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Published: January 28th 2007
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I finally managed to drag myself away from Varkala. And it was a real drag! My last night in Varkala was fabulous. I went to see the Kathakali dancers who did an amazing performance of a fable about a demon who falls in love with a mortal, so she disguises herself as a beautiful girl. She proposes marriage to him, but when he refuses her she turns back into a demon and he saws off her breasts. The makeup they wear is amazing, all made from powders of stones mixed with coconut oil. And they put some sort of herb in their eyes that makes the whites turn red and blood shot looking. The total effect is quite amazing. Before they do the play they do a demonstration of how facial gestures are used to portray different emotions. It is quite fantastic the skill they have at isolating different parts of the face! Most of the dance is about the face and body postures. Very fun to watch.
After that I went out for dinner with a new friend, Nithya and ended up staying up drinking and visiting way too late considering we had to leave for the train at
6:00 AM the next morning. Luckily Nithya is my travel agent and the one who had to get us to the train the next morning and was sympathetic to my extremely tired demeanor as I dragged my butt to the train station. Therese and I both fell asleep on the train and I was awoken by suddenly as Therese shook my shoulder and said we were leaving our stop. Sure enough the train was starting to pull away from the Allepey train station so we grabbed our bags and ran for the door. Some young kid told me to throw my bag and then jump, so I did. The train was starting to move pretty quickly by then, and I remember hearing him shout "Be Careful!" as I was jumping out the door. I thought it was a rather impressive landing myself, complete with shoulder roll, and only a couple bruises and scrapes to show for it. Therese jumped after me and the train was even going faster by then, and she was wearing her pack! Ouch. But luckily no injuries. It was like a movie stunt! I have new appreciation for those people who do that for a living.
We grabbed a cab to the guest house through which we had booked our house boat. They provided me a lovely breakfast and found Therese a place to get a good massage after her crazy leap. I spent the morning visiting with a lovely couple from Sweden who were traveling with their two teenage sons. What a great thing for kids to see instead of the typical theme parks and tourist resorts. They were suffering a little bit of internet withdrawal though. We took a cab most of the way to the boat, but there was road construction so we had to walk part of the way. Our crew carried our luggage and I felt so bad! It was hot out and the bags were heavy. We later found out that the sweet little man carrying Therese's bag on his head was our captain for the trip. And he was a bit of a comedian, even though he couldn't speak any English. Just the sound of his laugh would make me start giggling.
Our boat was very nice, if not as luxurious as many of the other floating palaces on the river. We went past house boats that
had two full stories, air conditioning and big screen TV's. Somehow I don't think they were really experiencing the backwaters the way we did. We had a crew of three, our charming captain, the mechanic and our cook. The cook is the only one who spoke much English, and he did a lot of translating for us. And he could really cook! The food was amazing, fish and chicken and vegetable curries. Snacks of fresh and fried fruits. Chai and lemonade. We were absolutely spoiled.
And then all around us were the backwaters. This is one of the most amazing construction works I have ever seen. They took a huge lake and built dikes all over it to create river type canals and rice fields. Brilliant. Particularly when you think of all the people that this project will feed for hundreds of years. The people on the river live simple and happy lives. The children all go to school by boat. They would chase after our boat along the shore asking "Aunty? Pen?". Apparently they collect pens from all the passing boats. At one of the villages we stopped in I bought a box of pens to give out.
At one point we stopped at the site of a Catholic church that is of historic significance here. It was founded by the first Indian to be canonized, and he did amazing things for the area. He introduced schools that were allowed all castes to attend, old folks homes, religious communities for men and women, printed the bible in Tamil, etc. They had preserved his house and build a church around it. It was so strange to hear the mass in Tamil, the cadence of the familiar phrases was so different and so familiar at the same time. On the 10 minute walk to and from the church, our cook pointed out all the different plants growing along side. We passed a mango tree, cashew tree, rice fields, okra plants, coconut palms, banana trees, and more. This place is so fertile with such a variety of food growing here it is amazing! No wonder it is one of the most wealthy states in India, between the natural beauty and the abundant agriculture.
For our two days and nights on the boat we did very little except eat, read, visit, gaze at the surroundings, painted my feet and hands
with mehendi (which I bought in a village for 5 rupees = 13 cents), and napping. The only bad part was the insects. Therese was bitten like crazy by mosquitoes and I was attacked by something that we think may have been bed bugs! At least they don't hurt or itch, but my legs look awful! They are just a mass of small red welts. They seem to accentuate the bruises and scrapes from the train jumping. So now I am taking antihistamines and rubbing some sort of cream on them in hopes of returning to normal and not scaring off everyone. At least I brought a few sets of salwar/chemise so I don't have to show my lovely legs to anyone.
Well, off the boat and on to new adventures.
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lisa
non-member comment
offivially envious
ok, I am NOW jealous!! That boat looked like TONS of fun!! I wish I were having the adventure you are having! What a wonderful way to travel!!! I am soooo jealous!!!