Advertisement
Published: April 24th 2008
Edit Blog Post
Limping down the road in our big metal box, we slammed into Kollam a mere 4 hours later to the (much celebrated) indifference of the rickshaw drivers. Our painfully hot public bus ride squeezed the sweat from our bodies like juice from a grape. We were graced with a bit of in-flight entertain in the form of an injured man (full arm cast) who stole a bundle of bus tickets from the bus conductor, who, when he realized, begun slapping the previously injured man around. The conductor, after further injuring the injured thief, motioned to the driver to stop the bus and subsequently kicked the man off. Our bus continued on and filled with the chatter of onlookers as everyone tried to figure out what just happened.
Right then, our arrival in Kollam….Rozy, in her persistent defensive posture, threw glares like daggers at all rickshaw drivers as we stepped off the bus just in case a certain rascal got out of line and attempted the scam. We snatched up the first driver we spoke to as he was polite and tossed out a reasonable price to take us to our selected hotel, the Shah International (sounds grand eh?). Shah turned
out to be a little less glamorous than its named implied, however, it was a decent budget spot complete with a balcony (oooooooohhhhhhhhh!!!!), big TV and a very large bed to comfortably align our three bodies.
We set out straight away to get acquainted with our new town and to put an end to growling stomachs. Food joints seemed a bit scarce and we finally found some eats at a place back near the bus station. Carnivorously challenged, the place served up some decent veg fare and the limpest friend bananas on planet earth. We took the rest of the evening slowly visiting the incredibly odd “Shrine of Our Lady of Velankanni”, and returning to our hotel to rest up for our backwater trek the next day. The shrine was for a Christian saint, however, the activity surrounding the shrine looked more like Hindus paying homage to a revered statue of Ganesh rather than Christians praying to a saint. A number of other glass-cased shrines could be seen in cities and villages throughout Kerela, housing colourful figurines of the assumed locally revered.
The next morning, we set out on a mission to find our boat for the day
in order to explore the extensive canal system that runs through southern Kerela. We strolled back to the bus station and finally decided on a 4 hour tour that started um, well, immediately. Assuming that we would be without food and water all afternoon in the hot sun, we quickly scrambled and bought copious amounts of water and snacks in a manner fit for a 2 day journey. Lugging our sack of snacks we hopped on a tuk-tuk and cruised for nearly an hour till we got deeper into the backwaters on a tiny canal system that intertwined Munroe Island. Our tiny wooden boat was captained by a middle-aged Kerelan man along with his nephew (Ajay) who provided some additional English.
In eco-friendly fashion, our captain punted us down a main stretch of canal before turning off into some beautifully green little canals (as narrow as 2-3 meters at some points) canopied with palms, coconuts, cashew, hibiscus, jackfruit, and other assorted trees. We lazily cruised through little villages, waving at kids, snapping pictures, and querying Ajay and his uncle on the flora and fauna encapsulating our little boat. Along the way, we made several stopoffs to witness village activities
such as coir making (coconut husk rope) and boat repairing, and, we also made a couple of stops to drink tea and coconut juice. The boat ride was nice and relaxing and gave us an up-close view of the landscape and daily life that exists in this remote nook of southern India. Four hours later, we arrived back in Kollam with our massive sack of snacks and a bit of daylight left to continue our explorations.
We had our tuk-tuk driver unload us at Kollam Beach in order to get what we hoped would be a redeeming view of the beach…no such luck. The portion of the beach near the entrance was somewhat trash-free, however, a few dozen meters down the coast, the beach was littered with absolutely everything imaginable. A very sad sight to see… what could have possibly been a nice tropical beach utterly destroyed by neglect. We hung around for a while to watch the Indian ladies discretely moisten their lower legs and run from the rushing waves, and, to take pictures of the kids on the beach playing cricket, riding bikes, and hanging out with friends. We quickly became the star attraction of the area
and the overwhelming hordes of kids rushing in to have their picture taken got out of control. When the requests for pens and biscuits swamped us, we smiled, said our “thank yous” and headed back towards the center of town. On a side note, I’d like to say a very special (sarcastic) “thank you” to the tourists who make THEMSELVES feel better by giving away pens and biscuits to kids in small towns. Not only does this teach/reinforce negative behaviours, but it also erodes the charm of these places and, arguably, makes them less desired tourist destinations (ie: potentially less future revenue to keep the community going). If you are inclined to provide economic assistance to the people in these towns, consider donating monies to reputable charities, churches, or other organizations designed to channel funds to projects that actually produce long term benefit to communities rather than short-term gastronomic satisfaction. We actually saw signs in a number of towns pleading with tourists not to give stuff to kids in an attempt to mitigate the negative impacts of tourism on the town. Ok, I’ll stand down from my soapbox now.
Awaking in our ridiculously large bed in Shah International made
MY DEBUT NOVEL AVAILABLE NOW!
Visit me at www.danielshortell.com for purchase information. us feel like the absolute kings of budget traveling, and, brushing my teeth with bottled water amidst such “grandeur” seemed a bit laughable but I did it for consistency’s sake. After washing up, we rickshawed it to our new favorite place…the KSRTC Bus Station to mount our grand coach destined for Kanyakumari (with a stop in Thirvundrum).
STATISTICS
- Flights taken = 9
- Intercity trains rides taken = 15
- Intercity bus rides taken = 34
- Times lost = 18
- Total instances of diarrhea = 6
- Total number of requests for pictures with Daniel = 35
- Total megabytes of pictures taken = 30,980
Advertisement
Tot: 0.148s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 21; qc: 94; dbt: 0.0744s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.3mb
Rani
non-member comment
31 Pics
Yeahhhhh....31 pics....Rani very happy.