escort waves me to fall in line behind him on the left, which I do. At the second road on the left he waves me off and I thank him for his help.
This road continues like the others, winding one way and the next, mostly through palms and other large shade trees. I’m grateful for shade as the sun is beating down mercilessly and my clothes are becoming drenched. After what seems like another 20 minutes I stop and asked a roadside vendor who tells me it’s about 2-1/2 kilometers. Either my understanding of a kilometer is off, or people are underestimating the distance. Later I consider that maybe I was going in a circuitous route that was indirect. I make several more turns and begin to become a little concerned that I might not be able to retrace my route back. I’d have to cross that bridge when I got to it.
More boys on bikes who, once again, aren’t sure where I’m going at first. I ask about the distance to the sea, which was a difficult concept. “1 or 2 kilometers?” I ask. Yes, they agree that it was surely 1 to 2 kilometers.This exchange continues for some time, and I started wondering if I’m ever going to reach the coast. Another three boys on bikes and the usual questions. 1/2 kilometer one says. They’re very pleased to have a visitor in their village and lead the way, pointing out highlights of the area. They leave the road at a small dirt drive that leads to a large church or temple. “Come see – very famous temple – very famous. I feel that I should at least give it a look so I walked around the exterior and make a mental note that I should spend a little more time looking at the inside on my way back – if it was allowed to outsiders. At the front of the church is a display of about 100 colorful umbrellas stuck in the sand, which is quite beautiful – a striking sight that I hadn’t seen before and I wanted to learn more, but I’m on a singular mission at this point. Regrettably I didn’t get back around to the temple. These areas of sand I take as a good sign that I’m was close to a beach. The .5 kilometers that I was told several times as the distance to the beach I eventually cover at least 4 more times.
Besides wondering if I’ll ever see that water, or just have to finally give up and turn around, I start wondering what sort of beach it actually might be. I hadn’t done any research on the coastline in this region, and realize that it might not be a nice sandy beach at all. It could just as easily be a beach of all rock, or a rocky cliff and steep drop-off unsuitable for a bike. It might be compromised of mangroves, swampy conditions, trash piles and toxic pollution flowing from nearby villages. Hopefully I’ll at least get a chance to find out.Soon the road comes to a complete dead-end, connecting to a road that runs perpendicular, or north-south generally. I could see down this road for quite a distance in both directions and didn’t see a clear reason to go one way or the other. This is probably the most perplexing decision of the ride – left, right or back the way I came. I’m also becoming acutely aware of the time and that soon the others will be wondering where I am.
I then notice two boys, probably in their early teens, waiting by the side of the road in a small bus shelter. “Hello guys” I say. “Do you know how I can get to the sea?” Without hesitation one of the boys gestures to a small path across the street, just yards from where I’m standing, that continues in the same direction I’m going. The path is hardly noticeable – just a dirt passageway between the palms.
I wonder if I might be crossing private land by taking the path, but the boy gives me an assuring nod. The path is flat, mostly sand mixed with dirt and passes behind or beside a couple of simple houses or farm structures. About 100 yards further I notice a low rock wall ahead and see that the palms appear to end abruptly all along the wall. I hear the unmistakable sound of surf and know that my quest will soon be over. Someone had propped a sturdy board from the ground to the top of the low wall, which I realize will be useful if I decided to take the bike to the other side. Halfway up the ramp it all comes into view: Clear blue sky and bright sunlight, illuminating an infinite sea of blue-green. The 3 or 4-foot high rock wall drops down to a pristine sandy beach. I’m in awe. The flood of emotion might have carried me out to sea.
I could have fallen to my knees and kissed the sand but it seemed too peaceful a setting for such melodramatics. Water gently swells and breaks on the sand – not the pounding surf of larger ocean beaches. I look around and see only a few people working around the area I had passed through. Up and down the beach there are a few distant boats but otherwise it appears quite deserted. I decide to quickly change into my bathing suit before I attract any more attention. There’s no time to waste. I don’t have a towel but it hardly matters since the air is so warm and the sun shines brightly. I stuff my shoes and shorts in the backpack and roll the bike up and over the wall where I can keep an eye on it. “Hello, where are you going?” says a voice. I turn to see four young boys looking up at me with great interest. “Hi. How are you?” I ask. “Fine” they reply. “What is your name?” “Where are you from?” “Where are you going?” they ask. I don’t want to seem rude and brush them off but I’m not interested in conversation at the moment so I change the topic. “Do you like to swim?” “Can you swim in the ocean – the sea?” They look puzzled, speak among themselves and laugh. “I’m going to go for a swim in the water, OK?”
I walk across the warm sand, the boys trailing after me. The water is almost like a tepid bath – no cold stinging shock – the perfect temperature. The sand is soft – no rocks or seashells along the shallow sea bottom. It’s exquisitely relaxing and peaceful, given especially that I’ve worked up quite a sweat to get here. I hear the boys yelling from the shore as I bob lazily in the water, letting the swells carry me in and out gently, waves cresting overhead. I keep an eye on my gear, though I can’t imagine any of these friendly youngsters getting mischievous and make off with my pack or bike. I decide to grab my camera and snap a few pictures. My new friends naturally get in on the act.I still can’t determine if swimming in the ocean is something they enjoy. “Do you like to go fishing in a boat?” That doesn’t go anywhere either. I get the impression that they regard the ocean as just something that’s there – no particular reason to swim around in it. I tell them that I’m going to swim a little more, before leaving soon. “Are you going to walk out to the middle of the sea?” a young boy asks. “Just a little ways.” I say. I splash around a bit, feeling a little uncomfortable about being watched. I splash some water back to the boys. They all laugh.
I could spend hours on the beach but I realize I need to be practical about getting back at a decent hour. An older boy comes up to me – I’d guess around a 12th grade student. His manner is extremely polite and curious. He asks a few questions and seems greatly interested in knowing about where I’m from and what America is like. “Do you have an ocean where you live?” “What is it like?” “How does it look?” “What do you do there?” “Where is your wife?” We talk for a short while. He wants to know everything. I tell him how much I like the area where he lives – beach and all – and how much I enjoyed talking to him. He wishes me well and I sling my pack over my shoulder and start to leave.
I carry the bike over some stones and roll it down the ramp. Some older family members of one of the farms have gathered at the wall to see what’s going on. An elderly man is saying something to me but I can’t make it out. He appears perplexed, as if he’s never seen a strange Anglo-American emerge from the sea before. I smile and say goodbye and namesté. A couple of other goodbyes and I’m heading back, with a little regret.
I ride for a while and see some boys that I might have met before. They ride with me for a while but we don’t say much. I’m trying to estimate how long it will take to get back, if I should try to call for a ride, or if I could somehow get a taxi or auto-rickshaw to give me a lift. The boy riding next to me is singing a Christmas song in English, which seems funny to me. I join him and we sing a couple of verses of Jingle Bells. As before, the boys pull off the road eventually, and yell goodbye and good luck.
It’s really hot now and I decide that I don’t want to ride all the way back. Besides not having any sunscreen to apply after my swim, I considered heat stroke a real possibility. Surely there will soon be an auto-rickshaw that I can hire. Some men are gathered around a truck with a fishing haul, including a couple of taxis. I tell the driver of one of the taxis that I’m looking for a ride. No response. The others are interested in showing me their catch, which appear to be tiny shrimp. After getting nowhere I say goodbye and head on.
A few taxis pass me and I realize that I might have a tough time getting a bicycle onboard one of the tiny vehicles. Several of the taxis pass by with passengers. Soon I see a couple of the 3-wheelers parked along the side of the road. I pull over and explain that I need a taxi for the bike and myself. This was met with some suspicion. I realize that I don’t know exactly where I’m going. “I need to get across the lake” This is met with a puzzled look. “Lake?” the man squints his trying to understand what I’m trying to tell him. We both wait a few seconds for some clarity that never comes. Once again there might be a language barrier. I recall from our guide that the Hindi work “lakh”, a large monetary sum, is pronounced “lake”. I try pantomiming a bridge going over a lake. This gets no more than a slight nod, as if to say “OK, my friend. Whatever you say.” I look to the man’s colleague who gives me a raised eyebrow. I’m sure he’s convinced I don’t have all of my faculties. I look around hoping to see a young student that might be able to help bridge our language barrier. I decide to continue further along and see if I have better luck closer to town.
I soon pass a row of small businesses and decide to see if I can get some information. A shopkeeper is reading a newspaper behind a small counter. I greet the man and realize his business is a small pharmacy. Surely he’ll be able to help me. I need to find out the name of the village where we started. If I can glance at a map I’ll see the village and be able to convey to a taxi driver where I need to go. “Namesté. Sir, I wonder if you might have a map of the area I could look at for a second.” Thankfully he understands me, and starts going through some drawers in search of a map. After several drawers and piles of papers I try to tell him that it’s OK if he doesn’t have a map, I was just wondering… “Please wait here,” says the man, who goes into a back room. After a minute he returns with another, younger man. I tell this man that it’s no problem if he has no map. The younger man replies, “Please wait, sir.” The two men go through a couple more boxes of papers and eventually I convince them to not pursue the matter any further. “Thank you so much” I say and carry on. I’ll ask a couple of taxi drivers about a map. Surely they carry road maps I figure.
Soon I’m back near the last center of commerce and a fair amount of traffic. I spot a small cluster of taxis in a dirt lot and decide to see who volunteers to transport me to the other side of “the lake”. I explain my predicament to one of the drivers and get the same look of bewilderment. Surely they’ve been to the lake and across the bridge just a few miles from here. I repeat “lake” and “bridge”, and search for some other clue as to where I’m trying to go. At this point I realize how ill prepared I really am, then remember the large church in the village. “St. Mary’s church?” I ask with hope. No clue. This is starting to feel like an episode of The Twilight Zone. At this point a group of 6 to 8 men have clustered around, either hoping to help solve the mystery, or just curious. I pick up a stick and draw a crude map with a kidney-shaped lake and a line crossing over. The men wait for more to the picture. I remember that the island, constructed many years ago, is entirely man-made and is thus an unnatural shape. I draw a trapezoid in the lake, resembling as closely as I can recall, the shape of the island that the farm we’re staying at is on. Still no sign of recognition. I’m becoming exasperated. I don’t what more I can say. I almost expect to be afforded the gracious “This is no problem sir” service and attitude that I’ve been spoiled with during our entire trip, but in this situation, it seems as though there is a problem.
Finally, I ask one of the drivers straight-on if he’ll transport me and the bike and I’ll tell him where to go. Surprisingly, this requires no further debate and the man presents his vehicle and an open palm, inviting me onboard. As expected, the bike doesn’t quite fit inside the tiny taxi, and my squeezing in behind the bike is something I wish I’d gotten a photo of. Immediately the cart is rolling down the road as I instruct the driver which directions to take. After a few minutes I get the feeling that he knows where we’re going, since we discussed the lake and bridge. We arrive at the detour and he exchanges words with the flagman. The detour he’s forced to take is brutal. The cart bounces along a dirt road with deep rivets and potholes. The bouncing slams me into the bike and against the steel frame of the vehicle. Several times I hit my head on the roof, fully expecting a minor contusion as a result. The detour somehow channels us into the middle of the roadwork, forcing the driver to turn back and retrace much of the route, in order to proceed further and bypass the road under construction. I’m amazed at how long the ride is, and wonder how bad it would be to be riding on the bike, considering the extreme discomfort of the auto-rickshaw ride.
I see familiar intersections and buildings and my spirits are comforted that I’m heading in the right direction at a good pace. Soon we approach the bridge and the driver turns to give me a chuckle as he points forward across the bridge. I’m amazed that he knows exactly where to go with little input from me. On the other side of the bridge I signal where he needs to turn but it seems unnecessary. St. Mary’s church appears after several turns and he slows the vehicle and pulls off in the church courtyard. I start telling him to keep going, as St. Mary’s was a point of reference, but I decide he’s taken me far enough and I can ride the remaining ¼ mile or so. I’m relieved to have the roller coaster ride at an end so I clamber out and carefully remove the bike, not wanting any additional scrapes to the interior of his vehicle. The driver looks at me with satisfaction, having delivered his fare exactly where I wanted to go, in spite of impossible communication obstacles. I mean to tell the man what a fine job he’s done getting me here.
I’m hoping I have enough rupees to pay him as he makes calculations on a small notepad. He jots down the total fair, which he underlines with his pen: 180 rupees (less than $4US). I’m in such disbelief and relief that I give him 3 100-rupee notes. I later wished that I’d added another 100 in consideration of the bike. I thank him a couple of times and head off for the short ride to the dock – total fare with tip about $6. I arrive at the dock and wait for the boatman to notice me, which he does after a few minutes. I return to our lodging at 4:00, 6 hrs. from the time we left this morning and take a much needed few minutes to relax, before our next adventure…
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Monday, February 9, 2009
Final post (from Anne at least)
January 29
Travel day. Last night we have all said our goodbyes to Suru, who heads home to Udaipur. We will miss him and he says he will miss us. He has been an incredibly knowledgeable guide to both the monuments and culture of Northern India. Not only has he shared the dates and particulars of various monuments but he has answered thousands of our questions about everyday life from how marriages are arranged to whether it is difficult to use the traditional toilet in a sari. (He deferred to Rama on that one). He has been patient with our changes in plan on whim and smoothed our way through airports, especially the ramped up security checks. We are not sure that we will make it safely to our next destination without his expert assistance!
We head to Kochi (also known as Cochin) in the south via Chennai (formerly known as Madras) and we do manage the change in flights smoothly on our own. Suru has trained us well. We even know how to negotiate the menu at the airport restaurant, ordering foods that our Western tummies can handle.
We arrive in Kochi late in the afternoon where Shagzil, our guide for the south, awaits us. Even driving to the hotel via the highway and streets of Kochi, we can sense that the tempo of India here is more relaxed. The traffic is less dense, the driving more relaxed and the beeping of horns less frenetic. The air is clear, the temperatures tropical and the roads are lined with coconut tress and palms. Houses are the brightly painted stucco. Everything is cleaner. Shagzil tells us that Kerala, the state in which Kochi is situated, is the most educated in India with almost 100% literacy. Religious diversity abounds here. He is an example of both – a young man with a masters degree and a Muslim. In addition to Hinduism and Islam, we will see prominent evidence of a thriving Christian community and even vestiges of an ancient Jewish settlement. Everywhere we see evidence of a fervent Catholicism -- many churches, businesses names after saints (e.g., "Little Flower Tire Company.") It is said that Thomas, the apostle, traveled here in the first century AD to make the first Christian converts. Although no documentary evidence survives to corroborate this claim, evidence of an influx of Syrian Catholics in 400 AD remains and the Portuguese converted many people when they arrived in Goa.
We head to the old city or Fort Cochin, where we will stay at the Old Harbour Hotel, a former British boating club. Just outside our door and across a small park, lies the Arabian Sea. The sea extends inland to form an extensive inland waterway, the famous backwaters of Kerala. We venture out for a short walk before dinner and quickly come upon the Chinese fishing nets that line the shore just by our hotel. Chinese traders introduced the technology and technique for this type of fishing but it is all Indian now. Each apparatus consists of a huge super structure of interlocking logs that look like a lever system with a vast net suspended from the end of long log arms reaching out over the water. (Someone will need to post a photo!) In the dark of the evening, we cannot tell if the nets rest on boats or piers. The fisherman have gone home for the day so a solution to the mystery of how these contraptions operate will need to wait for the morning.
Along the waterside walkway, vendors hawk freshly caught fish. Their wares include live crabs, squid, and prawns the size of a turkey drumstick. You can select your meal and have it cooked while you wait. John and Anne are game to try but Rama reminds us that we are about to have the same fresh seafood prepared more expertly by our hotel. She was right -- the same huge prawns, coated with a masala (mix of spices) and grilled show up as our appetizer. Fish curry follows. Delicious. Off to bed in rooms where the staff have strewn fragrant jasmine blossoms on our beds. This is the life!
January 30...
John gets up at the crack of dawn to catch the Chinese fishing nets in action only to discover in the light of day that they are shore based and not yet in action. He does have a chance however to see the early morning auction of fish, shrimp, etc caught during the night by fishermen who operate from boats. The boats are large handmade canoe-style vessels made of boards literally stitched together, caulked with coconut husk and sealed with a coating of coconut oil. Outboard motors mounted on the side power some vessels; others rely on manpower only. John and Anne see yet another style of fishing -- a man who has waded out to waist depth and hurls his net like a lariat over the sea, pulling in anything that gets snagged. The biblical injunction to "cast your net for men" now has a much more vivid meaning.
We meet Shagzil for an early morning walk around Fort Kochi and quickly discover why he has recommended an early start -- Kerala is hot! Our first stop is the Chinese fishing nets, now manned for action. We see that they are not in boats but shore based. Five men operate each net and it works like this. Four men stand on shore and release ropes slowly to lower the log arms to which the nets are attached into the coastal waters. One man walks precariously out on the center boom to add weight and make sure the nets are fully submerged. The men leave the nets in the water for a few moments, trying to gauge from the luck of their neighbors whether any fish have ventured by. The four men on shore begin hoisting the nets while the "boom man" waits with a small net in hand to scoop up anything caught in the huge nets as they rise from the water. As we watch, we see that often the catch consists of only some stray plastic bottles. John and Tim get a turn at the shore positions and report that raising the nets is hard, hard work. How can these nets account for the bounty of seafood we see in the vendors stalls? The open boats are the answer.
We hop our bus for a quick ride to the other side of the peninsula to Montecherry or Jew town. The term "Jew Town" is not derogatory here. The maharajah who ruled this area highly valued the Jewish traders who came to Kerala and granted them rights to this land "as long as the sun and the moon shall shine." He also granted them the right to worship in freedom and the use the perks of the upper class, such as having servants, carrying umbrellas to provide shade from the sun, etc. Today only 11 Jews still live here; the balance emigrated to Israel when it was first founded in the 1940s. We meet Sarah, an old woman, who is supervising the hand embroidery of skullcaps. Shops line the street we walk down to reach the synagogue, which is sadly closed for cleaning in preparation for Saturday's service. Shagzil tells us how special this temple is and we can tell from his description that this place of worship means much to him as a symbol of his country's tolerance of many and varied religions. He explains how the emigrants to Israel took several of the original torah scrolls from here with them when they left. These scrolls were recently stolen from their new home, while the scrolls that remain here in Kochi with only 11 Jewish protectors are safe. We vow to make a detour on our way out of town to see the synagogue when it is open.
By this time, about 1:30 in the afternoon, the Seattle crowd is literally melting. Our synthetic travel clothes are a disaster in this climate. We crave cotton (and air conditioning). It is back to the hotel to rummage through suitcases (or head for local shops -- Fabindia is here too) to find clothing that breathes -- breathes a lot!
Some hit the pool and Rama confers with the chef on the dinner menu. "Tuna salad," he suggests as an appetizer. "Where is it from?" she queries. "It is tinned; imported!" he exclaims. Rama makes it clear that as we sit surrounded by abundant fresh seafood, this will NOT do. "Only Keralan cooking," she insists. And dinner is another adventure. What would we do without Rama -- canned tuna, indeed!
Before dinner, it is off to see Kathakali, a temple dance native to this area. We arrive early to see one of the dancer and his assistant applying the ritual make-up. The dancer we watch will play the prince in a Hindu myth. As we come in, the assistant is drawing exaggerated eyes on his green painted face. Next, he applies glue to the dancer's chin line and attaches paper "collars." These are designed to make the dancer's face appear larger for the actual ceremony. Our dancer leaves to don his costume, which consists of a tall elaborate headdress and a decorated tunic and wide skirt (think bustles on each side like Marie Antoinette). Another dancer demonstrates for us the stylized moves of the dance, each of which conveys a specific meaning.
We return for a mini-performance -- at an actual temple it would last at least 3 hours if not all night. We watch the tale of the prince and his attempted seduction by a beautiful maiden who is actually a demon in disguise. As in the time of Shakespeare, men play both male and female roles. The dance ends with the discovery and slaying of the demon.
At dinner, we vow to alter plans slightly to linger in lovely Kochi a bit longer in the morning before heading to the backwater area for our next stay.
January 31
Back on the bus after a morning of exploring on our own. We drive for an hour or so to Phillip Kutty's Farm where we will stay for the next several days. Before we left the States, Joanne had found an article about the Farm in Gourmet magazine. The article focused on great places to take cooking lessons and this Farm was one of them. Anne has searched through her Rough Guide looking for a listing for the farm, just to get a sense of exactly where on the map we would be. Couldn't find it. No wonder -- the address on the business card does not refer to a town but just to the small-scale local market that is on the main road. We turn at the market and make our way through the village to a landing where we catch a ride on a flat boat with a boatman who will pole us across the channel to the farm. The farm is on a 750-acre island that was totally reclaimed from the freshwater lake that surrounds it. The lake, in turn, is part of the same lake that extended in front of our hotel to the Arabian Sea. Here the mountain waters that feed this vast inland waterway have not yet mixed with the sea.
The farm consists of a main building, the family home; an open air dining pavilion; and a necklace of cottages on either side, with all buildings facing the lagoon. The cottages are built in typical Keralan style and furnished with local antiques. Each has a gracious verandah, suitable for sitting and watching birds or just "vegging out."
Our hosts are Mummy, the matriarch, whose husband reclaimed the last of the land that makes up the island and Anu her daughter-in-law, the early widow of the artist/farmer who created this retreat. Her children, Phillip, and daughter, Ana, are informal hosts. The family is part of the Syrian Christian community that is prominent here in Kerala. The village also has a VERY active Hindu temple that is celebrating a 10-day festival. How do we know this? It is because they broadcast their chant over loud speakers.
Except for the heat, this is paradise. We will need to learn to adjust as the cottages rely on ceiling fans for cooling. No AC here where power is expensive and subject to scheduled outages that the farm compensates for with a generator. We all go native. Dorothy borrows salwar pants from our hostess and Anne breaks out the full salwar kameez she bought early on at Fabindia. She vowed she would never wear those funny pants but the heat will drive a woman to break many a vow. She wears it every day and launders it in the shower every night. Boring but cool.
On our arrival, we were met with glasses of refreshing coconut water and later in the day John and Anne get a tutorial from a farm worker on how it is harvested, or so we think. The man speaks no English but beckons to us to follow as he shimmies up a tree trunk and does something we can't see at the top. Down he comes and he offers us some milky liquid from the vessel tied to his waist. Tastes like coconut water but a little different. Hmmm....
Susan arranges to have an Ayuvedic massage at the local (I mean local) treatment center and dares others to try it but refuses to describe the experience except to say, "You should see the treatment room!" She looks VERY relaxed.
On our first evening, we settle in for some of Mummy's famous home cooking. Dinner is served in the pavilion where we are served along with four other guests at a round table with a huge lazy Susan in the middle. Course after course of fabulous food arrives. We begin to truly worry about the extra baggage charges we will need to pay for ourselves on the flight home. John and Anne find out that the coconut water they sampled earlier is actually sap drawn from the coconut flower that has fermented and is the native alcoholic drink!
February 1
John and Anne arise early to cross the lagoon for Catholic mass at St. Mary's, the local Syrian rite church (to the sound of Hindu chant and firecrackers). As with the Hindu temples we have visited, we must remove our shoes ("Avoid slippers" the sign outside warns) before we enter the church. Inside, we find that, as in Africa, men gather on one side, women on the other. Or you could say, bland color on one side and color, fabulous color, on the other. Anne feasts her eyes on gorgeous saris throughout the service. Both John and Anne are glad to have this distraction, since they can't understand a word of the service and are finding that the marble floors are hard on soft Western knees and butts (no pews!)
After the service, 16 muscular young men in colorful dhoti's (the male version of a sari, a piece of cloth wrapped around the waist to form a short skirt) stand in the courtyard with drums and beat out a wonderful rhythm. At the end of the song, the men peel off to join small processions, each led by a church elder carrying a decorated, fringed umbrella. Is this an every Sunday event? No, it is the feast of Saint Sebastian, we discover, and a procession group will travel to each Catholic home in the village to bless it (and set off a loud firecracker, which explains the booms that started early this morning). They visit our farm at breakfast, arriving by flat boat, umbrella, drummers, and all -- what fun!
We then get a quick tour of this organic farm where we see coconuts growing as well as vanilla, ginger, cinnamon, and all manner of spices. It is fascinating to see spices we buy in bottles at the supermarket hanging from vines and bushes.
At 11 am, we embark on a houseboat tour of the lake. We will get a taste of what it is like to vacation in this famous Keralan style as we lunch and cruise the lake. Our boat has two luxurious bedrooms, each with its on bath, and comes equipped with chef and crew. Lots of water bird spotting, waving to fishermen, and just slow cruising along the shores learning about this beautiful area. Back in time for another fabulous dinner! More chanting from across the lagoon.
February 2
A quiet morning (the chanting from the Hindu temple has become part of the atmosphere). In the lagoon, kingfishers, herons, and other waterfowl. As they sit by the lagoon spotting birds, John and Anne are reminded that we are truly celebrities in rural India when five young farm workers stop by to say hello. Only one speaks ANY English and the others are just content to stare at us during the long lapses in the conversation. Anne finally resorts to her stock of family photos and Seattle postcards to keep up her end of the conversation. Gopi, who speaks the local language, comes to the rescue.
Today, the men will cross the lagoon and explore the area on bicycle, led by Shagzil. The women stay behind for the cooking lesson. Mummy will prepare lunch and we will madly take notes and try to guess the amounts she is adding. She has helpfully laid out each spice and ingredient on plates and explains what each element of the dish is, how to prepare it, when to add it, and how long to cook it. Key ingredients are green chilies and curry leaves. They seem to be in every recipe. We gulp when we see the amount of salt Mummy adds but remind ourselves that each dish is prepared for 12. After scribbling furiously, we discover that many of the recipes we have observed being prepared appear in the issue of Gourmet Joanne has. Phew!
Lunch is served. John and Gopi return from the bicycle outing but where is Tim? He has decided to strike out on his own, we are told. "He will be fine. He has a cell phone," they assure us. "No, he doesn't" says Susan. We start lunch without him but Susan is looking over her shoulder to see if he has arrived on the next boat. The afternoon proceeds. Still no Tim. We all begin to be a bit concerned. The group decides to visit the temple that has haunted our morning and evenings. Tim still not here. Our bus driver assures us he will be fine. We go to the temple and make a quick tour. Only Gopi and Rama, as Hindus, are allowed into the inner sanctum. As is traditional, Gopi must remove his shirt to enter. John is secretly relieved not to be able to enter -- too much good food. Rama hits upon the idea of making a donation to the temple that will ensure that all the oil lamps will be lit and we make plans to return at dusk to see the sight. We hope Tim will be home to join us!
Finally before we head out to the temple, Tim appears. It seems he has quite a story but we make him wait until dinner so we can all hear it. (Susan gets an early preview, I'm sure.) Anne stops at the tailor to have an native outfit of cool cotton made up with some fabric from Rama. He will make it up overnight and wants 100 rupees ($2) for his work. He pulls out his tape and makes some quick measurements.
When we arrive at the temple, a group of eager young boys greet us. Aru, who is about 9, is the stand out. With their limited English, they lead us to the temple walls and give us oil-dipped torches to begin lighting the temple. Each of us seems to have our own boy attendant, who encourages, adjusts lamp wicks, and generally makes sure we get the job done. We light only the hundreds of lights on the front of the temple. Devotees start to stream in and begin lighting the sides and rear wall. In the end, thousands of oil lamps light the temple on all sides. Drummers and two cymbal percussionists appear to beat a rhythmic song. They dress just like the musicians at the Christian church on Sunday and the song is almost the same. All members of the "orchestra" are men except for one young boy on cymbals. The boy senses he is being videoed, turns, and flashes a big smile. It is Aru, the leader of the temple boys who helped us light the candles. We leave reluctantly as more and more worshipers continue arriving. Judging from the chanting we have heard, we know the ceremonies will continue until 10 PM or so and some of us have an early morning departure to prepare for.
Dorothy stops to visit the Ayuvedic practitioner to find our about her "dosa." This is a diagnosis of the primary physical type she is and will influence any Ayuvedic treatment she might receive in the future. She tells us the doctor has categorized her as prone to phlegm, which seems right on as she as her asthma has been acting up during the trip.
Back at the farm, we have dinner and hear Tim's adventure. Seems he had a "bee in his bonnet" about taking a swim in the Arabian Sea. He had missed his chance in Kochi, where the beaches admittedly were not very inviting. So... Tim decided to bicycle his way to the sea. He knew the general direction but did not have a map, nor in this rural area, any language advantages. Still he pressed on. Occasionally, he stopped to ask directions, making friends despite the language barrier. He got a tour of a local temple complete with a temple elephant and met tons of friendly kids. Folks continued to assure him that he was heading in the correct direction. "Three kilometers," he was told more than once when he asked for directions using hand gestures to signify waves. Persist he did and finally he found himself on a beautiful beach on the Arabian Sea and then in the water, his dream accomplished.
With his dip behind him, Tim faces the task of finding his way home. Now he is truly tired and he decides to take an auto rickshaw home but finds no one here has heard of Phillip Kutty's farm. As noted previously, there is no there there and Tim does not know the name of the identifying local market. Finally, by describing the dam he crossed and the Catholic church near the Farm he is able to communicate with the driver and arrive safely at the boat landing. What an adventure! We all raise a glass at dinner in honor of his dream fulfilled.
February 3
Some of our party depart (Rama, Gopi, Susan, Tim and Dorothy). Joanne, John and Anne linger for another day. Joanne takes up residence on her porch and makes fast friends with all the Brits who are our fellow guests. Anne and John head off Ayuvedic massage, taking up Susan and Gopi on their dares. We walk in the village for an hour first (and re-encouter Aru and friends at drumming school) and thus arrive at the Ayuvedic hospital hot and sweaty.
We see the doctor who takes a pulse and blood pressure and asks about any special conditions. We then are led to separate massage rooms. Susan is right -- this is a very BASIC experience. The rooms are in a large shed-like structure and are clean but spare. Anne has two women; John has one man (half his height, poor guy). I won't go into the details but the treatment involves so much oil, we worry about slipping off the table and a full body scrub down when we are done. The oil and the water are hot but surprisingly, since it is midday, we are cool and relaxed when all is done. Anne finds this $18 massage more relaxing than the $80 one back in Agra. You will need to ask John about his thoughts on the whole experience. Expect a blush -- men are not used to that whole “nude” massage thing.
Back to the farm for more wonderful food with deliciously relaxed Joanne.
February 4
Time to leave! We get an early start so that we can visit the synagogue in Kochi. The early departing group has texted back that it is a "must see." They are so right. Hand crafted Chinese tiles pave the floor of the main room of this small building. Above hang old, old Belgian crystal chandeliers. Some have been wired to accept electricity but others are still filled with oil. Hearing the story again of how the maharajah gifted this place to the Jews of Kochi takes on new significance now that we are here. Shagzil gets the staff to illuminate the chandeliers briefly for us so that we can enjoy the special light that they radiate. We are enchanted.
Outside, on Synagogue Street, we succumb to some of the wonderful handicraft shops that line each side. Anne gets a handmade tablecloth and both women and even John buy beautiful handmade shirts. We can't get over how inexpensive it is to buy intricately crafted garments and fabrics here in India. It is so seductive that all of us will come home with more than we ever dreamed of purchasing. (Anne and John even purchased a gorgeous silk rug back in Delhi.)
Off to Bangalore to join the others at the Leela Palace. Our travel agent upgraded us to this wonderful hotel, we think as a reward for overcoming our jitters after the Mumbai attack in December. When we see the hotel, we can't help but wonder if they will let riff raff like us in! We meet up with everyone including Susan and Tim who should have been on their way home but were delayed a day due to the snow storm that incapacitated London. They will now be leaving early the next morning.
February 5
Bangalore does not have many monuments or sites to see but the city is a site in itself, so different than any place we have visited thus far. This is the most Western of cities on our tour. It looks more like New York than Delhi. Of course, the city is dirtier and some sections more dilapidated than NYC but all in all we feel quite at home. We visit the famous Bull temple in the AM and split off, some to shop and others (John and Anne) to sightsee a little longer and then shop.
The sightseeing includes a chance to see how Bangalurians (and in fact other Hindu Indians) embrace their new vehicles. Proud owners of new cars, scooters, trucks and other things moving bring them to the temple for "puja" or a blessing. The owner decorates his or her new purchase with flowers (and sometimes a beautiful bow) and pays a fee to the temple priest for a blessing. The priest scatters red powder over the car or scooter, blesses it with an oil lamp and then the owner places a lemon under each wheel and drives over them. We explain to Shagzil the association of a lemon with a new car would not be considered a good sign back home.
Anne goes to see a business associate that she "met virtually" on a consulting project 2 years ago and verifies that there really is a Mitesh P. John hangs out at the Leela, not a bad rap. Others continue to explore the modern bazaar of Bangalore. We skip a formal dinner (at last) and go to see Slumdog Millionaire instead. A great movie! We make the tough decision to meet in the lobby at 5 AM the next morning so that we can visit the famous city flower market before flying off to visit Hampi.
February 6
Five bleary-eyed travelers gather in the lobby at 5 AM. (Gopi has left us to conduct business.) We pile on to the bus and head off to see the flowers as they are auctioned off from the wholesale market. The main streets of Bangalore are empty at this time of day but the streets around the flower market are already bustling. Our driver has told us that by 6:30 most of the action will be over. In the dim streetlights, we see heaps and heaps of flowers, usually with a woman sitting in the midst stringing flowers into lei like arrangements. Folks here love to be photographed and smile whether in the picture or not. One woman gifts Anne with a string of jasmine and a hairpin to fix it in her hair. Just another example of the warmth of the people here. The photographs of this area should be incredible -- ask to see them. Back on the bus, Rama gifts all with a jasmine bracelet and fragrance fills the air. At the airport, we gather compliments from the security screeners and from fellow passengers. We leave a trail of jasmine petals wherever we go.
A short flight (with celebrities -- the revered ex-president of India and the head of a famous corporation) and head out on a bus again to Hampi. This new bus is not just new to us but brand-new. It sports its own flower garland -- it was just blessed yesterday. We have a wonderful ride, stopping to photograph women sorting through huge piles of red chili peppers and pluck a piece of cotton from the fields. Our new bus sadly has a bad fan belt that whines loudly and fairly regularly. We wonder if someone missed a lemon yesterday or if the bus is a real lemon. As we get closer to Hampi, we are surrounded by the verdant green of rice paddies that are terraced amid mountains of brown boulders; some balanced precariously one on top of another.
We arrive at Boulders, a rustic hotel, across the river from Hampi itself. It is too late to cross the river to visit the ruined city of Hampi so we head out to a women's village cooperative recommended by a friend of Rama's. It is 5 when we arrive and the workshop is closing for the day but we get a quick tour. Most of the products, hand woven baskets, purses, etc are made from dried coconut leaves that have been tinted different colors with vegetable dyes. Off to the shop, which is not closed, to buy some of the crafts. Here we can even feel righteous about our spending since all income goes to the cooperative that supports over 100 women and their families.
February 7
Only one day to see the ruined Hindu city of Hampi. We cross over the river in a ferry, accompanied by high-pressure 10-year-old salesman who sells us all postcards during the 5-minute ride. Who can resist this entertaining huckster! We climb through the simple market. It is all that is left of a fabulous city that was built in the 16th century and then pretty thoroughly trashed by Muslim invaders. Not much is left but you can still get enough of an impression to imagine the rich silks, spices, and gold that foreign visitors of the time say filled this city. We visit the active temple in the village and are blessed by Lakshmi, the temple elephant, who accepts our donation with her trunk, hands it to her mahout, and then lays her trunk atop our heads for the blessing. Then we climb to see the actual ruins, which remind of us Palatine Hill or the Forum in Rome.
We have lunch at Mango Tree restaurant, another recommendation of Rama's friend. It is an unusual lunch and I'm not talking about the food, which is traditional south Indian. The restaurant itself is the attraction. It consists of a series of slate terraces overlooking the river. The staff spread out reed mats for us to sit on and pull up small benches that will serve as tables. It's delightful here under the shade of the mango trees and we enjoy ogling all the hippy backpackers from Goa who are our fellow diners.
More hot touring in the afternoon but it is worth it to see the Queen's quarters and bath and the stable for the King's prized elephants. As we tour, we seem to be on the same schedule and route as a class of fifth graders who delight in shaking our hands and practicing their "hellos" and "how are yous" on us. At our third chance encounter, we all burst into giggles. One final stop to ride in a coracle, a saucer-shaped boat woven from reeds that looks like a big sawed off basketball. With the five of us carefully aboard, there is barely room for the oarsman. We have a short paddle down the river and a demo of how the boar spins in the water. I can't help but sing... "rub-dub-dub, three men in a tub... ).
Next we are off to Hospet, the nearest real town, to catch the overnight train to Bangalore. This will be our only train travel experience and we are not sure what to expect. It turns out we have six bunks in a shared space. Four stretch out from the wall lengthwise, then an aisle and two more horizontally squeezed against the other side. We down some sandwiches made quickly at local restaurant == filling but a definite come down from our feasts thus far. Shagzil helps set up the beds, then he and John take the longer top bunks and Dorothy climbs up to the upper across the aisle. Suddenly, the sound of something falling and we realize the window curtain and rod have spontaneously fallen on Rama. Much hysterical laughter ensues. The Leela Palace it ain't.
February 8
Thanks to Ambien, we arrive in Bangalore somewhat rested but it is a relief to be back at the Leela. We are mostly on our own today. John and Anne hang out by the gorgeous pool while Anne blogs and then they visit the Botanical Gardens to see Bangalore out in its “central park” on a Sunday afternoon. The highlights of their day a chance encounter of Thomas Friedman in the lobby, the sight of a nut brown man walking nonchalantly in total nudity down the streets of this sophisticated city, and a chance to commune with almost tame monkeys at the park. Others finish off their shopping checklists. Rama is off to join Gopi at festivities associated with a family wedding they will stay in town to attend. The rest of us crash early so that we can be in the lobby at 5 AM yet again to catch our flights home.
February 9
Farewell to Shagzil, another fabulous guide whose enthusiasm about the culture and history of his country is infectious. He sees us safely to the airport before he begins his 12 hour train journey back to Cochin.
Heading home at last. Others will get copies of this blog and add their own thoughts and experiences, so I'll just finish with my own.
India overwhelms but not necessarily in the ways I had predicted. It is culture shock, especially since there are so many people everywhere and so many religions and styles of life. Although I whined in advance that we were trying to see too much, I now appreciate that we have touched so many parts of this diverse country. I would describe our trip as comparable to traveling through 8 or 10 different countries in Europe over the course of 5 weeks. Each area has its own language and its own culture. Ox cart tilled fields coexist with tech centers; dirty, packed street markets with marble covered high-end malls. The contrasts can be mind-boggling. The long bus drives I was dreading turned out to be incredible cultural voyeurism instead.
The one thread that runs through it all for me is the warm hospitality of the Indian people. I had expected to be bothered constantly by beggars and indeed there have been some (and a lot of very persistent souvenir hawkers) but I had not expected to be greeted so enthusiastically by toddlers, children, adults and elders alike. In India, it is not considered impolite to stare at someone and we got lots of prolonged fixed stares. At first this made me most uncomfortable but as the weeks wore on I learned to flash a big smile at my gawker. Nine times out of ten my smile was returned with an even larger one usually accompanied by a friendly wave or even a "Hello! How are you?"
I am dubbing our whirlwind tour "Tastes of India" and am most thankful to Rama and Gopi and the wonderful Enchanting India, our travel agent, for leading us on this adventure. To Rama and Gopi special thanks for their patience with all our questions and their special guidance on the marvelous cuisine of India, a highlight of our trip. We have paid for a "puja" or blessing at several of the temples we visited during the trip and I truly do feel blessed at the end of this fabulous trip. Dhanyavaad, Gopi! Dhanyavaad, Rama! Namaste...
Travel day. Last night we have all said our goodbyes to Suru, who heads home to Udaipur. We will miss him and he says he will miss us. He has been an incredibly knowledgeable guide to both the monuments and culture of Northern India. Not only has he shared the dates and particulars of various monuments but he has answered thousands of our questions about everyday life from how marriages are arranged to whether it is difficult to use the traditional toilet in a sari. (He deferred to Rama on that one). He has been patient with our changes in plan on whim and smoothed our way through airports, especially the ramped up security checks. We are not sure that we will make it safely to our next destination without his expert assistance!
We head to Kochi (also known as Cochin) in the south via Chennai (formerly known as Madras) and we do manage the change in flights smoothly on our own. Suru has trained us well. We even know how to negotiate the menu at the airport restaurant, ordering foods that our Western tummies can handle.
We arrive in Kochi late in the afternoon where Shagzil, our guide for the south, awaits us. Even driving to the hotel via the highway and streets of Kochi, we can sense that the tempo of India here is more relaxed. The traffic is less dense, the driving more relaxed and the beeping of horns less frenetic. The air is clear, the temperatures tropical and the roads are lined with coconut tress and palms. Houses are the brightly painted stucco. Everything is cleaner. Shagzil tells us that Kerala, the state in which Kochi is situated, is the most educated in India with almost 100% literacy. Religious diversity abounds here. He is an example of both – a young man with a masters degree and a Muslim. In addition to Hinduism and Islam, we will see prominent evidence of a thriving Christian community and even vestiges of an ancient Jewish settlement. Everywhere we see evidence of a fervent Catholicism -- many churches, businesses names after saints (e.g., "Little Flower Tire Company.") It is said that Thomas, the apostle, traveled here in the first century AD to make the first Christian converts. Although no documentary evidence survives to corroborate this claim, evidence of an influx of Syrian Catholics in 400 AD remains and the Portuguese converted many people when they arrived in Goa.
We head to the old city or Fort Cochin, where we will stay at the Old Harbour Hotel, a former British boating club. Just outside our door and across a small park, lies the Arabian Sea. The sea extends inland to form an extensive inland waterway, the famous backwaters of Kerala. We venture out for a short walk before dinner and quickly come upon the Chinese fishing nets that line the shore just by our hotel. Chinese traders introduced the technology and technique for this type of fishing but it is all Indian now. Each apparatus consists of a huge super structure of interlocking logs that look like a lever system with a vast net suspended from the end of long log arms reaching out over the water. (Someone will need to post a photo!) In the dark of the evening, we cannot tell if the nets rest on boats or piers. The fisherman have gone home for the day so a solution to the mystery of how these contraptions operate will need to wait for the morning.
Along the waterside walkway, vendors hawk freshly caught fish. Their wares include live crabs, squid, and prawns the size of a turkey drumstick. You can select your meal and have it cooked while you wait. John and Anne are game to try but Rama reminds us that we are about to have the same fresh seafood prepared more expertly by our hotel. She was right -- the same huge prawns, coated with a masala (mix of spices) and grilled show up as our appetizer. Fish curry follows. Delicious. Off to bed in rooms where the staff have strewn fragrant jasmine blossoms on our beds. This is the life!
January 30...
John gets up at the crack of dawn to catch the Chinese fishing nets in action only to discover in the light of day that they are shore based and not yet in action. He does have a chance however to see the early morning auction of fish, shrimp, etc caught during the night by fishermen who operate from boats. The boats are large handmade canoe-style vessels made of boards literally stitched together, caulked with coconut husk and sealed with a coating of coconut oil. Outboard motors mounted on the side power some vessels; others rely on manpower only. John and Anne see yet another style of fishing -- a man who has waded out to waist depth and hurls his net like a lariat over the sea, pulling in anything that gets snagged. The biblical injunction to "cast your net for men" now has a much more vivid meaning.
We meet Shagzil for an early morning walk around Fort Kochi and quickly discover why he has recommended an early start -- Kerala is hot! Our first stop is the Chinese fishing nets, now manned for action. We see that they are not in boats but shore based. Five men operate each net and it works like this. Four men stand on shore and release ropes slowly to lower the log arms to which the nets are attached into the coastal waters. One man walks precariously out on the center boom to add weight and make sure the nets are fully submerged. The men leave the nets in the water for a few moments, trying to gauge from the luck of their neighbors whether any fish have ventured by. The four men on shore begin hoisting the nets while the "boom man" waits with a small net in hand to scoop up anything caught in the huge nets as they rise from the water. As we watch, we see that often the catch consists of only some stray plastic bottles. John and Tim get a turn at the shore positions and report that raising the nets is hard, hard work. How can these nets account for the bounty of seafood we see in the vendors stalls? The open boats are the answer.
We hop our bus for a quick ride to the other side of the peninsula to Montecherry or Jew town. The term "Jew Town" is not derogatory here. The maharajah who ruled this area highly valued the Jewish traders who came to Kerala and granted them rights to this land "as long as the sun and the moon shall shine." He also granted them the right to worship in freedom and the use the perks of the upper class, such as having servants, carrying umbrellas to provide shade from the sun, etc. Today only 11 Jews still live here; the balance emigrated to Israel when it was first founded in the 1940s. We meet Sarah, an old woman, who is supervising the hand embroidery of skullcaps. Shops line the street we walk down to reach the synagogue, which is sadly closed for cleaning in preparation for Saturday's service. Shagzil tells us how special this temple is and we can tell from his description that this place of worship means much to him as a symbol of his country's tolerance of many and varied religions. He explains how the emigrants to Israel took several of the original torah scrolls from here with them when they left. These scrolls were recently stolen from their new home, while the scrolls that remain here in Kochi with only 11 Jewish protectors are safe. We vow to make a detour on our way out of town to see the synagogue when it is open.
By this time, about 1:30 in the afternoon, the Seattle crowd is literally melting. Our synthetic travel clothes are a disaster in this climate. We crave cotton (and air conditioning). It is back to the hotel to rummage through suitcases (or head for local shops -- Fabindia is here too) to find clothing that breathes -- breathes a lot!
Some hit the pool and Rama confers with the chef on the dinner menu. "Tuna salad," he suggests as an appetizer. "Where is it from?" she queries. "It is tinned; imported!" he exclaims. Rama makes it clear that as we sit surrounded by abundant fresh seafood, this will NOT do. "Only Keralan cooking," she insists. And dinner is another adventure. What would we do without Rama -- canned tuna, indeed!
Before dinner, it is off to see Kathakali, a temple dance native to this area. We arrive early to see one of the dancer and his assistant applying the ritual make-up. The dancer we watch will play the prince in a Hindu myth. As we come in, the assistant is drawing exaggerated eyes on his green painted face. Next, he applies glue to the dancer's chin line and attaches paper "collars." These are designed to make the dancer's face appear larger for the actual ceremony. Our dancer leaves to don his costume, which consists of a tall elaborate headdress and a decorated tunic and wide skirt (think bustles on each side like Marie Antoinette). Another dancer demonstrates for us the stylized moves of the dance, each of which conveys a specific meaning.
We return for a mini-performance -- at an actual temple it would last at least 3 hours if not all night. We watch the tale of the prince and his attempted seduction by a beautiful maiden who is actually a demon in disguise. As in the time of Shakespeare, men play both male and female roles. The dance ends with the discovery and slaying of the demon.
At dinner, we vow to alter plans slightly to linger in lovely Kochi a bit longer in the morning before heading to the backwater area for our next stay.
January 31
Back on the bus after a morning of exploring on our own. We drive for an hour or so to Phillip Kutty's Farm where we will stay for the next several days. Before we left the States, Joanne had found an article about the Farm in Gourmet magazine. The article focused on great places to take cooking lessons and this Farm was one of them. Anne has searched through her Rough Guide looking for a listing for the farm, just to get a sense of exactly where on the map we would be. Couldn't find it. No wonder -- the address on the business card does not refer to a town but just to the small-scale local market that is on the main road. We turn at the market and make our way through the village to a landing where we catch a ride on a flat boat with a boatman who will pole us across the channel to the farm. The farm is on a 750-acre island that was totally reclaimed from the freshwater lake that surrounds it. The lake, in turn, is part of the same lake that extended in front of our hotel to the Arabian Sea. Here the mountain waters that feed this vast inland waterway have not yet mixed with the sea.
The farm consists of a main building, the family home; an open air dining pavilion; and a necklace of cottages on either side, with all buildings facing the lagoon. The cottages are built in typical Keralan style and furnished with local antiques. Each has a gracious verandah, suitable for sitting and watching birds or just "vegging out."
Our hosts are Mummy, the matriarch, whose husband reclaimed the last of the land that makes up the island and Anu her daughter-in-law, the early widow of the artist/farmer who created this retreat. Her children, Phillip, and daughter, Ana, are informal hosts. The family is part of the Syrian Christian community that is prominent here in Kerala. The village also has a VERY active Hindu temple that is celebrating a 10-day festival. How do we know this? It is because they broadcast their chant over loud speakers.
Except for the heat, this is paradise. We will need to learn to adjust as the cottages rely on ceiling fans for cooling. No AC here where power is expensive and subject to scheduled outages that the farm compensates for with a generator. We all go native. Dorothy borrows salwar pants from our hostess and Anne breaks out the full salwar kameez she bought early on at Fabindia. She vowed she would never wear those funny pants but the heat will drive a woman to break many a vow. She wears it every day and launders it in the shower every night. Boring but cool.
On our arrival, we were met with glasses of refreshing coconut water and later in the day John and Anne get a tutorial from a farm worker on how it is harvested, or so we think. The man speaks no English but beckons to us to follow as he shimmies up a tree trunk and does something we can't see at the top. Down he comes and he offers us some milky liquid from the vessel tied to his waist. Tastes like coconut water but a little different. Hmmm....
Susan arranges to have an Ayuvedic massage at the local (I mean local) treatment center and dares others to try it but refuses to describe the experience except to say, "You should see the treatment room!" She looks VERY relaxed.
On our first evening, we settle in for some of Mummy's famous home cooking. Dinner is served in the pavilion where we are served along with four other guests at a round table with a huge lazy Susan in the middle. Course after course of fabulous food arrives. We begin to truly worry about the extra baggage charges we will need to pay for ourselves on the flight home. John and Anne find out that the coconut water they sampled earlier is actually sap drawn from the coconut flower that has fermented and is the native alcoholic drink!
February 1
John and Anne arise early to cross the lagoon for Catholic mass at St. Mary's, the local Syrian rite church (to the sound of Hindu chant and firecrackers). As with the Hindu temples we have visited, we must remove our shoes ("Avoid slippers" the sign outside warns) before we enter the church. Inside, we find that, as in Africa, men gather on one side, women on the other. Or you could say, bland color on one side and color, fabulous color, on the other. Anne feasts her eyes on gorgeous saris throughout the service. Both John and Anne are glad to have this distraction, since they can't understand a word of the service and are finding that the marble floors are hard on soft Western knees and butts (no pews!)
After the service, 16 muscular young men in colorful dhoti's (the male version of a sari, a piece of cloth wrapped around the waist to form a short skirt) stand in the courtyard with drums and beat out a wonderful rhythm. At the end of the song, the men peel off to join small processions, each led by a church elder carrying a decorated, fringed umbrella. Is this an every Sunday event? No, it is the feast of Saint Sebastian, we discover, and a procession group will travel to each Catholic home in the village to bless it (and set off a loud firecracker, which explains the booms that started early this morning). They visit our farm at breakfast, arriving by flat boat, umbrella, drummers, and all -- what fun!
We then get a quick tour of this organic farm where we see coconuts growing as well as vanilla, ginger, cinnamon, and all manner of spices. It is fascinating to see spices we buy in bottles at the supermarket hanging from vines and bushes.
At 11 am, we embark on a houseboat tour of the lake. We will get a taste of what it is like to vacation in this famous Keralan style as we lunch and cruise the lake. Our boat has two luxurious bedrooms, each with its on bath, and comes equipped with chef and crew. Lots of water bird spotting, waving to fishermen, and just slow cruising along the shores learning about this beautiful area. Back in time for another fabulous dinner! More chanting from across the lagoon.
February 2
A quiet morning (the chanting from the Hindu temple has become part of the atmosphere). In the lagoon, kingfishers, herons, and other waterfowl. As they sit by the lagoon spotting birds, John and Anne are reminded that we are truly celebrities in rural India when five young farm workers stop by to say hello. Only one speaks ANY English and the others are just content to stare at us during the long lapses in the conversation. Anne finally resorts to her stock of family photos and Seattle postcards to keep up her end of the conversation. Gopi, who speaks the local language, comes to the rescue.
Today, the men will cross the lagoon and explore the area on bicycle, led by Shagzil. The women stay behind for the cooking lesson. Mummy will prepare lunch and we will madly take notes and try to guess the amounts she is adding. She has helpfully laid out each spice and ingredient on plates and explains what each element of the dish is, how to prepare it, when to add it, and how long to cook it. Key ingredients are green chilies and curry leaves. They seem to be in every recipe. We gulp when we see the amount of salt Mummy adds but remind ourselves that each dish is prepared for 12. After scribbling furiously, we discover that many of the recipes we have observed being prepared appear in the issue of Gourmet Joanne has. Phew!
Lunch is served. John and Gopi return from the bicycle outing but where is Tim? He has decided to strike out on his own, we are told. "He will be fine. He has a cell phone," they assure us. "No, he doesn't" says Susan. We start lunch without him but Susan is looking over her shoulder to see if he has arrived on the next boat. The afternoon proceeds. Still no Tim. We all begin to be a bit concerned. The group decides to visit the temple that has haunted our morning and evenings. Tim still not here. Our bus driver assures us he will be fine. We go to the temple and make a quick tour. Only Gopi and Rama, as Hindus, are allowed into the inner sanctum. As is traditional, Gopi must remove his shirt to enter. John is secretly relieved not to be able to enter -- too much good food. Rama hits upon the idea of making a donation to the temple that will ensure that all the oil lamps will be lit and we make plans to return at dusk to see the sight. We hope Tim will be home to join us!
Finally before we head out to the temple, Tim appears. It seems he has quite a story but we make him wait until dinner so we can all hear it. (Susan gets an early preview, I'm sure.) Anne stops at the tailor to have an native outfit of cool cotton made up with some fabric from Rama. He will make it up overnight and wants 100 rupees ($2) for his work. He pulls out his tape and makes some quick measurements.
When we arrive at the temple, a group of eager young boys greet us. Aru, who is about 9, is the stand out. With their limited English, they lead us to the temple walls and give us oil-dipped torches to begin lighting the temple. Each of us seems to have our own boy attendant, who encourages, adjusts lamp wicks, and generally makes sure we get the job done. We light only the hundreds of lights on the front of the temple. Devotees start to stream in and begin lighting the sides and rear wall. In the end, thousands of oil lamps light the temple on all sides. Drummers and two cymbal percussionists appear to beat a rhythmic song. They dress just like the musicians at the Christian church on Sunday and the song is almost the same. All members of the "orchestra" are men except for one young boy on cymbals. The boy senses he is being videoed, turns, and flashes a big smile. It is Aru, the leader of the temple boys who helped us light the candles. We leave reluctantly as more and more worshipers continue arriving. Judging from the chanting we have heard, we know the ceremonies will continue until 10 PM or so and some of us have an early morning departure to prepare for.
Dorothy stops to visit the Ayuvedic practitioner to find our about her "dosa." This is a diagnosis of the primary physical type she is and will influence any Ayuvedic treatment she might receive in the future. She tells us the doctor has categorized her as prone to phlegm, which seems right on as she as her asthma has been acting up during the trip.
Back at the farm, we have dinner and hear Tim's adventure. Seems he had a "bee in his bonnet" about taking a swim in the Arabian Sea. He had missed his chance in Kochi, where the beaches admittedly were not very inviting. So... Tim decided to bicycle his way to the sea. He knew the general direction but did not have a map, nor in this rural area, any language advantages. Still he pressed on. Occasionally, he stopped to ask directions, making friends despite the language barrier. He got a tour of a local temple complete with a temple elephant and met tons of friendly kids. Folks continued to assure him that he was heading in the correct direction. "Three kilometers," he was told more than once when he asked for directions using hand gestures to signify waves. Persist he did and finally he found himself on a beautiful beach on the Arabian Sea and then in the water, his dream accomplished.
With his dip behind him, Tim faces the task of finding his way home. Now he is truly tired and he decides to take an auto rickshaw home but finds no one here has heard of Phillip Kutty's farm. As noted previously, there is no there there and Tim does not know the name of the identifying local market. Finally, by describing the dam he crossed and the Catholic church near the Farm he is able to communicate with the driver and arrive safely at the boat landing. What an adventure! We all raise a glass at dinner in honor of his dream fulfilled.
February 3
Some of our party depart (Rama, Gopi, Susan, Tim and Dorothy). Joanne, John and Anne linger for another day. Joanne takes up residence on her porch and makes fast friends with all the Brits who are our fellow guests. Anne and John head off Ayuvedic massage, taking up Susan and Gopi on their dares. We walk in the village for an hour first (and re-encouter Aru and friends at drumming school) and thus arrive at the Ayuvedic hospital hot and sweaty.
We see the doctor who takes a pulse and blood pressure and asks about any special conditions. We then are led to separate massage rooms. Susan is right -- this is a very BASIC experience. The rooms are in a large shed-like structure and are clean but spare. Anne has two women; John has one man (half his height, poor guy). I won't go into the details but the treatment involves so much oil, we worry about slipping off the table and a full body scrub down when we are done. The oil and the water are hot but surprisingly, since it is midday, we are cool and relaxed when all is done. Anne finds this $18 massage more relaxing than the $80 one back in Agra. You will need to ask John about his thoughts on the whole experience. Expect a blush -- men are not used to that whole “nude” massage thing.
Back to the farm for more wonderful food with deliciously relaxed Joanne.
February 4
Time to leave! We get an early start so that we can visit the synagogue in Kochi. The early departing group has texted back that it is a "must see." They are so right. Hand crafted Chinese tiles pave the floor of the main room of this small building. Above hang old, old Belgian crystal chandeliers. Some have been wired to accept electricity but others are still filled with oil. Hearing the story again of how the maharajah gifted this place to the Jews of Kochi takes on new significance now that we are here. Shagzil gets the staff to illuminate the chandeliers briefly for us so that we can enjoy the special light that they radiate. We are enchanted.
Outside, on Synagogue Street, we succumb to some of the wonderful handicraft shops that line each side. Anne gets a handmade tablecloth and both women and even John buy beautiful handmade shirts. We can't get over how inexpensive it is to buy intricately crafted garments and fabrics here in India. It is so seductive that all of us will come home with more than we ever dreamed of purchasing. (Anne and John even purchased a gorgeous silk rug back in Delhi.)
Off to Bangalore to join the others at the Leela Palace. Our travel agent upgraded us to this wonderful hotel, we think as a reward for overcoming our jitters after the Mumbai attack in December. When we see the hotel, we can't help but wonder if they will let riff raff like us in! We meet up with everyone including Susan and Tim who should have been on their way home but were delayed a day due to the snow storm that incapacitated London. They will now be leaving early the next morning.
February 5
Bangalore does not have many monuments or sites to see but the city is a site in itself, so different than any place we have visited thus far. This is the most Western of cities on our tour. It looks more like New York than Delhi. Of course, the city is dirtier and some sections more dilapidated than NYC but all in all we feel quite at home. We visit the famous Bull temple in the AM and split off, some to shop and others (John and Anne) to sightsee a little longer and then shop.
The sightseeing includes a chance to see how Bangalurians (and in fact other Hindu Indians) embrace their new vehicles. Proud owners of new cars, scooters, trucks and other things moving bring them to the temple for "puja" or a blessing. The owner decorates his or her new purchase with flowers (and sometimes a beautiful bow) and pays a fee to the temple priest for a blessing. The priest scatters red powder over the car or scooter, blesses it with an oil lamp and then the owner places a lemon under each wheel and drives over them. We explain to Shagzil the association of a lemon with a new car would not be considered a good sign back home.
Anne goes to see a business associate that she "met virtually" on a consulting project 2 years ago and verifies that there really is a Mitesh P. John hangs out at the Leela, not a bad rap. Others continue to explore the modern bazaar of Bangalore. We skip a formal dinner (at last) and go to see Slumdog Millionaire instead. A great movie! We make the tough decision to meet in the lobby at 5 AM the next morning so that we can visit the famous city flower market before flying off to visit Hampi.
February 6
Five bleary-eyed travelers gather in the lobby at 5 AM. (Gopi has left us to conduct business.) We pile on to the bus and head off to see the flowers as they are auctioned off from the wholesale market. The main streets of Bangalore are empty at this time of day but the streets around the flower market are already bustling. Our driver has told us that by 6:30 most of the action will be over. In the dim streetlights, we see heaps and heaps of flowers, usually with a woman sitting in the midst stringing flowers into lei like arrangements. Folks here love to be photographed and smile whether in the picture or not. One woman gifts Anne with a string of jasmine and a hairpin to fix it in her hair. Just another example of the warmth of the people here. The photographs of this area should be incredible -- ask to see them. Back on the bus, Rama gifts all with a jasmine bracelet and fragrance fills the air. At the airport, we gather compliments from the security screeners and from fellow passengers. We leave a trail of jasmine petals wherever we go.
A short flight (with celebrities -- the revered ex-president of India and the head of a famous corporation) and head out on a bus again to Hampi. This new bus is not just new to us but brand-new. It sports its own flower garland -- it was just blessed yesterday. We have a wonderful ride, stopping to photograph women sorting through huge piles of red chili peppers and pluck a piece of cotton from the fields. Our new bus sadly has a bad fan belt that whines loudly and fairly regularly. We wonder if someone missed a lemon yesterday or if the bus is a real lemon. As we get closer to Hampi, we are surrounded by the verdant green of rice paddies that are terraced amid mountains of brown boulders; some balanced precariously one on top of another.
We arrive at Boulders, a rustic hotel, across the river from Hampi itself. It is too late to cross the river to visit the ruined city of Hampi so we head out to a women's village cooperative recommended by a friend of Rama's. It is 5 when we arrive and the workshop is closing for the day but we get a quick tour. Most of the products, hand woven baskets, purses, etc are made from dried coconut leaves that have been tinted different colors with vegetable dyes. Off to the shop, which is not closed, to buy some of the crafts. Here we can even feel righteous about our spending since all income goes to the cooperative that supports over 100 women and their families.
February 7
Only one day to see the ruined Hindu city of Hampi. We cross over the river in a ferry, accompanied by high-pressure 10-year-old salesman who sells us all postcards during the 5-minute ride. Who can resist this entertaining huckster! We climb through the simple market. It is all that is left of a fabulous city that was built in the 16th century and then pretty thoroughly trashed by Muslim invaders. Not much is left but you can still get enough of an impression to imagine the rich silks, spices, and gold that foreign visitors of the time say filled this city. We visit the active temple in the village and are blessed by Lakshmi, the temple elephant, who accepts our donation with her trunk, hands it to her mahout, and then lays her trunk atop our heads for the blessing. Then we climb to see the actual ruins, which remind of us Palatine Hill or the Forum in Rome.
We have lunch at Mango Tree restaurant, another recommendation of Rama's friend. It is an unusual lunch and I'm not talking about the food, which is traditional south Indian. The restaurant itself is the attraction. It consists of a series of slate terraces overlooking the river. The staff spread out reed mats for us to sit on and pull up small benches that will serve as tables. It's delightful here under the shade of the mango trees and we enjoy ogling all the hippy backpackers from Goa who are our fellow diners.
More hot touring in the afternoon but it is worth it to see the Queen's quarters and bath and the stable for the King's prized elephants. As we tour, we seem to be on the same schedule and route as a class of fifth graders who delight in shaking our hands and practicing their "hellos" and "how are yous" on us. At our third chance encounter, we all burst into giggles. One final stop to ride in a coracle, a saucer-shaped boat woven from reeds that looks like a big sawed off basketball. With the five of us carefully aboard, there is barely room for the oarsman. We have a short paddle down the river and a demo of how the boar spins in the water. I can't help but sing... "rub-dub-dub, three men in a tub... ).
Next we are off to Hospet, the nearest real town, to catch the overnight train to Bangalore. This will be our only train travel experience and we are not sure what to expect. It turns out we have six bunks in a shared space. Four stretch out from the wall lengthwise, then an aisle and two more horizontally squeezed against the other side. We down some sandwiches made quickly at local restaurant == filling but a definite come down from our feasts thus far. Shagzil helps set up the beds, then he and John take the longer top bunks and Dorothy climbs up to the upper across the aisle. Suddenly, the sound of something falling and we realize the window curtain and rod have spontaneously fallen on Rama. Much hysterical laughter ensues. The Leela Palace it ain't.
February 8
Thanks to Ambien, we arrive in Bangalore somewhat rested but it is a relief to be back at the Leela. We are mostly on our own today. John and Anne hang out by the gorgeous pool while Anne blogs and then they visit the Botanical Gardens to see Bangalore out in its “central park” on a Sunday afternoon. The highlights of their day a chance encounter of Thomas Friedman in the lobby, the sight of a nut brown man walking nonchalantly in total nudity down the streets of this sophisticated city, and a chance to commune with almost tame monkeys at the park. Others finish off their shopping checklists. Rama is off to join Gopi at festivities associated with a family wedding they will stay in town to attend. The rest of us crash early so that we can be in the lobby at 5 AM yet again to catch our flights home.
February 9
Farewell to Shagzil, another fabulous guide whose enthusiasm about the culture and history of his country is infectious. He sees us safely to the airport before he begins his 12 hour train journey back to Cochin.
Heading home at last. Others will get copies of this blog and add their own thoughts and experiences, so I'll just finish with my own.
India overwhelms but not necessarily in the ways I had predicted. It is culture shock, especially since there are so many people everywhere and so many religions and styles of life. Although I whined in advance that we were trying to see too much, I now appreciate that we have touched so many parts of this diverse country. I would describe our trip as comparable to traveling through 8 or 10 different countries in Europe over the course of 5 weeks. Each area has its own language and its own culture. Ox cart tilled fields coexist with tech centers; dirty, packed street markets with marble covered high-end malls. The contrasts can be mind-boggling. The long bus drives I was dreading turned out to be incredible cultural voyeurism instead.
The one thread that runs through it all for me is the warm hospitality of the Indian people. I had expected to be bothered constantly by beggars and indeed there have been some (and a lot of very persistent souvenir hawkers) but I had not expected to be greeted so enthusiastically by toddlers, children, adults and elders alike. In India, it is not considered impolite to stare at someone and we got lots of prolonged fixed stares. At first this made me most uncomfortable but as the weeks wore on I learned to flash a big smile at my gawker. Nine times out of ten my smile was returned with an even larger one usually accompanied by a friendly wave or even a "Hello! How are you?"
I am dubbing our whirlwind tour "Tastes of India" and am most thankful to Rama and Gopi and the wonderful Enchanting India, our travel agent, for leading us on this adventure. To Rama and Gopi special thanks for their patience with all our questions and their special guidance on the marvelous cuisine of India, a highlight of our trip. We have paid for a "puja" or blessing at several of the temples we visited during the trip and I truly do feel blessed at the end of this fabulous trip. Dhanyavaad, Gopi! Dhanyavaad, Rama! Namaste...
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Update 4
January 25...
We leave for a flight and drive to the Glenburn Tea estate in the hills near Darjeeling, right next to Bhutan. The drive up the narrow winding mountain roads with no guardrails and steep precipices to the side adds a new dimension to the thrill of driving in India. We must ascend to 6000 feet and then descend to about 3200 feet where the estate lies. We pitch about like bottles in the ocean for the last 3 km of the road, which is unpaved, rutted, and replete with axle testing potholes. We arrive late in the day and our hosts greet us with hot tea served on the verandah of the 100-year-old bungalow that is the headquarters for the estate. Susan and Tim will stay in the bungalow itself. The others will get settled in to the new Water Lily bungalow. We meet for drinks and dinner with other guests, staff and family. We are lucky to encounter the whole Prakash family, who have been in residence for the Glenburn Tea Festival, a yearly event of celebration for the 1000 member estate staff which guests are invited to join. The patriarch of the family, Mr. Sudhir Prakash, presides over the dinner table. He has recently made a trip to Seattle to visit his nephew and is convinced that our city is ripe for a tea shop featuring branded Glenburn tea. We are urged to plant the flag for Glenburn at home. The Prakash family has owned Glenburn for only the last 10 years but has been in the tea planting business for five generations (or at least four as the six and two year olds underfoot cannot have developed much business sense yet).
January 26...
Happy Republic Day! Today is a major holiday in India, celebrating the inauguration of the constitution that made the country a republic two years after India achieved independence from Britain. Independent they may be but at Glenburn all things British are still prized from the china and décor to the tea itself. Colonial settlers first began planting tea in India in 1846, using cuttings from bushes smuggled in from China, which formerly had a monopoly on this valued commodity. The tea bushes are actually camellias -- didn't know that! For our first day, we decide to visit the campsite down by the river. Those with bad knees descend by vehicle but Tim, Rama, Gopi, Anne and John make the 3-hour hike down on foot. We walk through the villages of the local Nepali people who work on the estate and through fields of tea bushes. To use the word, "field" seems wrong somehow. The tea bushes can be quite old, 80 to 100 years, but they are pruned severely so that they remain at picking height for the diminutive Nepali women who harvest the leaves. So instead of straight rows of crops, we see sinuous paths through bonsai-like bushes with a tall tree planted here and there to shade the tea. The effect is of a Japanese garden rather than a farm as we know it and the garden is draped like a deep green fabric over a steeply descending hillside. The winter mists that hang in the air accentuate the mood.
The villages provide us with another view of the diversity of life in India. Here the people look like what we would call Tibetan. They are smaller and have very Asiatic facial features. Their homes are built into the hillsides and supported by stilts. Some look sturdy; others quite precarious. Here homes are made of wood and brightly painted, perhaps to enliven the forest green of the lush surroundings. As we walk, we encounter chickens, goats, and children who are enjoying their school holiday. We all walk to the river camp, an old fashioned wooden structure, also on stilts, that presides over the riverbank. The river, green with glacial till, tumbles by through a field of boulders. Pools, rocks, and patches of white sand dot the riverbed that lies exposed during winter months. The estate staff provides a wonderful lunch with barbeque cooked over a wood fire and quiches and salads carried down from the main kitchen. Today, we share the picnic site with lots of local families celebrating the holiday and we can't help but notice that one other family will be having a barbeque as well. They will have roast chicken but have first to "do in" the fowl that has come live to the picnic. Fresh free-range chicken, indeed!
We take advantage of the afternoon to hike or just relax -- Glenburn is a vacation from our vacation, just as Rick Steve's recommends. No discussion of its charms would be complete without a comment on the cuisine of Glenburn. Every night delights. We eat with other guests and our hosts in a gracious dining room around an oval table that seats 15 or more. The linens are exquisite, a fire roars in the fireplace and the china setting change to match the theme of the meal. And the food! Homemade steamed dumplings, mushroom and cheese stuffed crepes, vegetables roasted Indian-style -- too many wonderful dishes to remember. We have homemade green tea ice cream garnished with a chocolate tea leaf for dessert and an orange cake emerges with candles for Dorothy and Rama, who have birthdays during our trip. We all have a favorite recipe to request, as no cookbook is available yet, darn it!
January 27
Another lazy day at Glenburn. We visit the government school on the estate. The Prakash family has established the Glenburn Trust, which is used to refurbish the school and sponsor private schooling for the most talented of children in the community. They also have sponsored a library and arrange for volunteers to assist at the Spartan school. Harry, a delightful young man from Britain in the midst of his "gap year," is currently in residence. Harry has been dining with us every night and now we get to see the fruits of his work. The children perform for us the song that they prepared for the festival, "We shall overcome" sang in Hindi, English, French (learned on the fly from visitors present during the festival) and Nepali. Harry is working with them on letters and drawings they will share with pen pals at a school in California.
Later we have the tea tour and Harry pops in to join us since Mr. Prakash, Senior, will lead the tour himself. His email is teaplanter@hotmail.com and he is the genuine article. We process in jeeps down rutted farm roads to his chosen spot, a place where a newly planted field is juxtaposed with an ancient grove ready for pruning. Mr. Prakash explains the science of cultivation and why the soil and climate conditions here produce the finest of teas. We see women descending the hillside with baskets resting high on their backs secured by a strap that wraps around the forehead. Today, they are carrying pruned branches but in picking season, they will fill the baskets with their harvest. They will pick only the youngest part of the plant, no more than two leaves and a leaf bud off the newest shoots. They pick in separate sections of the estate on a six-day rotation (five days of picking and one day of rest), ensuring that they capture new growth when it is at its most tender.
From the fields, we go to the factory, where the tea is dried (called "withering") and we learn that differences in the method of preparation rather than the tea plant itself create various types of tea. The same plant gives us green, oolong and all the other teas we drink. Except for herbal tea -- "An abomination," exclaims Mr. Prakash. "It is not tea at all!"
Finally, we taste. The tea estate manager leads this part of our tour. He shows how to taste tea -- it involves slurping and lots of noise to get the full taste. He has arranged eight teas for us to taste. We start with first blush tea, the tea made from the earliest spring new growth and move through the year to monsoon and finally autumn. The green tea we taste is much smoother than my Tazo morning cup and there are two white teas. Again, same leaves processed in a different way. Who knew? Tim who does not “do tea” has characterized this as "tea camp."
January 28
Time to leave Glenburn. One of the attractions of the estate we have not seen is the famous view of one of the tallest peaks in the Himalayas, visible from Glenburn on a clear day. The staff has promised a mountain knock in the early am, should a clear morning unveil the mountain, but alas no knock on this our last day. The winter mists still cling to the hillside this morning. We head off for another day of travel, down the mountain by jeep to the airport and by plane back to Kolkata.
By this time, we have been able to print a copy of the blog and others note a few missed highlights. First among them is riding camels in Udaipur. Our ride is short but memorable, mostly for the start and finish. We ride two to a camel and mount while the camel sits with his legs folded neatly underneath him. The handler tells us to hold on tightly when we mount and we soon see why. When the camel (a dromedary, or one humped camel, as Tim has pointed out) rises, his back legs come up first and in the front, he remains kneeling from the knee down. As a result, the riders tilt forward precariously until in a second fluid motion, the camel pushes up with his forelegs. The "ride" itself is smooth and we have a nice view of the lake. Then the mounting process is reversed for another precarious moment and we are done! Another method of transportation to add to the long list of how we have traveled in India. In reverse order of technological sophistication, by the time we finish in Bangalore, we will have traveled by plane, full-on tourist bus (well only for an airport transfer), mini-bus (a lot), SUV, car, overnight train, motorized river boat, rice boat (a south Indian house boat), auto rickshaw, bicycle rickshaw, vallum (a flatboat propelled by pole), coracle (a saucer-shaped fishing boat), elephant, camel, and by foot. We have missed only horseback and being pulled in a rickshaw by a man on foot and we westerners are way too heavy for the latter.
The riverboat cruise is another skipped item. The cruise was on a branch of the Ganges that runs through Kolkata, as close to the sacred river of India as we will get. As we cruise along the river, the incredible diversity of India unfolds before us. We pass through the "Raj" section of town with its British imperial buildings and through "black town," where the dilapidated mansions of Hindu traders who made fortunes trading with the Brits can still be seen. Along the banks of the river, people bathe and wash clothes at the "ghats" or steps down to the river. We pass a crematorium where some bodies are burned in gas-powered ovens but others in traditional fires. We cross under the new bridge where literally thousands of pedestrians stream by. Suru tells us that 2 million peoples a day cross over via this bridge. It sounds unbelievable until you consider that 14 million people live in Kolkata and another 2 to 3 million commute in every day.
We leave for a flight and drive to the Glenburn Tea estate in the hills near Darjeeling, right next to Bhutan. The drive up the narrow winding mountain roads with no guardrails and steep precipices to the side adds a new dimension to the thrill of driving in India. We must ascend to 6000 feet and then descend to about 3200 feet where the estate lies. We pitch about like bottles in the ocean for the last 3 km of the road, which is unpaved, rutted, and replete with axle testing potholes. We arrive late in the day and our hosts greet us with hot tea served on the verandah of the 100-year-old bungalow that is the headquarters for the estate. Susan and Tim will stay in the bungalow itself. The others will get settled in to the new Water Lily bungalow. We meet for drinks and dinner with other guests, staff and family. We are lucky to encounter the whole Prakash family, who have been in residence for the Glenburn Tea Festival, a yearly event of celebration for the 1000 member estate staff which guests are invited to join. The patriarch of the family, Mr. Sudhir Prakash, presides over the dinner table. He has recently made a trip to Seattle to visit his nephew and is convinced that our city is ripe for a tea shop featuring branded Glenburn tea. We are urged to plant the flag for Glenburn at home. The Prakash family has owned Glenburn for only the last 10 years but has been in the tea planting business for five generations (or at least four as the six and two year olds underfoot cannot have developed much business sense yet).
January 26...
Happy Republic Day! Today is a major holiday in India, celebrating the inauguration of the constitution that made the country a republic two years after India achieved independence from Britain. Independent they may be but at Glenburn all things British are still prized from the china and décor to the tea itself. Colonial settlers first began planting tea in India in 1846, using cuttings from bushes smuggled in from China, which formerly had a monopoly on this valued commodity. The tea bushes are actually camellias -- didn't know that! For our first day, we decide to visit the campsite down by the river. Those with bad knees descend by vehicle but Tim, Rama, Gopi, Anne and John make the 3-hour hike down on foot. We walk through the villages of the local Nepali people who work on the estate and through fields of tea bushes. To use the word, "field" seems wrong somehow. The tea bushes can be quite old, 80 to 100 years, but they are pruned severely so that they remain at picking height for the diminutive Nepali women who harvest the leaves. So instead of straight rows of crops, we see sinuous paths through bonsai-like bushes with a tall tree planted here and there to shade the tea. The effect is of a Japanese garden rather than a farm as we know it and the garden is draped like a deep green fabric over a steeply descending hillside. The winter mists that hang in the air accentuate the mood.
The villages provide us with another view of the diversity of life in India. Here the people look like what we would call Tibetan. They are smaller and have very Asiatic facial features. Their homes are built into the hillsides and supported by stilts. Some look sturdy; others quite precarious. Here homes are made of wood and brightly painted, perhaps to enliven the forest green of the lush surroundings. As we walk, we encounter chickens, goats, and children who are enjoying their school holiday. We all walk to the river camp, an old fashioned wooden structure, also on stilts, that presides over the riverbank. The river, green with glacial till, tumbles by through a field of boulders. Pools, rocks, and patches of white sand dot the riverbed that lies exposed during winter months. The estate staff provides a wonderful lunch with barbeque cooked over a wood fire and quiches and salads carried down from the main kitchen. Today, we share the picnic site with lots of local families celebrating the holiday and we can't help but notice that one other family will be having a barbeque as well. They will have roast chicken but have first to "do in" the fowl that has come live to the picnic. Fresh free-range chicken, indeed!
We take advantage of the afternoon to hike or just relax -- Glenburn is a vacation from our vacation, just as Rick Steve's recommends. No discussion of its charms would be complete without a comment on the cuisine of Glenburn. Every night delights. We eat with other guests and our hosts in a gracious dining room around an oval table that seats 15 or more. The linens are exquisite, a fire roars in the fireplace and the china setting change to match the theme of the meal. And the food! Homemade steamed dumplings, mushroom and cheese stuffed crepes, vegetables roasted Indian-style -- too many wonderful dishes to remember. We have homemade green tea ice cream garnished with a chocolate tea leaf for dessert and an orange cake emerges with candles for Dorothy and Rama, who have birthdays during our trip. We all have a favorite recipe to request, as no cookbook is available yet, darn it!
January 27
Another lazy day at Glenburn. We visit the government school on the estate. The Prakash family has established the Glenburn Trust, which is used to refurbish the school and sponsor private schooling for the most talented of children in the community. They also have sponsored a library and arrange for volunteers to assist at the Spartan school. Harry, a delightful young man from Britain in the midst of his "gap year," is currently in residence. Harry has been dining with us every night and now we get to see the fruits of his work. The children perform for us the song that they prepared for the festival, "We shall overcome" sang in Hindi, English, French (learned on the fly from visitors present during the festival) and Nepali. Harry is working with them on letters and drawings they will share with pen pals at a school in California.
Later we have the tea tour and Harry pops in to join us since Mr. Prakash, Senior, will lead the tour himself. His email is teaplanter@hotmail.com and he is the genuine article. We process in jeeps down rutted farm roads to his chosen spot, a place where a newly planted field is juxtaposed with an ancient grove ready for pruning. Mr. Prakash explains the science of cultivation and why the soil and climate conditions here produce the finest of teas. We see women descending the hillside with baskets resting high on their backs secured by a strap that wraps around the forehead. Today, they are carrying pruned branches but in picking season, they will fill the baskets with their harvest. They will pick only the youngest part of the plant, no more than two leaves and a leaf bud off the newest shoots. They pick in separate sections of the estate on a six-day rotation (five days of picking and one day of rest), ensuring that they capture new growth when it is at its most tender.
From the fields, we go to the factory, where the tea is dried (called "withering") and we learn that differences in the method of preparation rather than the tea plant itself create various types of tea. The same plant gives us green, oolong and all the other teas we drink. Except for herbal tea -- "An abomination," exclaims Mr. Prakash. "It is not tea at all!"
Finally, we taste. The tea estate manager leads this part of our tour. He shows how to taste tea -- it involves slurping and lots of noise to get the full taste. He has arranged eight teas for us to taste. We start with first blush tea, the tea made from the earliest spring new growth and move through the year to monsoon and finally autumn. The green tea we taste is much smoother than my Tazo morning cup and there are two white teas. Again, same leaves processed in a different way. Who knew? Tim who does not “do tea” has characterized this as "tea camp."
January 28
Time to leave Glenburn. One of the attractions of the estate we have not seen is the famous view of one of the tallest peaks in the Himalayas, visible from Glenburn on a clear day. The staff has promised a mountain knock in the early am, should a clear morning unveil the mountain, but alas no knock on this our last day. The winter mists still cling to the hillside this morning. We head off for another day of travel, down the mountain by jeep to the airport and by plane back to Kolkata.
By this time, we have been able to print a copy of the blog and others note a few missed highlights. First among them is riding camels in Udaipur. Our ride is short but memorable, mostly for the start and finish. We ride two to a camel and mount while the camel sits with his legs folded neatly underneath him. The handler tells us to hold on tightly when we mount and we soon see why. When the camel (a dromedary, or one humped camel, as Tim has pointed out) rises, his back legs come up first and in the front, he remains kneeling from the knee down. As a result, the riders tilt forward precariously until in a second fluid motion, the camel pushes up with his forelegs. The "ride" itself is smooth and we have a nice view of the lake. Then the mounting process is reversed for another precarious moment and we are done! Another method of transportation to add to the long list of how we have traveled in India. In reverse order of technological sophistication, by the time we finish in Bangalore, we will have traveled by plane, full-on tourist bus (well only for an airport transfer), mini-bus (a lot), SUV, car, overnight train, motorized river boat, rice boat (a south Indian house boat), auto rickshaw, bicycle rickshaw, vallum (a flatboat propelled by pole), coracle (a saucer-shaped fishing boat), elephant, camel, and by foot. We have missed only horseback and being pulled in a rickshaw by a man on foot and we westerners are way too heavy for the latter.
The riverboat cruise is another skipped item. The cruise was on a branch of the Ganges that runs through Kolkata, as close to the sacred river of India as we will get. As we cruise along the river, the incredible diversity of India unfolds before us. We pass through the "Raj" section of town with its British imperial buildings and through "black town," where the dilapidated mansions of Hindu traders who made fortunes trading with the Brits can still be seen. Along the banks of the river, people bathe and wash clothes at the "ghats" or steps down to the river. We pass a crematorium where some bodies are burned in gas-powered ovens but others in traditional fires. We cross under the new bridge where literally thousands of pedestrians stream by. Suru tells us that 2 million peoples a day cross over via this bridge. It sounds unbelievable until you consider that 14 million people live in Kolkata and another 2 to 3 million commute in every day.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Update 3
After lunch one group departs to shop; Susan and Tim are off to find the street where Susan's great aunt once lived; and John, Gopi and Anne decide to walk back to the hotel. Rama, head of the shopping group, talks her way into the studios of Bridgette Singh, who sells only to top star hotels and to wholesale. How does she do it? Perhaps with the language barrier she may have come off as a buyer? Anyway, all come away with fabulous designer linens. Susan and Tim find the street they are looking for and get a photo for Susan's aunt. Gopi, John and Anne get lost but do eventually make it through the back streets to our hotel.
For our last dinner in Jaipur, or rather outside of the city, we drive an hour to the Samode Palace, the vacation home of the family whose town home we have been staying in. The countryside is beautiful and when we arrive we see that this palace, now converted to a hotel needs no restoration. The first revelation is the beautiful entry garden. Then we ascend a series of staircases, each of which leads to its own interior courtyard. Our guide leads us to the mirrored reception room of the palace. The walls of this many chambered room have the feeling of being quilted with hundreds of small mirror panes and all remains in perfect condition. Rama shows us how we can stare into the tiny tiles to create multiple refracted images of ourselves. The tile work is stunning as are the frescos. We eat dinner on the pool deck under Venus rising but need to request blankets to wrap ourselves in.
January 21...
Rama and Gopi depart for Kolkata (they need a vacation from us!) while the rest of us head to Udaipur, the hometown of Suru our guide. Suru sings the glories of Rajasthan and Udaipur. Here as in other parts of Rajasthan, the native dress is particularly colorful. As is other parts of India, the women wear saris in glorious colors but in Rajasthan, the men join the show with brightly hued turbans. Suru explains that each caste wraps the turban in a characteristic way.
The flight goes well and we arrive in time for some sightseeing. John, Anne, Tim and Susan head out for the City Palace. Dorothy and Joanne who are not feeling well must crash. The majarana (king) has split his huge palace into two hotels and a museum and still been able to retain a spacious wing for his own family's use. Highlights are the beautiful blue tiled peacocks whose breasts and heads jut out in bas-relief from the walls of one courtyard. We manage a short walk through the market that sells foods and wares to locals and purchase some gifts to take to our planned school visit. We also see the famed Lake Palace that seems to float in one of the city's series of connecting lakes. Sadly, monsoons of late have been scanty and the lakes are no longer at full glory. We will have to imagine the scene as it was meant to be.
Suru invites us to lunch with his family at his sister's hotel the next day and promises us real home cooked Rajasthani food.
January 22...
Out to the countryside this morning for a visit to the ruins of a 10th century temple complex and a village visit. The first temple we see is a ruin partially submerged in a small lake. The others are more accessible and beautiful, partially because of the peaceful, lush, rural setting. The temples were defaced centuries ago by Moghul invaders but some of the wonderful sculptures survive. Tim and Susan finally have a chance to see a few Khajuraho-style erotic carvings.
Next we follow small winding roads through farms and fields to visit a small village. The trek yields photo opportunities galore of women in bright attire with milk pots and bundles of sticks balanced on their heads, children herding goats, and men in colorful turbans. At the village the men are mostly away working in the fields but the women and children are welcoming. The one older man who is at home for the day invites us into his house where his wife is busy making corn flower roti (bread) over a fire in their courtyard and two delightful children (his grandchildren?) smile at us shyly. We visit their one room residence and are amazed at the neat and orderly way they make it all work. I know that my own home would not be nearly as presentable if I was to find myself showing it off unexpectedly to drop in guests.
The children follow us through the village paths to the school demonstrating home made toys. At school, we visit the first and second forms. One class sits on the verandah; the other inside a classroom and the teacher's desk is perched in the doorway overseeing both groups. The kids sit on the floor in their neat uniforms writing in their notebooks. The walls are brightly painted with murals of Hindi and roman script, colors identified in English and Hindi, etc. The children sit quietly in place during our visit even when we distribute our little presents of crayons and drawing books and say a polite "thank you" as we leave. Then we hear the babble of delighted voices as they break into their little gifts. We dodge cows and head back to the bus where the little boy we first encountered is busily sketching our vehicle with his new crayons.
Back to town for lunch with Suru's family. The family hotel is in the middle of town and we have lunch up on the roof deck. The home cooking is wonderful and we get a chance to meet Suru's wife, delightful five-year old son, sister and nephew. We have three different kinds of bread, (dahl bati, corn and some other type of chapatti), chicken masala, vegetables and dessert. Most of the dishes are flavored with ghee (clarified butter). No wonder we love it! Suru's wife and sister have overseen preparation of the meal and have toned down the spices for us. Although we love Indian food, we find the flavors overwhelming at times. Suru shows us old photos of himself dressed traditionally (for his wedding). He is a proud member of the warrior caste, second only to the Brahmins. Many of his caste have made the transition to jobs in the tourist industry.
Afterwards more shopping! To the tailors for fabric, shawls and even John buys something -- a couple of ties.
January 23...
John and Anne escape to walk to the lake on their own and on foot. They are followed through the streets by an auto rickshaw driver who first offered them a ride at the hotel. At every intersection where they might make a wrong turn, he carefully directs them to the correct route. Finally, they agree to meet him at the viewpoint on the lake and accept his offer of a quick tour of town. He takes us to his favorite spots and through the narrow streets of the old town. Lots of fun!
Off to join Rama and Gopi in Kolkata. It takes pretty much the rest of the day to get there with airport security, transfers and two flights. On both flights (each about an hour) we are served a full meal and the food is delicious and free! How will we go back to air travel American style? In Kolkata, we are at the Oberi and the security is tight. Perhaps this is an opportune time to talk about the logistics of traveling in the age of terror.
Everywhere we go, we are told that they tourism is down by 50% or more. Many cancelled after the incident in Mumbai and the spiraling downturn of the economy has also contributed. I admit to checking my travel insurance policy in December. I learned that we were not covered for a cancellation unless we were visiting the city where an attack occurred (and we were never scheduled to go to Mumbai). In reading over the fine print of the policy, I also discover we are not covered for assault if it is perpetrated by a member of our own party. (The insurance company must have some interesting stories to tell!)
We are glad we did not cancel because we have most of the tourist attractions here in India to ourselves. The security is indeed tight everywhere. In Delhi, we had an announced search of our rooms by security staff with metal detectors and bomb sniffing dogs. Does that make us feel safer or freaked? At every hotel, our van is checked with mirrors and hatches opened to check luggage or even the engine. We pass through metal detectors and are wanded at nearly every monument. At the Kolkata Oberai, we are individually searched every time we enter the hotel. Airport checks are tight as well. Later, in Bangalore, even our luggage and handbags will be x-rayed every time we enter the hotel. But everywhere we go, people are unbelievably friendly. They want to know where we are from and smile broadly when we say "USA." The welcome mostly overcomes the worry.
January 24...
Some of us do a historic walk through colonial Kolkata in the morning and then we join everyone for brunch at the apartment of a local art collector. The apartment is in a heritage building that was the original British department store. We walk up some dingy stairs to the fourth floor (the elevator is broken) and privately develop a few qualms about brunch. We walk down a long, dilapidated hallway and ring the bell in front of a set of old double doors. Our host answers and lead us into a gracious flat. The ceilings must be 10 feet or more and have plenty of room to display an amazing collection of Bengali art. Fascinating objects are displayed artfully on every table. We definitely get a taste of how well-to-do intelligentsia can live graciously in the center of a busy, noisy city.
John and Anne want to see the statues being constructed for the upcoming celebration of the festival of Saraswati, the goddess of learning. Gucci, one of our brunch hosts, agrees to take us on an excursion to the neighborhood where the statues are made. Craftsman here practice a skill handed down from father to son; their only occupation is making statues for festivals. As we walk through, we see literally thousands of statues of the goddess in various sizes and poses. Each statue begins with a base of straw that is tightly bound to the basic shape of the goddess. Then the sculptors cover the straw with layers of river mud and fashion the serene face of the goddess. Fingers and feet are mass-produced and added to a row of statues in assembly line fashion. Statues in various states of development line the narrow lanes to dry and fill every workshop. After the mud dries, the artisan paints the face and body, adds fiber hair, and dresses it with cloth and handmade ornamentation heavy with sequins. We see a few finished works being hauled to trucks for delivery. On the day of the festival, the owner will take the statue to the river for a blessing and then float it out onto the water where it will sink into the river and return to the mud.
For our last dinner in Jaipur, or rather outside of the city, we drive an hour to the Samode Palace, the vacation home of the family whose town home we have been staying in. The countryside is beautiful and when we arrive we see that this palace, now converted to a hotel needs no restoration. The first revelation is the beautiful entry garden. Then we ascend a series of staircases, each of which leads to its own interior courtyard. Our guide leads us to the mirrored reception room of the palace. The walls of this many chambered room have the feeling of being quilted with hundreds of small mirror panes and all remains in perfect condition. Rama shows us how we can stare into the tiny tiles to create multiple refracted images of ourselves. The tile work is stunning as are the frescos. We eat dinner on the pool deck under Venus rising but need to request blankets to wrap ourselves in.
January 21...
Rama and Gopi depart for Kolkata (they need a vacation from us!) while the rest of us head to Udaipur, the hometown of Suru our guide. Suru sings the glories of Rajasthan and Udaipur. Here as in other parts of Rajasthan, the native dress is particularly colorful. As is other parts of India, the women wear saris in glorious colors but in Rajasthan, the men join the show with brightly hued turbans. Suru explains that each caste wraps the turban in a characteristic way.
The flight goes well and we arrive in time for some sightseeing. John, Anne, Tim and Susan head out for the City Palace. Dorothy and Joanne who are not feeling well must crash. The majarana (king) has split his huge palace into two hotels and a museum and still been able to retain a spacious wing for his own family's use. Highlights are the beautiful blue tiled peacocks whose breasts and heads jut out in bas-relief from the walls of one courtyard. We manage a short walk through the market that sells foods and wares to locals and purchase some gifts to take to our planned school visit. We also see the famed Lake Palace that seems to float in one of the city's series of connecting lakes. Sadly, monsoons of late have been scanty and the lakes are no longer at full glory. We will have to imagine the scene as it was meant to be.
Suru invites us to lunch with his family at his sister's hotel the next day and promises us real home cooked Rajasthani food.
January 22...
Out to the countryside this morning for a visit to the ruins of a 10th century temple complex and a village visit. The first temple we see is a ruin partially submerged in a small lake. The others are more accessible and beautiful, partially because of the peaceful, lush, rural setting. The temples were defaced centuries ago by Moghul invaders but some of the wonderful sculptures survive. Tim and Susan finally have a chance to see a few Khajuraho-style erotic carvings.
Next we follow small winding roads through farms and fields to visit a small village. The trek yields photo opportunities galore of women in bright attire with milk pots and bundles of sticks balanced on their heads, children herding goats, and men in colorful turbans. At the village the men are mostly away working in the fields but the women and children are welcoming. The one older man who is at home for the day invites us into his house where his wife is busy making corn flower roti (bread) over a fire in their courtyard and two delightful children (his grandchildren?) smile at us shyly. We visit their one room residence and are amazed at the neat and orderly way they make it all work. I know that my own home would not be nearly as presentable if I was to find myself showing it off unexpectedly to drop in guests.
The children follow us through the village paths to the school demonstrating home made toys. At school, we visit the first and second forms. One class sits on the verandah; the other inside a classroom and the teacher's desk is perched in the doorway overseeing both groups. The kids sit on the floor in their neat uniforms writing in their notebooks. The walls are brightly painted with murals of Hindi and roman script, colors identified in English and Hindi, etc. The children sit quietly in place during our visit even when we distribute our little presents of crayons and drawing books and say a polite "thank you" as we leave. Then we hear the babble of delighted voices as they break into their little gifts. We dodge cows and head back to the bus where the little boy we first encountered is busily sketching our vehicle with his new crayons.
Back to town for lunch with Suru's family. The family hotel is in the middle of town and we have lunch up on the roof deck. The home cooking is wonderful and we get a chance to meet Suru's wife, delightful five-year old son, sister and nephew. We have three different kinds of bread, (dahl bati, corn and some other type of chapatti), chicken masala, vegetables and dessert. Most of the dishes are flavored with ghee (clarified butter). No wonder we love it! Suru's wife and sister have overseen preparation of the meal and have toned down the spices for us. Although we love Indian food, we find the flavors overwhelming at times. Suru shows us old photos of himself dressed traditionally (for his wedding). He is a proud member of the warrior caste, second only to the Brahmins. Many of his caste have made the transition to jobs in the tourist industry.
Afterwards more shopping! To the tailors for fabric, shawls and even John buys something -- a couple of ties.
January 23...
John and Anne escape to walk to the lake on their own and on foot. They are followed through the streets by an auto rickshaw driver who first offered them a ride at the hotel. At every intersection where they might make a wrong turn, he carefully directs them to the correct route. Finally, they agree to meet him at the viewpoint on the lake and accept his offer of a quick tour of town. He takes us to his favorite spots and through the narrow streets of the old town. Lots of fun!
Off to join Rama and Gopi in Kolkata. It takes pretty much the rest of the day to get there with airport security, transfers and two flights. On both flights (each about an hour) we are served a full meal and the food is delicious and free! How will we go back to air travel American style? In Kolkata, we are at the Oberi and the security is tight. Perhaps this is an opportune time to talk about the logistics of traveling in the age of terror.
Everywhere we go, we are told that they tourism is down by 50% or more. Many cancelled after the incident in Mumbai and the spiraling downturn of the economy has also contributed. I admit to checking my travel insurance policy in December. I learned that we were not covered for a cancellation unless we were visiting the city where an attack occurred (and we were never scheduled to go to Mumbai). In reading over the fine print of the policy, I also discover we are not covered for assault if it is perpetrated by a member of our own party. (The insurance company must have some interesting stories to tell!)
We are glad we did not cancel because we have most of the tourist attractions here in India to ourselves. The security is indeed tight everywhere. In Delhi, we had an announced search of our rooms by security staff with metal detectors and bomb sniffing dogs. Does that make us feel safer or freaked? At every hotel, our van is checked with mirrors and hatches opened to check luggage or even the engine. We pass through metal detectors and are wanded at nearly every monument. At the Kolkata Oberai, we are individually searched every time we enter the hotel. Airport checks are tight as well. Later, in Bangalore, even our luggage and handbags will be x-rayed every time we enter the hotel. But everywhere we go, people are unbelievably friendly. They want to know where we are from and smile broadly when we say "USA." The welcome mostly overcomes the worry.
January 24...
Some of us do a historic walk through colonial Kolkata in the morning and then we join everyone for brunch at the apartment of a local art collector. The apartment is in a heritage building that was the original British department store. We walk up some dingy stairs to the fourth floor (the elevator is broken) and privately develop a few qualms about brunch. We walk down a long, dilapidated hallway and ring the bell in front of a set of old double doors. Our host answers and lead us into a gracious flat. The ceilings must be 10 feet or more and have plenty of room to display an amazing collection of Bengali art. Fascinating objects are displayed artfully on every table. We definitely get a taste of how well-to-do intelligentsia can live graciously in the center of a busy, noisy city.
John and Anne want to see the statues being constructed for the upcoming celebration of the festival of Saraswati, the goddess of learning. Gucci, one of our brunch hosts, agrees to take us on an excursion to the neighborhood where the statues are made. Craftsman here practice a skill handed down from father to son; their only occupation is making statues for festivals. As we walk through, we see literally thousands of statues of the goddess in various sizes and poses. Each statue begins with a base of straw that is tightly bound to the basic shape of the goddess. Then the sculptors cover the straw with layers of river mud and fashion the serene face of the goddess. Fingers and feet are mass-produced and added to a row of statues in assembly line fashion. Statues in various states of development line the narrow lanes to dry and fill every workshop. After the mud dries, the artisan paints the face and body, adds fiber hair, and dresses it with cloth and handmade ornamentation heavy with sequins. We see a few finished works being hauled to trucks for delivery. On the day of the festival, the owner will take the statue to the river for a blessing and then float it out onto the water where it will sink into the river and return to the mud.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
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