(This post and the one that follows, Mystery Location, are from the blog backlog. I wrote them a few weeks after we visited the places and then forgot to post them. To put them in context, see Cliff Notes, the summary of where I have been lately.)
Kasaragode was one of our great, not-listed-in-the-guidebooks adventures. When we tumbled out of the train, we were struck by the quiet and sense of calmness in the air. A breeze rustled the palm fronds and time didn't exactly stand still, but it certainly meandered at its own pace. We wandered around and the town itself had the same feel as the platform at the station. We figured out that most of the hotels are clustered around the new bus stand and caught a rickshaw.
The air changes. The new bus stand, which doesn't look particularly new at all, is surrounded by huge complexes with hotels and shops. These are definitely new and mostly empty. Our sparkling hotel doesn't seem to have any guests at all, and only about half the storefronts are occupied. We find an Indian Coffee House (a chain restaurant that isn't a coffee house at all but serves decent food) that just had its grand opening the day before in the same building as another just opened hotel and plenty of empty yet-to-open shops. Across the street are several large jewelry stores (jewelry is big business in India), and we wonder how a town this small can support stores so big. From a few construction and business signs and the size of the buildings, it is clear that this is not local investment supporting the growth. The entire area has the feeling of anticipation, of investment and expectation for the future. Both of us are (perhaps morbidly) curious to go back in a few years to see if the investors' gambles have paid off and if Kasaragode has become a destination of its own or at least a transport hub.
Our hotel room is my new favorite. There is a place to sit and type (handy, as I must finish editing my grad school application while we are here). The room is the quietest I have had in India: our giant window looks out over a grassy, wooded area behind the hotel. We fit my mosquito net over one of the windows and sleep with it open that night.
We find some great places to eat in Kasaragode, although the options are limited. The Muslim population is the greatest we've seen yet. The signs on most restaurants in India declare them "veg" or "pure veg". In Kasaragode they are all "non-veg" or at best "veg/non-veg." Even Indian Coffee House, the chain restaurant, reflects local tendencies: the thali, the standard rice plate lunch, is non-veg.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Mystery Location
I have a friend who visited India maybe twenty or thirty years ago. He's one of those seriously-off-the-beaten path, adventurous types. He was so excited when I was planning this trip. He told me I had to visit one of his favorite places, Alappuzha (aka Alleppey), to float along the backwaters of Kerala. Unfortunately, in the time between our travels, the rest of the world has discovered Alleppey, and, as one friend told me, the view from your houseboat will be of billboards and other houseboats, not palm trees or villages. With our selfish desire to visit an as yet undisturbed section of the backwaters, we decided to skip Alleppey and scope out another place. Thus one morning we hopped a bus to a town I won't tell you the name of where we caught a rickshaw to another unnamed location. We wandered along the shore for a bit and found a looonnggg footbridge across to a tiny island. A footbridge, right? No motorized vehicles here. The only path was a single dirt track, which we followed around the edge of the island. All we could see on the far side of the sparkling water was swaying palm trees, and on this side we saw a few locals who seemed rather surprised to see us! We stopped for a while and watched a beetle digging a hole. We found a tiny shop selling a few basic goods. I had already told Martin that if we found a business on this island, we were buying something, anything, no matter what. We had plenty of water, so we got bananas. We tried to chat with the shopkeeper to see if we could hire a boatman. He was thrilled that Martin spoke some Malayalam, but we didn't get much past that. We kept walking.
A few times the path seems to dead end into someone's private home, but we keep spotting where it resumes on the other side and no one seems too bothered by our presence so we keep walking. Eventually we end up in a yard with huge tarps covered with drying coconuts. While we try to figure out if we can continue or if we should turn back, the family spots us and calls us over. I try to exclaim about their abundance of coconuts! Martin actually manages a basic conversation. They must have understood at least some of my enthusiasm because they send me over to pick out some coconut. I get a little piece and happily munch on it, but apparently I didn't pick out the right piece and the man goes to fetch me a better one. He comes back with copra: it looks like a tiny coconut and we aren't sure how to open it. Then he squeezes it with one hand and cracks it open, and we realize the entire hard outer husk has been removed. The concentrated aroma of coconut carries me off to state of bliss. When we eat it, we can taste the sunshine that it was basking in moments before.
Somewhere in the midst of all this, chairs appear in the shade and we are seated. Martin has also communicated what we are doing in India, how he came to speak some Malayalam, and that we are hoping to rent a boat (and someone to row it). A few villagers wander through (following the same path we were on; I feel better knowing that it is ok to follow the path through people's yards). One man stops to talk; Martin again gives our story and asks about a boat. He tells us to wait here, and he'll come back for us. So, we wait.
And wait. And wait. We chat. We sit in amiable quiet and enjoy the day. Martin and I watch a hawk soaring overhead. The women clean little fish. The man takes a nap on the front porch. Several neighboring women arrive. They gawk at us, and then set to work packing the coconuts in burlap sacks, which they carry off on their heads. We ask a few questions about the coconut drying business. They try to explain the process. I gather that the coconuts only dry in the sun for a few days. They also have a barn with a loft and a space for a fire underneath for drying. Tea is served. We get tea and a plate of cookies and sweets, some of which are from a bakery in a town on the mainland. I am, yet again, struck by the hospitality of people we have just met.
We both have that sense that our boatman will be back, that it is just our Western impatience that doesn't believe, but, I admit, we eventually discuss how much longer we should wait and when we should give up. Fortunately, it is just talk, and we continue waiting. We are briefly concerned when the man leaves to sell the now bagged coconuts. We aren't sure if we are supposed to leave too, but the family assures us we should wait for the guy to come back.
Eventually he returned and ushered us off to the waiting boat. He was joined by another boatman and they poled us down the river. It had taken a bit of explaining to get a non-motorized boat. From their perspective, motors mean less work and more speed. From our perspective, they mean noise and pollution. It was another reason we weren't interested in the houseboats of Alleppey. We see all sorts of other boats along the river, but they are all working boats. Large, motorized fishing boats. A wooden rowboat ferrying passengers across to the islands. Small boats bobbing along, apparently unmanned until a swimmer appeared, emptying his net full of clams into the boat. Other boats were poled along so full of wet sand that the sides were just above water level. They are doing this in broad daylight, so we assume it is legal. In Aranmula, we had seen impounded trucks full of sand sitting at the police station, their owners having been arrested for illegally mining sand from the Pamba River at night.
Every time we are within speaking range of another boat or people on the shore, Martin listens to the boatmen explain, in Malayalam, that we have been in India for four months and that Martin speaks Malayalam and that we wanted a non-motorized boat!
We pull up on a sandy peninsula where families are drying tiny shrimp on nets spread across the sand. We walk across to Arabian Sea. I have to at least stand in it (once again my churidar pants are getting a salty bath). I can see that the sand drops away sharply, so I don't go in far. The boatmen look nervous nonetheless and tell me not to go any deeper. The language barrier makes it tricky to promise I won't and to explain why I had to stand in the sea.
The sun is low in the sky on the return trip. They drop us off not where we left from, but at the home of the family where we spent the afternoon. They seem pleased to see us and rush off to pick two fresh coconuts for us. After watching the sunset and enjoying our coconut water treat, we say our farewells and thank yous and reverse our path around the island, over the bridge, onto a rickshaw and then a bus.
With Google Earth and a bit of sleuthing, I'm sure you could figure out where we were, but for now this spot is going unnamed. Unless Martin named it in his blog... hmmm, have to check on that. But in the meantime, he has posted some pictures we took that day, so do check those out.
A few times the path seems to dead end into someone's private home, but we keep spotting where it resumes on the other side and no one seems too bothered by our presence so we keep walking. Eventually we end up in a yard with huge tarps covered with drying coconuts. While we try to figure out if we can continue or if we should turn back, the family spots us and calls us over. I try to exclaim about their abundance of coconuts! Martin actually manages a basic conversation. They must have understood at least some of my enthusiasm because they send me over to pick out some coconut. I get a little piece and happily munch on it, but apparently I didn't pick out the right piece and the man goes to fetch me a better one. He comes back with copra: it looks like a tiny coconut and we aren't sure how to open it. Then he squeezes it with one hand and cracks it open, and we realize the entire hard outer husk has been removed. The concentrated aroma of coconut carries me off to state of bliss. When we eat it, we can taste the sunshine that it was basking in moments before.
Somewhere in the midst of all this, chairs appear in the shade and we are seated. Martin has also communicated what we are doing in India, how he came to speak some Malayalam, and that we are hoping to rent a boat (and someone to row it). A few villagers wander through (following the same path we were on; I feel better knowing that it is ok to follow the path through people's yards). One man stops to talk; Martin again gives our story and asks about a boat. He tells us to wait here, and he'll come back for us. So, we wait.
And wait. And wait. We chat. We sit in amiable quiet and enjoy the day. Martin and I watch a hawk soaring overhead. The women clean little fish. The man takes a nap on the front porch. Several neighboring women arrive. They gawk at us, and then set to work packing the coconuts in burlap sacks, which they carry off on their heads. We ask a few questions about the coconut drying business. They try to explain the process. I gather that the coconuts only dry in the sun for a few days. They also have a barn with a loft and a space for a fire underneath for drying. Tea is served. We get tea and a plate of cookies and sweets, some of which are from a bakery in a town on the mainland. I am, yet again, struck by the hospitality of people we have just met.
We both have that sense that our boatman will be back, that it is just our Western impatience that doesn't believe, but, I admit, we eventually discuss how much longer we should wait and when we should give up. Fortunately, it is just talk, and we continue waiting. We are briefly concerned when the man leaves to sell the now bagged coconuts. We aren't sure if we are supposed to leave too, but the family assures us we should wait for the guy to come back.
Eventually he returned and ushered us off to the waiting boat. He was joined by another boatman and they poled us down the river. It had taken a bit of explaining to get a non-motorized boat. From their perspective, motors mean less work and more speed. From our perspective, they mean noise and pollution. It was another reason we weren't interested in the houseboats of Alleppey. We see all sorts of other boats along the river, but they are all working boats. Large, motorized fishing boats. A wooden rowboat ferrying passengers across to the islands. Small boats bobbing along, apparently unmanned until a swimmer appeared, emptying his net full of clams into the boat. Other boats were poled along so full of wet sand that the sides were just above water level. They are doing this in broad daylight, so we assume it is legal. In Aranmula, we had seen impounded trucks full of sand sitting at the police station, their owners having been arrested for illegally mining sand from the Pamba River at night.
Every time we are within speaking range of another boat or people on the shore, Martin listens to the boatmen explain, in Malayalam, that we have been in India for four months and that Martin speaks Malayalam and that we wanted a non-motorized boat!
We pull up on a sandy peninsula where families are drying tiny shrimp on nets spread across the sand. We walk across to Arabian Sea. I have to at least stand in it (once again my churidar pants are getting a salty bath). I can see that the sand drops away sharply, so I don't go in far. The boatmen look nervous nonetheless and tell me not to go any deeper. The language barrier makes it tricky to promise I won't and to explain why I had to stand in the sea.
The sun is low in the sky on the return trip. They drop us off not where we left from, but at the home of the family where we spent the afternoon. They seem pleased to see us and rush off to pick two fresh coconuts for us. After watching the sunset and enjoying our coconut water treat, we say our farewells and thank yous and reverse our path around the island, over the bridge, onto a rickshaw and then a bus.
With Google Earth and a bit of sleuthing, I'm sure you could figure out where we were, but for now this spot is going unnamed. Unless Martin named it in his blog... hmmm, have to check on that. But in the meantime, he has posted some pictures we took that day, so do check those out.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Fractal Reflections
Hmmm, it is getting harder and harder to keep track of the date and the day... it's Saturday evening and I just discovered that yesterday was Friday the 13th. Some part of my brain must have known... recently I was wondering when the next Friday the 13th was coming... then I thought it was a really random thought to be having.
So, keeping the blog up to date is becoming increasingly difficult. Sorry about that. I have lots of blog posts bouncing around in my head at the moment, but those seem to be stuck unwritten (at this rate I will have entire tomes of blog posts in the Unseen University's library). This one is entirely un-premeditated but has the distinct honor of being, well, written and posted!
We have made it to Varanasi, after a whirlwind of camel treks and forts and crazy colors in Rajasthan. Varanasi, formerly known as Benares (and on some signs I saw today, still called "Banarasi"). We nearly fell in to the Ganges on arrival. (Ganges: pronounced something like /gunguh/ with hard g's). It is big and green and so polluted and holy and the banks are full of life and death and every little detail in between. Our guest house is right Manikarnika Ghat, the main burning ghat (ghats are big cement steps on the banks of a river). Yep, a burning ghat, as in cremation. A dip in the Ganges is supposed to wipe away your sins and dying here is quite auspicious. To that end, Manikarnika Ghat is filled with giant piles of wood and pan-balance scales (like massive scales of justice) to weigh it.
When we arrived, I was exhausted from an overnight train trip (and because I am generally exhausted lately). That afternoon I fell asleep watching the animated Hanuman film, which fetures lots of chanting of "Ram Ram" and "Jai Sri Ram" (as Hanuman, the monkey, is devoted to Ram, an incarnation of Vishnu). In my delirious sleep, I thought to myself, "this city is vibrating with the name Ram...." Later I came to enough to realize that it was real people chanting "Ram Ram satyaha" over and over as they processed under our window. That's the chant of the funeral processions, carrying the body on a garlanded stretcher, as they wind through the tiny alleys of the old city to the river.
It would be pretty easy to get lost here. Fortunately you can always find your way to the Ganges, the goddess of Varanasi, and follow her home, except during the monsoons when her waters climb too high and cover the ghats-- but then again, maybe not anymore... we had lunch today at the "Hotel River View", a family run guesthouse with a "Family Restaurant" (that's literally the name). We sat at one of the two plastic tables with a plastic tablecloth but huge windows that opened onto the river. The proprietor was telling me about the dam built up north on the Ganges. He was pretty angry about it and the effects it has had on the water levels of this sacred body of water. Of course, Varanasi still has daily power outages (and a serious sewage problem).
Oh, right... fractals. Sometimes writing about India feels like trying to put a fractal in to words. Every experience contains the whole, over and over again. As Martin said one day, "I don't write much on my blog because even trying to write one sentence, it breaks apart and branches in ten directions and it just gets too complicated." Every thing is so tied up and connected to every other thing. And little details, tiny discoveries that give me great joy: they are just too complicated with all the background... they either don't make sense or sound totally weird. I'm off to the ghats for sunset.
So, keeping the blog up to date is becoming increasingly difficult. Sorry about that. I have lots of blog posts bouncing around in my head at the moment, but those seem to be stuck unwritten (at this rate I will have entire tomes of blog posts in the Unseen University's library). This one is entirely un-premeditated but has the distinct honor of being, well, written and posted!
We have made it to Varanasi, after a whirlwind of camel treks and forts and crazy colors in Rajasthan. Varanasi, formerly known as Benares (and on some signs I saw today, still called "Banarasi"). We nearly fell in to the Ganges on arrival. (Ganges: pronounced something like /gunguh/ with hard g's). It is big and green and so polluted and holy and the banks are full of life and death and every little detail in between. Our guest house is right Manikarnika Ghat, the main burning ghat (ghats are big cement steps on the banks of a river). Yep, a burning ghat, as in cremation. A dip in the Ganges is supposed to wipe away your sins and dying here is quite auspicious. To that end, Manikarnika Ghat is filled with giant piles of wood and pan-balance scales (like massive scales of justice) to weigh it.
When we arrived, I was exhausted from an overnight train trip (and because I am generally exhausted lately). That afternoon I fell asleep watching the animated Hanuman film, which fetures lots of chanting of "Ram Ram" and "Jai Sri Ram" (as Hanuman, the monkey, is devoted to Ram, an incarnation of Vishnu). In my delirious sleep, I thought to myself, "this city is vibrating with the name Ram...." Later I came to enough to realize that it was real people chanting "Ram Ram satyaha" over and over as they processed under our window. That's the chant of the funeral processions, carrying the body on a garlanded stretcher, as they wind through the tiny alleys of the old city to the river.
It would be pretty easy to get lost here. Fortunately you can always find your way to the Ganges, the goddess of Varanasi, and follow her home, except during the monsoons when her waters climb too high and cover the ghats-- but then again, maybe not anymore... we had lunch today at the "Hotel River View", a family run guesthouse with a "Family Restaurant" (that's literally the name). We sat at one of the two plastic tables with a plastic tablecloth but huge windows that opened onto the river. The proprietor was telling me about the dam built up north on the Ganges. He was pretty angry about it and the effects it has had on the water levels of this sacred body of water. Of course, Varanasi still has daily power outages (and a serious sewage problem).
Oh, right... fractals. Sometimes writing about India feels like trying to put a fractal in to words. Every experience contains the whole, over and over again. As Martin said one day, "I don't write much on my blog because even trying to write one sentence, it breaks apart and branches in ten directions and it just gets too complicated." Every thing is so tied up and connected to every other thing. And little details, tiny discoveries that give me great joy: they are just too complicated with all the background... they either don't make sense or sound totally weird. I'm off to the ghats for sunset.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Happy Birthday!
Happy Birthday, Daddy-O!!
Just a quick post to wish my dad a happy birthday. I won't tell how old he is, but let's just say it's a big one :) It's also a big day here in India: Holi, the color festival to celebrate the start of spring. More on that after I experience it!
Just a quick post to wish my dad a happy birthday. I won't tell how old he is, but let's just say it's a big one :) It's also a big day here in India: Holi, the color festival to celebrate the start of spring. More on that after I experience it!
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Wacky Water
I hate to admit how much bottled water I've been drinking lately (oh, the wastefulness and, if it's anything like the US, bottled water restrictions aren't anything special anyway), but making the best of the situation, here's a list of my favorite brands from the last few weeks:
Safe (are they trying to tell us something?)
Yes
ChampYen
Can... i
Golden Valley (the slogan "From God's Own Country" refers to Kerala's own state slogan)
Indiana (slogan: Be Indian... Buy Indiana!)
Welcome
Ganpati
Amritam (slogan: Pure for Sure, I believe "amrita" means nectar)
Bailley's (I don't know why, but I trust this brand. Might be the professional looking label and bottle.)
Flagon
Vinayak
Kwality Kwencher
Shree (I swear the first time I had this the slogan was "Your Choice", but the bottle I had yesterday said "My Choice"... knockoff? two brands? my imagination?)
Bisleri (by far most popular brand in Mumbai, one of our favs as they have a 5L bottle that can be returned for a refund and-better yet- to be reused!)
Oxyrich (contains 300% more oxygen or something. now if only I had gills)
Aquafina (hey! a familiar name! and it tastes just as bad as Aquafina in the US)
Kingfisher (not just a beer company)
Foster's (ditto)
Aqua G
Intimate (what???)
Panihari (pani = Hindi for water, Hari = name of Vishnu/Krishna)
Holy-Aqua (this is still the best! see Martin's pictures for a photo)
Safe (are they trying to tell us something?)
Yes
ChampYen
Can... i
Golden Valley (the slogan "From God's Own Country" refers to Kerala's own state slogan)
Indiana (slogan: Be Indian... Buy Indiana!)
Welcome
Ganpati
Amritam (slogan: Pure for Sure, I believe "amrita" means nectar)
Bailley's (I don't know why, but I trust this brand. Might be the professional looking label and bottle.)
Flagon
Vinayak
Kwality Kwencher
Shree (I swear the first time I had this the slogan was "Your Choice", but the bottle I had yesterday said "My Choice"... knockoff? two brands? my imagination?)
Bisleri (by far most popular brand in Mumbai, one of our favs as they have a 5L bottle that can be returned for a refund and-better yet- to be reused!)
Oxyrich (contains 300% more oxygen or something. now if only I had gills)
Aquafina (hey! a familiar name! and it tastes just as bad as Aquafina in the US)
Kingfisher (not just a beer company)
Foster's (ditto)
Aqua G
Intimate (what???)
Panihari (pani = Hindi for water, Hari = name of Vishnu/Krishna)
Holy-Aqua (this is still the best! see Martin's pictures for a photo)
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