Welcome to Havana, India.

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Our plane screeches onto the tarmac. Just as the lovely lead hostess begins to say, Ladies and gentlemen, we've arrived in Kochin. Please remain seated and keep your seatbelts fastened," nearly everyone on the plane burst from their seats and starts grabbing at hand luggage in the overhead compartments or struggling to reach the as yet unopened door. For my part, I burst out laughing.

The moment we step out of the cabin door, I sense a sea change coming. This is clearly not Delhi. There are no loose cables hanging from the airport roof, no taxi touts screaming prices at us, no chaos. The temperature is warmer and the air languid and thick. Outside the small airport are a few Ambassador cabs, luxury cars from days gone by. After stopping at the pre-pay stand, we search for our cabbie, finding a short, curt, bald man with tiny glasses and a thin, white South American-looking ensemble on. He guides us to his massive Ambassador. The roof and seats are covered in a plush black and gold lining that adds to the sense of old-world gentility. He takes our pre-paid ticket and we speed off into the night.

Marci and I start nudging each-other in the shoulders, our eyes growing wider as we gun it down the highway. What's amazing us is not spectacular monuments or scenes of unimaginable urban squalor. Rather, it's the triumph of the ordinary miracle. If you've never been to India, you might not understand why the two of us might be clucking like two midwestern biddies on their first trip to the big city.

"Ohmigod, look! There are lines on the road!"
"I just saw a turn signal! A turn signal!"
"That motorcyclist had a helmet on! A helmet!"

What shocked and amazed us as we sped through the warm Kerala night was, as Marse perhaps less than delicately put it, civilization. There was commerce, newly-built infrastructure, a distinct dearth of shanty-towns, and a sense of design and aesthetics. Everywhere, were the signs of rampant economic growth. There were massive billboards advertising bridal malls ("Saree Magic"), luxury developments ("with shuttlecock court, pool, and exercise gym, starting at 19,45,000 rupees!"), education ("Prepare for an IT world.") and medical aid ("Come to the Piles Clinic where we specialize in piles!") It was fucking weird. At the time, we had no idea that Kerala was India's richest state. A place with a ninety percent adult literacy rate, a fast-growing tech sector, the least poverty, and the lowest infant mortality rate in the country.

Oh yeah, and they're commies. Kerala is the only state in India that's governed by CPI, India's largest communist party. At first Marci and I assumed that the Communist Party of India must be a group of social democrats, whose aims would be reforms like health care, social welfare programs, workers' rights and the like. But when we wandered by their Madencherry headquarters, the huge Che Guevera poster and a hammer and sickle logo put the lie to that idea. It's an odd, possibly uniquely Indian paradox that the most economically successful state is run by a party that would prefer everyone's earning were regulated.

It was a natural that I was wearing my favourite Industriales (the Yankees of the Cuban league) T-shirt as we rolled into Fort Cochin, our home for the next couple of days. It was as if Castro had jumped in bed with Mahatma Gandhi and they'd given birth to a tiny Southern fishing village. The place was filled with colonial-era architecture, dating back to the seventeen and eighteen hundreds when the Portugese and later the Dutch East India Trading Company ruled Kerala. Fading, water-damaged shades of yellow and sea blue adorned many walls and wood shingled rooves were in abundance. The people were warm and welcoming, particularly our guest house host, Subosh. (A sweet and earnest young man, he even had a suggestion for my lack of mustache growth. Apparently, he had dealt with the same issue and, as "women in India like moustaches," had searched out solutions. There may be hope yet, in the form of oils and special rubs. I just need to "fertilize" as Subosh put it.)

The architecture. The heat. The humidity. The antique American cars. The white cotton shirts. The commies.

The whole place had the feel of Cuba if the capitalist Miami emigres took it over.

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Comments

[Rohit Gupta]

Communist State
Hi mate, i have been following your blogs for a while and enjoying it a lot. Just though i'll let u know that Kerala is not the only Commie run State. West Bengal, which is in Eastern part of India also has a Communist govt for over 2 decades. Cheers.