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Published: June 30th 2008
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The minute my flight touched Indian soil, I felt this exhilaration and nostalgia for my country. It’s still hard for me to decide which country I like the best - my birth or my adopted. I love New York, at the same time, I cannot deny my love for India. This was my first landing in Cochin airport, I usually fly to Bangalore. What a total contrast between both the airports! Though Bangalore is a major IT hub, during my last visit, it was a sea of chaos and confusion and the staff had no sense of discipline. Cochin airport on the contrary, was clean, well-organized with professional staff and smooth procedures. I was really impressed.
We proceeded to claim our baggage, craning our necks to spot our family in the arrivals area. The minute we spotted them, Niki ran over to them and was enveloped in hugs and kisses. I was left all alone to juggle with our luggage, which fortunately did not take long to show up. There was a Honda city car and a Toyota Innova mini-van waiting for me. The drivers took over my trolleys the minute they spotted me and proceeded to load the trunks.
I felt sorry for my husband who had loaded and unloaded my heavy luggage in NY, and was grateful for this luxury. The Innova was very much like the Toyota Sienna, only slightly smaller and not that expensive either. It was good to see a decent mini-van in India’s roads as opposed to the ominous looking Maruti Omni.
I had some work in Emirates office, which was in Cochin City and the airport was in the suburbs. The traffic was maddening, the heat killing and the roads terrible, but I was at my happiest. As the mini-van zig zagged its way into the streets of Cochin, I gazed longingly at the big colorful hoardings on the way that advertised saris and jewelry and couldn’t wait to go shopping.
It took us an hour to reach Emirates office. The office had a token system and pretty female staff dressed in Emirates costumes, but broken printers. Typical Indian setting, something had to go wrong. The lady Derin, suggested that we have lunch and get back in couple of hours, so she can get it done by hand. So off we went to Le Meridian down the street. Le Meridian had
an awesome ambience, with rich décor, a gorgeous pool and lush green lawns. I changed into capris and a cotton shirt and felt more at home. We ordered, relaxed, gossiped, teased, laughed and enjoyed a delicious lunch. Finally I got my work done at Emirates, after mom called Derin 4 times from the restaurant to speed her up.
I noticed that the colonial Cochin that I knew 10 years ago had transformed into a mini-Dubai. MG road was choked with shops and businesses; Seematti, a shop that sold clothes for the entire family was located in an imposing, grandly decorated building. Antique shopping was prime in Jew town; tourists were flocking at the Chinese fishing nets in Mattancherry, watching the catch of the day. Heritage homes were promoting heritage tourism. Cochin was definitely happening!
My 5 week vacation zoomed by in a jiffy. On my return journey, we stopped at Mattancherry to show the Chinese fishing nets to Niki, who had only seen American fishing. I, myself learnt some history as well. The Chinese fishing nets can be seen only in 3 parts of the world - China, Vietnam and Cochin, India, where they were set up as
early as 1350. The beaches of Cochin are beautifully lined with these Chinese nets. These nets are locally known as ‘Cheenavala’. The nets are set up on bamboo poles and are horizontally suspended over the sea, giving an appearance of a huge hammock and are counter balanced by stones tied to ropes. Six fishermen submerge the nets into the sea, wait for a few minutes and raise them in rhythm, maintaining a steady balance as they raise the net out of the water.
The Chinese fishing nets have become a very popular tourist attraction, their size and elegant construction is very photogenic and the slow rhythm of their operation is quite hypnotic. In addition, catches can be purchased individually and taken only a short distance to a street entrepreneur who will cook it. We browsed through the fish market and I was surprised that my daughter wanted to hold the crabs, lobsters, baby sharks and other beautiful fishes that the fishermen caught and I couldn’t resist clicking a few shots of her. Smelling like the fish, we proceeded to our next stop - Jew Town.
The quaint old Jew Town at Mattancherry was a perfect place to rummage
for fragments of history. The town had an overwhelming feel of melancholy, being abandoned by its own people, the Jews, and walking through the narrow alleys was fascinating as well as amusing to find what meant ‘antiques’, was not really antique but exact replicas ‘made antique’. If my great grandmothers were alive, they would be tickled to find that the varpus, chembus, wooden spoon holders, old cash boxes, rice measures and spice boxes of yester-years now occupy pride of place as treasured antiques. The reason being that modern living rooms are showcasing old kitchen utensils as objects d’ art!
Somewhere in the fourteenth century Jews began fleeing Cranganore and wandered into Cochin. And Jew Town was built on the site granted to them by the Rajah of Cochin in 1567. After living in this town for almost four hundred years, trading prosperously and even waging wars with the Portuguese, in the 1950’s the Jews began to migrate to Israel and by the 1980’s there were only a handful left in this town. But the name ‘Jew town’ stuck.
The string of antique shops has a clutter of objects piled precariously and the disorderly array makes it history’s junkyard.
Kerala’s ayurvedic massage platforms are now longish coffee tables At Pappali’s Antiques Shop, the Kerala palanquins and the Kerala doors with shutter and frame with the intricate manichitrathazhu are gorgeous. The Jew almirah with colored glass is an 18th century piece of workmanship. The ink jars and the alcohol bottles left behind by the Dutch is added to the junk pile. Colorful wooden cow heads that are used in temple processions during Onam, lined the antique shops.
Long ago before the colonial crowd arrived on these shores the Chinese were peacefully trading with Kerala. The Chinese fishing nets, Chinese Jars, Chinese wok etc. left behind by these traders is the remnants of a trading activity that took place over five hundred years ago. The Chinese Jars made of porcelain and clay are beautiful collector’s items and the big Chinese glazed jars with dragons embossed on them are period pieces that cannot be exported. It is believed that the Chinese brought water and oil in them and the bigger jars were used to balance the galley ships and on their return they carried spices. Every old Kerala home had the big and small Chinese Jars, which were used to store
salted mangoes, tamarind, salt etc.
We bought tickets for the sunset cruise at the harbor and set out at 5:30 pm. We passed the Cochin skyline with a view of Marine Drive and into the backwaters of the Arabian sea. We passed numerous small and large houseboats, steamers ferrying people, cars and buses and the Cochin shipyard. There were many war ships from Indian Navy anchored at the naval yard. We moved towards Rajiv Gandhi Container handling terminal. This terminal with modern container handling cranes and equipments has improved the efficiency of the port and reduced the average waiting time for ships to load and unload.
The famous Bolghatty Palace, located in Bolghatty Island was on our right and to our left was the Willington Island. There is a boat kept at a park on this island which has the honor of having three prime ministers of India as its passengers - Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi. Sun was slowly diving into the sea. It was an entirely different experience from the Desert sunset. Passing more colorful fishermen in fishing boats cleaning their fishing nets and retiring for the day, the cruise ended back in the harbor.
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