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Published: March 27th 2009
Where the ladies wait while the men swim
Kat was not amused it was so flipping hot!EDIT- Katherine thinks this is boring but Ed wants to mention that in Hampi (previous entry) he bought afried chilli from an impoverished looking street vendor one night, which he spotted was wrapped in an page from Cosmopolitan magazine, specifically an articel about what form of contraception women preferred. Contrasts everywhere....
The journey to Kochi:
From Banagalore, we took the train south to Kochi. As normal, we turned up roughly an hour in advance and sat on the platform for a further hour in the evening heat as the small flies drifted around us, periodically going in for a nibble. Hunter Marriott killed a good number, only to discover later a few had been going in under the radar and he had a number of bites on the back of his arm. Poor Katherine’s lower legs, however, looked like they had been blanket bombed!
The town of Kochi itself is separated into the Old Fort (which, being historically Portuguese controlled, looks very much like parts of Goa and the Carribean, with small winding streets, big colonial houses turned 5 star hotels and quaint little houses painted a multitude of faded colours. (One particularly cool things they have are
chinese fishing nets by the quayside. These look a bit like mediaeval catapaults but essentially is a huge net about 30 ft accross that is lowered into and raised from the water by men pulling on the other side of a fulcrum, with the aid of some huge rocks. )The 'new' part of the city is indistinguishable IMHO from any other in southern India- broken pavements, palm trees, ramshackled concrete buildings and lots of mainly smiling, happy faces.
We had decided that we needed to take in some of the local arts of Kochi so we decided to pay a visit to a local theatre group who perform an ancient type of theatre that dates back thousands of years. If you ever go to the region, don’t make our mistake. Its too painful for me to write anything more on the subject. It should be noted Kat really enjoyed the elaborate application of the makeup - the actual performance was so weird, it involved the man you see in the photos moving every muscle in his face along to drums being played and doing ornate hand gestures - very unique however reasonably boring!
We decided to do a
Local dramatics
Putting on the makeup took an hour day trip to the waterfalls about 3-hours out of Kochi that were supposed to be unspoiled, not too busy and a nice place to swim. The falls themself were stunning, however it seemed like every person for each surrounding village had the same idea that day to come and see the falls and get away from the heat, it was very busy. The worst part was that Kat couldnt go swimming as the woman dont show any skin and perch under surrounding trees while the men strip down and frolic with each other. So Ed got a nice refreshing swim, while Kat took photos of him while sweat soaked her unused bathing suit under her clothes...
The Box- Part 2
We located the General Post Office in Kochi. When we enquired about the insurance we needed for the contents we obviously entered a time warp of some sort and were told that
-the cotton cloth covering it must have been stitched in red thread
-the stitches were to have no less than one stitch per inch; and
-the stitching must be 'sealed'.
When we inquired how we were supposed to 'seal' cotton and thread, it turned
out that it mean 'seal' literally i.e we needed to get ourselves an actual seal somewhere and do it with wax. We promptly grabbed our box and possessions and ran out, lest we were trapped in the 18th century permanently.
DHL were more accommodating over security concerns, but when they started insisting on having a doctor prescription for the aspirin etc in the surplus first aid kit, and itemize every item in the box we wanted to send back (i.e vest x1, t- shirt x2, novel x1, guide book x2, sunglasses x1, razor x1, phone charger x 1) with a valuation- we got bogged down. There was also a limit on the value of items we could include which precluded Kat from including her new sapphire necklace - luckily, the people serving us liked us and using her womanly charms she was able to slip it into the box undetected. 1 hr 45 mins later we left, convinced we would never see the box again, and 4 days later it arrived in the UK.
Train ride to Trivendrum
We got on as normal- loaded to the gills with bags we shouldn’t be carrying, Ed with both
rucksacks. The train was late, and it was midnight already but all was well- tickets: check, wallet : check, luggage: check, girlfriend: check.
Shuffling through our sleeper carriage (our preferred mode of transport is 2nd a/c- when we first saw this level of travel we were horrified however after realizing how lucky we were to be in this level versus the other levels we became very grateful when it was available), we came to our berths, which had someone in them already. We had dealt with this before and robustly withdrew our tickets and asked them to move. A bit of a standoff developed with these slightly surly young Indian men, but on closer examination, it turned out we were, er, one day early for the train. Embarrassing. We apologised and sheepishly made for the exit, but by then, the doors were locked and we were off! We kind of looked at each other and said 'oh well its only 5-hours let's just camp in the hall or see if any seats are available'. The carriage started to quieten down, and we resorted to sitting on our rucksacks in the corridor, by the toilets, to contemplate our fate. There
was a pool of liquid coming out from under the door of one of them, creeping ominously across the floor towards us. (see photo) Katherine started to have a sense of humour failure. Ed- a champion sleeper- started to doubt even his abilities to get some sleep in this circumstance.
Soon after, we were discovered by the head conductor, a fat pompous guy, who treated us as a pair of stoways and ignored our attempts to ask if there was any spare seats, or whether we could buy another ticket. He decided to be an ass and a. not let us sit there and b. kept hustling us to the carriages in front of him. He shooed us down the train, where we found another conductor, who we thought told us to find a spare berth in the carriage, which we both did. Having settled down nicely, half an hour later, the Fat Conductor came through checking tickets and ejected us to the next carriage. We waited there until he found us again, when he told us we had to go 4 carriages down and find a seat in fourth class. In that class, people were sleeping in aisles
and in the luggage racks and Katherine was about to have a fit (it was now 2am). When the train stopped at a station in the middle of knowhere, we prepared to get off the train and take our chances, he someone started understanding our English and sold us two new tickets. Kat found a berth above two policemen on the train, who promised- with a wink- to wake her at our destination at 4am (there are no announcements on a speaker system etc when you get to a destination- you need to be already up and ready to get off, regardless of the time) Ed found a berth nearby and had to defuse a small argument with an Indian lady below me who, when he was pushing my rucksack underneath to store it for the night, I think thought he was trying to steal her flip flops. Finally, we slept. First train saga complete - next one to be found further in entry.
Trivendrum was a nice town that seemed to have many of the ammenities that we had so desperately been missing in the previous cities. Most notably the hospitality manager Winona who was a godsend! We
moved from our earlier crappy overpriced hotel to this lovely, modern hotel that was having a special rate of 1000 rupees off given the low tourist season - we were in heaven! Then we met Winona who was so keen to help us find every little necessity we had been missing and help us plan fun excursions during the day. She even took Katherine to her tailor for Kat's sari blouse to be lined and sewed. We both had to pick up some traditional Indian garb for our next stop a peedam in Chennai, so we had fun shopping with the locals picking out outfits. As you can see from the photo Ed- being a typical man regarding the shopping- didn't try on his trousers before purchasing them, despite Katherine's insistence.
The journey to Chennai:
We had made the mistake of only leaving 45 minutes to get to the train station, which was really only 5 minutes away, but there was a festival going on on our travel date. The people at the hotel were totally inept at checking us out, we ended up paying cash because they couldn't figure out how to use their credit card machines
- Ed was about to blow a gasket so we threw too much money at them and hopped into the very cramped waiting rickshaw and tried to head to the station. The traffic was literally not moving bumper to bumper - we were so screwed if we missed this train as trains get booked weeks in advance and we didnt want to buy plane tickets. We finally convinced our driver how big his tip was if he got us to the station in time and he hauled ass - going down one ways, going down the wrong way on the road and finally over a pile of bricks when a stubborn horrible old man wouldnt move his car a few inches. We arrived at the station with 10 minutes to spare and realized how far we had to go - Ed grabbed Kat' bag and she took the small ones and dashed for the train in hopes of convincing it to not leave without Ed. We had to run all the way down one reasonably full platform over a bridge then onto our platform. Our platform was literally shoulder to shoulder filled with people, thousands of people sitting, lying, standing
Local tailors in Trivendrum
sewing lining into Kat's sari you name it. Our carriage was at the VERY end. Kat started and literally had to start pushing people to make room to pass, she was also thinking there is no way in hell Ed is going to get through here with 2 huge bags. As she pushed herself half way down the platform she was about to give up thinking no way Ed's going to make it and looked back at a sweat covered Ed pummeling through people only a 100 yards behind her - spurred on she finally finds her carriage (the now beloved 2nd A/C) and the doors are locked! A train worker says we have to go in through the 3rd class doors and internally make our way to our carriage 3 carriages away. This carriage already has people hanging out the doors, it is brimming with people - how in the world are we going to do this? There were so many times when we thought we wouldn't make it, and it was the good nature of the Indian people that made it possible for us to get to our seats - they shoved people out of the way and kept encouraging us saying keep
pushing, taking our bags, making room saying 'you can do it'. One particularily funny moment was when Ed accidently grabbed an older woman's breast and see quite seemed to like it giggling and whispering to her friends. It took us about 30 minutes to get through these carriages, it was like pushing peanut butter through cheese cloth but we finally arrived at our seats absolutely drenched in sweat, completely dishelved and in shock. Not surprisingly people were in our seats - so after some prodding they left we sat down and prepared for our 16 hour journey!
Half way through the evening, we were joined by two othe travellers taking the the other two bunks in our area. One was an elderly gentleman called 'Mr Malcolm' who was a retied automotive engineer, the other was a rotund man in his mid 50's. He proudly- upon finding out Ed was a lawyer in London and asking him his monthly salary- produced his business card which introduced him as a retired army major, practicing criminal lawyer, author of two legal text books, and leader of a political party. He rarely stopped talking to Katherine and declared that she would start a
charitable foundation or something in the nearby area and that he would secure a plot of land for her at a good price. His cell phone, which had two sim cards in it, which could be switched between with ease (Chinese made), rang constantly with calls from his staff, and towards the end of the journey he declared as a matter of fact that there would probably be a crowd of several hundred at the station waiting to meet him. A charming, but somewhat immodest fellow. One of the things he did recommend we saw was St Thomas' church, which we actually did manage to see.
Chennai
Our purpose for going to Chennai was to spend a week at a peedam (a place of worship) that is based upon a guru named Amma, believed to be the living form of 3 Hindu godesses. Katherine's good friend Heather and her family have been devotees of Amma for over a decade and after years of hearing about Amma she was very curious to check it out. Ed and I have decided to not publicly write about our experiences at the peedam as it was personal and better told in person.
The smells....
All open water seems to reek - our lovely guide lite incents for us You can read a bit about it on the peedam's website: www.sripuram.org
Once experience that was amazing was volunteering at the children's school run by Amma - the children were adorable and sweet and so keen to learn. Susan was a devotee staying at peedam with us and her and Katherine hit it off right away, she had taken a particuarily keen interest in the children's school and had it completely cleaned and re-painted. Susan and Kat went over to play with kids, color and sing with them. It was really sweet as many of them hadnt even seen crayons before and didnt know how to use them, so it was a lot of do what I do - that afternoon was a highlight of the visit.
We had little time in Chennai itself. We tried to head to the St George's area of the city- where a number of state and colonial buildings are clustered together inside the old fort walls of the city- but it was shut for the day (at 4pm). An enterprising rickshaw driver ju mped on us and took us to a church which turned out to be St Thomas. It is only one
Amusing brand use
Do you think Tetkey could market bottledwater in the UK? of three churchs to be built on the burial site of an apostle- the other being obviously St Peters at the Vatican and some other one in Spain we forgot the name of. Watching hundreds of Indians inside a huge christian church in the sweltering evening heat, saying prayers in Tamil was a bit surreal.
That night we managed to find a bar near our hotel (which despite being probably 4 star and having an amazing restaurant on the roof and being open 2 years, had no alcohol licence! Ed claims that when checking out the next morning on the comments card they gave him he suggested they bribe a local official to give them one) to serve us a drink. The manager reassured Katherine that she could hace a cosmopolitan and that they knew exactly what was in it. 15 minutes later one of the most disgusting drinks we've had in our lives arrived. It seems the bar had no cranberry juiceand they used grenadine instead.........obviously we said we liked it very much.
So our India trip has now officially come to a close - we were so glad to have spent 6-weeks here - as you've
Ed's new Indian Gear
They wear their pants a little differently over here... read it hasnt all been comfortable but overcoming barriers we never imagined we'd be able to and actually funneling ourselves across such a huge country is a feat unto itself (and not killing each other in the process 😊 On balance, India is a lovely country, though, and generally full of some of the most lovely and generous people we've ever met. Apart from rickshaw drivers, that is. We're glad we did India first and are also glad to leave onto the more tranquil lands of SE Asia!
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Donna & Bob
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Hello to you both. Sounds like it's been a trip and a half. Loved reading about your travels and look forward to more. Take care.