For the majority of the voyage we have looked forward to
each port with eager anticipation. Every port, except for India. We were
concerned about the heat, the “intense smells” that everyone had warned us
about, and most specifically the spicy food. As some of you know, Jesse has a very strong aversion, some might
even say allergy, to spicy food. As soon
as he takes a bite of anything with a spicy pepper in it, immediately his face
goes numb and the crown of his head begins to sweat. For all of these reasons
we were concerned.
I write this while
floating on a houseboat in the backwater of Kerela, slowly gliding down canals surrounded by palm trees and
banana trees. The coastline is speckled with small huts filled with people
doing their daily chores of washing their clothes in the river and wrangling
their goats and cows. We are sharing
this house boat with 5 other friends who all sit and relax while we watch the
view slowly pass us by. We all chat and eat amazing meals cooked by our private
chef that includes local cuisine including crab and tiger prawns from the
market we bought along the way. Jesse is actually really enjoying the Indian
food (shhhh, don’t tell anyone).
So far Cochin, India has been my favorite port. I am sure it
is some combination of my minimal expectations, my intense distain for the idea
of getting on four flights in 5 days to be able to see the Taj Mahal (instead we
decided to stay close to the ship), the
amazing experiences and people we have experienced along the way, and us
getting better at traveling in general.
As soon as we stepped off the ship we were hounded by people trying to
sell us goods or ride in their tuk tuk for the day. We quickly realized that
tuk tuks are the best mode of transportation ever. Not only are they fun to
ride in and provide a nice breeze to the riders, they also provide a unique
opportunity to get to know some of the people that live in that area. Many of
our friends picked a “tuk tuk guy” who for $10 a day would be waiting for them
when they woke up in the morning, drive them any where they wanted to go, and
sit and wait while you shopped or went to dinner. Our best tuk tuk experience
culminated in us tuk tuk racing the Executive Dean (both of our boss) and his
wife home from dinner one night. Luckily we got the “party tuk tuk” that night
which included party lights, a sound system, and leather seats complete with a
console and cupholders. We took Bob and Abby down, veering into the wrong side
of the road, taking turns at crazy speeds, and catching air as we went over
speed bumps. While obviously unsafe (sorry mom) it was the most fun I have had
on the voyage thus far.
I also was able to take a yoga class while in India. For 300
rupies ($5), I got a two hour yoga class and a vegetarian meal. The yoga class
was taught by someone that could have no other career except to be a yoga
instructor in india. Long black hair,
tied in a pony tail; long white beard, skinny, no shirt, wearing pajama pants.
He taught with a thick indian accent which was hard to understand in and off
itself but even harder with the sounds of India behind it (goats crying, trucks
backfiring, birds chirping, and frogs croaking). He then preached on about how
we are all members of the cosmos and that we need to be prepared to leave this
body behind and only be our consciousness which is what we will take with us
into our next life. We focused on the breath, we focused on stretching, and
focused on poses that he bent our bodies into what would be very illegal in the
united states for fear of being sued. After the class, all 15 of us riding our
“we are one with the world” yogi high, went downstairs into his living room
where his wife was making us dinner. We all took off our shoes and sat in a
circle on the floor. The teacher had us all “ooommmmm” and “shanti shanti” and
then gave us instructions to silently mediate while eating. My inner monologue
went something like this “ok we are going to mediate now, breath in breath out,
wow this food is really good, wait meditate, right, breath in breath out breath
in breath out, wow I am bad at mediating, wait no one can be bad at mediating,
that is a judgment, breath in breath out, wow it is really awkward that no one
is talking right now and we are all eating quietly, I wondering if anyone else
feels awkward (look around) yup the other three people that came with me from
the ship feel awkward, ok don’t laugh, stop laughing, breath in breath out….”
-Gabby
On our third day we rented scooters
to travel up the coast 30 km north to a nearby beach town. We google mapped a
route which, looked simple enough. A
short ferry ride, to a highway, turn right when you come to the only right
turn, then 10 more Kilometers north on beach road. Like we’ve come to learn in India, nothing is
quite as simple as it seams. Getting 4
people and 2 mopeds onto the ferry was no simple task in of it’s self. After queuing up single file amongst a large
number of motorcycles and other more powerful machines than what we were riding
to board the ferry I knew something had to make this process more difficult,
this is India after all. As soon as the
ferry landed, and the hoards of people coming over to our side stampeded off,
the crew ushered a number of cars on to the ferry in a relatively orderly
fashion, allowed all pedestrians to find a spot on the ferry in the shade, ,
then, to the tune of revving motorcycle engines, unleashed the gates of
hell. In signaling the motorbikes that
they were allowed to board, what was once a single file queue quickly
transformed into whirling chaotic race to the death to board this ferry. There were horns, there were yells, there
were screams, and then there was me, slowly pushing my little mo-ped on
board. It was something. When all was said and done, they ferry ride
its self was no more than 4 minutes, the loading and unloading on either end
was no shorter then 15. It was
pandemonium. Upon scooting off that
ferry, we looked for what we thought was a highway on google maps. In 1927 this may have been a highway, but
today, I’d go with, let’s say, smallish kind of paved road through a town with
no stoplights. Yup, that’s a better
description than highway. After finding
what was the only right turn, we turned, though quickly encountered the road
ending into a giant hole. As it turns
out, the road didn’t end there, a small 6 inch wide path had been carved
between the giant hole and the lake beside us.
Luckily the two people walking by made the assumption that the only
reason white people would be on this road would be to go to Cherai beach so
they shoed us along, simply saying “cheari, cherai” and pointing the direction
we were headed. When this road
eventually ended, we turned onto what google maps had labeled ‘Beach Road’, but
should have labeled “A Beach Road”. The
word ‘beach’ was fitting, the word ‘road’ was not. This was a sort of designated path with sand,
stones, goats, and cows blocking the way.
You know, India. A few kilometers down the ‘road’, we made it
to Cherai Beach, and well, lets just say that Beach towns in India are missing
something from what we have to expect in a beach town. The little shops selling floaties were there
Ice cream vendors as far as the eye could see. Lifeguard towers, Check. But looking down the beach you realized two
staples of the beach were missing. One:
Beer. Kerala is a nearly dry state, with
only 23 licensed alcohol vendors.
Apparently Cherai beach didn’t make the cut, because no matter how many
restaurants we stopped into, nary a beer was to be found. Secondly, bathing suits… not a single person on the beach was wearing
a bathing suite. It was strange. The women (though very few) were going into
the water in their full saris, and never for more than a few seconds. The men were in the water either in jeans and
a t-shirt, or just their underwear. I
can’t tell if a boutique Indian bathing suit line would be a million dollar
idea, or a complete bust, either way, the jeans in the ocean just didn’t make
much sense to us. It was India after
all, I guess we just needed to stop asking questions.
O, yah, and for the first three
days I had a Mustache, then I started to get startled every time I would look
in the mirror or a see a picture of myself.
So I shaved it. When in
India…
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