dash for deli - Madurai

madurai was another shock tot he system, this place was really run down, no pavements, open sewers piles of rubbish on every street, which the cows eat. i have not mentioned the cows before, they are not every where but they are common. i heard stories that they are reveared and that they can hold up trafic for hours if one decides to sleep on the road. from what i have seen this is not true, the cows are left preety much to there own devices and wonder the streets eating garbage. anyway there is wa sa temple not for from our hotel/sqwat but before we went three of us went for lunch. ubntil this point i had mainly eaten at hotels & restaurants. now was the time to venture into a real local indian shit hole for food. of the four of us three of us ordered the limited thali, which is a strange name as the food is unlimited. Suzanne whois from finland took one look at the place and decided that she just wanted a pepsi. the food came on a big leaf which you had to wash with (mineral) water. you then got a big lump of rice, something which resembled bombay potato, something that was green and two other thngs which were a yellowy redish colour. oh and you had to eat with your fingers, righthand only. it was reaaly good food, the thali cost 27rps - there are 80 to the pound.

then we went to the temple, they all look pretty much the same, although this one was run down. on the way in i bought three jasmin flower neclaces for 200rps (see above), while walking aroud the temple a crazed looking religious type jumped out "yuo have flowers to make blessing to shiva", "um, yeah ok". he proceed to do alot of praying at a statue and took the flower neclaces of me and the girls and put then on the statue, he then gave me a red mark on my forehead. im not sure but i think i might me a hindu now. sorry sister leonne, sorry father delany, it just happened. when the priest fella had finished hinduising me or what ever he then gave me another neclace of flowers which was much bigger then the one i had given him. good deal. walked around for a bit feeling like a tourist knob head, which my red mark and ridiculousley oversized flower neclace, when i bumbed into the germans. i havent mentioned them before but this was freaky. i met them for the first time in chennai when i lost my camera, i then bumped into them in Mahabalipuram, in a country of 1 billion i could lost these guys. i talked to them for a bit about where they were going next and it seams that our paths will niot cross again so i gave them the flowers and wished them all the best.

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