Okay so my second India blog…
The second morning in India me Lis and her roommate Kerry decided to go find an internet café so we could skype or just get on real internet and what not. So we walked around for like 45 minutes trying to find an internet café. It wasn’t as easy as we thought it was and finally we just decided to get a rigshaw and have him take us. First we had to get to an ATM though so we could get money out. We got to an ATM and my card worked but Kerry and Lis’s card didn’t. We tried another ATM and the same thing was happening. This seemed really strange so for some weird reason we decided it was a major emergency and to head to the US conciliate, which was like 15 minutes away. So we get there and go through major security and finally get inside and the guy we talked to (who is fully American and born in American) was the same guy who had come to give a diplomatic briefing to our ship community the day before. He was very nice and told Kerry to try to use the ATM in their building which sure enough worked. While Kerry was figuring out all of her card stuff me and Lis asked if they had internet and sure enough, they had a full library upstairs with internet that costs like 25c for an hour. We only spent like 20 minutes on the internet but it was good enough for me.
So after that we got back into the rigshaw and headed back to our ship because Kerry, Lis, and all my other friends had an FDP at 1:00. It took us a lot of firm No’s to finally get across to our driver that we don’t have time to go to any shops and especially the ones he’s getting points at. I think he was pretty mad but we had to get back so we didn’t really have a choice.
We made it back in time for their FDP and I just hung around the ship for a few hours cause I needed to pack and get ready and prepare myself for my adventure across India.
Lis, Lauren, and Steph got back later that night and we left the ship around 7, we were also joined by our friend Patrick who was traveling with us too. We were basically kicked off the ship because it was leaving at 8ish to sail to the other port where we were meeting it.
So we got off the ship and hired a taxi driver that took us to our bus station. Uh and on the way to the bus station our taxi driver (keep in mind the previously stated driving situation in India) hit another car. Yes we were in a car accident and all that came of it was my driver getting out and looking at the damage and then both cars just moving on and making their ways elsewhere. I guess it’s just not that big of a deal in India or something to hit a car and just bounce. It pretty much was not helping me considering I was already EXTREMELY anxious about this whole India traveling thing to begin with.
So anyways, we got to the bus station at like 9:30 I think (at night) and it was so crowded and so many buses and I had no idea what we were doing or where we were going and I pretty much had a mini panic attack. I started to cry and needed to sit down because I was so overwhelmed with pretty much anything and everything that India is all about. But Patrick had previously visited the station and he was helped and got our tickets and once we had them I was a little less anxious..I guess. So we had time to kill and decided that we would hang out at this bar that was next door inside a semi-nice hotel. We noticed that we were the only women in this bar..or any bar I went to in India for that matter. But we had a drink and some snacks before we got to spend the next 9 hours on a sleeper bus.
So we got on the sleeper bus and we got the very back row. It had 5 connected seats which worked out perfect for us. I sat in the corner by the window and unfortunately that and the other corner were the only chairs that didn’t lean back. But let me tell you, the guy in front of me fully let me know his chair was capable of leaning back and he took full advantage of that fact that it did. I slept maybe an hour on the bus. They turn the lights down like they would on an airplane flight but they had a tv in the front that was playing the loudest Indian movie with so many loud fighting scenes. The AC was either blasting causing us to freeze, or it wasn’t on at all causing us to die of heat. Needless to say a few stops and 9 hours later we FINALLY made it to Madurai (Google it).
Seeing as we were on a bus for 9 hours, our first priority was getting to a bathroom. We went to the first one we could find and it was pretty sketch and we had to pay for it. Pretty much it’s a hole in the ground but a little more dressed up…but not really (don’t worry I took a picture). I remember seeing a toilet like this from when Brian studied abroad and thinking, “oh god if I ever had to use one of those, well, I just wouldn’t”. Looks like I’ve changed a bit.
We were also hungry too. So we just picked a place that looked semi decent that wouldn’t hurt our intestines too much. We found this veggie place (which most places are in India) and sat down there. There was a worn sign that said they only use mineral water which was a good sign. But it was a bad sign when I could see their process of cleaning dishes. But whatever I tried really hard not to let it get to me and kept layering on hand sanitizer. I think I used a total of like a half of a large bottle of that stuff during this trek. But I ordered a plane dolsa and we got this donut thing that tasted fishy for free. The food was pretty good and didn’t even end up hurting our intestines.
After that we kind of just wanted to walk around. So we did. We ended up in some rural neighborhood and market area that only locals would know about. We met a man from Georgia there and he asked if we were lost and needed to get back to the main road but we told him no and that we liked roaming around seeing the real India.
It’s just so mind boggling to see such poverty but such happy people. We all had our cameras out some of these people had never even seen a camera before and had no idea what it was or how to work it. They were absolutely amazed when we’d ask to take a picture and then get the playback and show them their own picture. It was so great to see how happy it made them. The people photograph so well and look genuinely happy. Steph brought a huge thing of stickers that she started handing out to the kids and at one point I think we were the talk of the town cause we had kids following us and tracking us down for a sticker everywhere. We even gave some away to the adults. They just loved it.
After wandering around for a while and sweating out everything we took in, we decided to get a rigshaw to take us to a temple. Madurai is known for temples so we figured we should see one while we were there.
The temple was pretty and was set in front of what kind of look like the red rocks back home and we were told that their god lived or had been to the top of the rocks that were set behind the temple. We were snapping pictures and this guy saw us an invited us to come to his rooftop in order to get a better picture. We accepted and got some great pictures and a great view over part of the town. After we were done doing that we decided to walk to the market area down below. We bought some cool hand made Indian bracelets and Patrick got a freshly cut coconut drink that was pretty sweet and he chopped it open and stuck a straw in it right in front of us. At this point it was getting towards lunch time and we wanted to find another trustworthy restaurant.
We found a place that was actually awesome. You pay upfront and pay like a little more for an AC room. Though, we came to find out it’s not really AC it’s just open windows but we still had a fan with a breeze from the windows and we were upstairs around like one other family which was nice. We had the best meal here. It was a thing where you eat with your hands and the guy serving us was hilarious. We got a dolsa on a banana leaf and tons of sauces and rice to mix with the sauces and some potato mixture too. Pretty much you have to have the mindset that you’re a 2 year old in a highchair playing with your food before you shove some sort of half solidified mixture half soupy into your mouth for an amazing taste. It was great! And this guy just kept coming over and giving us more sauce and more food from this bucket they keep it in. We made a huge mess but it was great. He gave us this shot type thing of sweet stuff (I wasn’t a fan) and we didn’t know what to do with it so he showed us by shoving the whole thing down Patrick’s throat haha. We also got bananas for dessert (yes, this is why American’s are fat, we don’t eat a mini banana for dessert). But their bananas are so fresh and delicious. I don’t think I’ll ever eat “American” bananas the same!
The meal was delicious but we had made a deal earlier with this travel company that we would rent a car and driver from them so they could take us to a small mountain town called Kumily (seriously Google that) ((AND visit, it’s gorgeous and amazing)). So we got this nice air-conditioned SUV and this crazy driver and his girlfriend to take us there. It was a gorgeous scenery throughout the ride and we had a really fun time driving. And I’m pretty sure we almost died 6 or 7 times with this guy’s driving skills at hand.
I think the drive was like 3 hours, but it went by really quick. Once we arrived in Kumily we walked down this main entrance street and we were approached by this man who lives there and goes by the name Charlie. He was awesome. He showed us a brochure of all this stuff we could do and knew of where we could stay and said he would pretty much be our tour guide for our stay in the town.
This town has a small town feel and I kept telling my friends that I would compare it to Durango. Anyone who loves Durango would love this town most definitely. So Charlie took us to where he thought would be a good place for us to stay. We walked up this side road which was kind of windy and it had a bunch of hotels and hostels and a few homes that locals lived in too (which were actually pretty nice). We finally got to our place (after seeing 3 other SAS kids, how they found that town is beyond me). Our hotel, first of all, was called the Rainbow Hotel and it looked straight out of the Bahamas. It was like yellow, pink, orange, lime green. It was awesome. We got to view the rooms before buying (which you should always do) and they we nice. They were also color themed. One we got was bright lime green and the other was bright pink. Obviously we made Patrick sleep in the bright pink room. And the beds were like extra large king beds which were nice too.
We decided we loved it so much we would stay two nights instead of one (we were winging the entire trip, so why not). We planned out our next day with Charlie and then he took us into town (a 5 minute walk) where he told us a few places we could eat at. So we decided to do a little shopping and then head to our new favorite restaurant Lord’s. It has tons of different types of food and all of it was SO good. Some of us got banana pancakes (they’re made with their locally grown organic mini bananas). And they were by far the best pancakes I’ve ever had. So we ate there and decided we would go out for a little bit after that.
We went back to our hotel room to “get ready” which consisted of bathing in baby wipes. After we were ready, we headed out to this bar that was next to one of the nice hotels in Kumily. Me, Lis, Lauren, and Steph were, again, the only girls who were in the entire bar. I guess in their culture its not really appropriate for women to be out at night like that-which actually was similar in other cultures I’ve seen as well.
-oh I forgot to add that I changed shoes and noticed at this point that I had kankles. Real nice. My ankles were the size of my upper thigh pretty much. It wasn’t just mine though; all of our ankles were like this. We think it is because we slept sitting up on the sleeper bus. But who knows. I do know it really bothered me at the time though. And of course my friends were saying the size of my ankles swollen were the size of their ankles normally yadda yadda-ah how I love when people point out how tiny I am, never gets old.
After being there a while we were so tired, seeing as we slept like 1 hour the night before so we headed to bed. Plus we had an early morning and a full day in front of us.
We woke up the next morning and got some breakfast at the hotel and ate on our balcony which overlooked a lot of Kumily- very beautiful. We met Charlie at like 9ish because we were going to RIDE ELEPHANTS!! He got us in this off-roading jeep that took us to the elephant park. Once we got there we were literally up close to these elephants and we could even see a baby one off in the distance. We all got up on this platform and divided into two groups (3 on each elephant) to begin our ride. Me, Lis, and Steph rode on a male elephant and I couldn’t pronounce his name for the life of me but he was so giant and beautiful. His skin was really rough and the hairs on his skin were very course. We got to go on a half hour ride through the Indian mountains, which really looked more like rainforest. It was really neat, our guides didn’t speak hardly any English but as wed pass by something theyd tell us what it was. We saw pepper, jack fruit, coriander, coffee beans and more. We even got to try them too.
After our ride was over, we got to go over to where the baby elephant was. He was chained down by his feet which was really sad but I guess that’s what they have to do to keep them from running away and not keep them in an enclosed cage. I got to pet the baby and feed him some sugar. He knew we were coming over to feed him and he started dancing it was so cute. I went to pet him and he brought his trunk up and sniffed my arm with it. It was like something from a movie-it was really awesome and it really makes me want to work with animals for good now.
So after that we watched a man bathe an adult elephant and watched the elephant get water in its trunk and then spray it on itself-just like a movie once again. Then Charlie told us we were going on a little hike. It was like 10minutes up to the main road but it was through the forest/mountainous area. It was so neat and this is where we got to taste all the foods and spices I talked about earlier. We also got to try papaya which was cool. The last time I had fresh papaya like that was in Hawaii when I was little. So we waited on the side of the road for a rigshaw that took us back in to town where we got lunch at Lord’s again.
We brought Charlie this time and treated him to partially thank him for all he had done for us. This time at lunch I got fried rice and veggie spring rolls.
Sidenote: ever since my anthropology of food class I have for the most part become a vegetarian. I never thought this would happen but it definitely has. Though, I will definitely be getting a giant cheese burger sometime after I get home no matter what.
Okay, so the food was really good-again. We didn’t have too much time to eat though because we were now going to get a ride down to the Periyar Tiger Reserve. And let me save you the anticipation, no we did not see any Tigers. But we did make our way down there and met our guide, who actually had really good English and he led us around this park. It’s pretty much like a giant hike and I believe they said it was 3 or 4 miles long. It was led through the Indian mountains, which looked more like rain forest. It was really beautiful and though we didn’t see tigers or wild elephants, we did see monkeys, birds, butterflies, some sort of buffalo deal, and different spices like nutmeg in its original form.
After our trek we headed back into town and rested up for a little while and got ready for our last meal in Kumily. We had Charlie join us because we wanted to treat him in order to partially thank him for all he had done for us in the past 2 days. He was probably the kindest person I had met in all of India. He wasn’t even out to make a profit from us; he just wanted to educate us on his town and the people. It was truly amazing and I would come back and stay in Kumily any day
He took us to this super nice restaurant that, I think, his friend worked at. It was in a super new area that looked like a miniature British town of mini condo deals. And they had this place to eat inside of it all. They had great food- I got fish and chips which was soo good. Can’t go wrong with that. And we all got ice cream and milkshakes (we even made Charlie get one). We have all learned that only American’s like sweets as sweet as we do. And yes the ice cream and milk shakes went down fine. (we tried some pretty gnarly food this trip and none of us were affected by us, I think Dr. Morte is trying to scare us).
The meal was done and we decided to say our goodbyes to Charlie. Then we proceeded to do some last minute shopping. I got a shirt and some other stuff. Laruen and Patrick got these coconut monkey things which I fondly refer to as Dust Collectors. So, yeah, we all got some shopping in and decided to head back to the hotel for the night.
We needed to get up at 3:30 the next morning to catch our 4am bus ride to Cochin where we were meeting the ship. So we slept for like 3 hours and woke up and made our way down to the bus. We didn’t have time for breakfast, plus nothing was open. This is where the near 60 bananas Patrick bought came in handy. We had a whole rack of them, it was hilarious and we’d offer them to any India who approached us. They pretty much thought we were crazy.
So I don’t know what kind of bus you’re picturing me on but I should probably describe it. Well on Wikipedia its called a “crowded Indian bus” serious emphasis on the crowded. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Thanjavur_04.jpg) . Yeah, that’s pretty much exactly what our bus looked like. Don’t worry, I had an aisle seat instead of hanging outside of the bus, but let me tell you they pack that bus SO full that you cannot even move your arms.
I was on this bus for a grand total of 6 hours. It took a lot of patience and I almost had another panic attack towards the end but it was worth the experience. Once we got semi-close to where we thought the ship was, we got off the bus and used my google maps in my blackberry to determine where we were. We decided walking wasn’t going to work so we all shoved into a rigshaw and after about 15 minutes and some stand still traffic we FINALLY made it back to the ship. I have never been so happy to see it!
So I did it. I traveled independently across India with no major plans in mind. I’m really proud of myself considering before this I could hardly go anywhere in Durango by myself. I feel fully confident traveling anywhere in America by myself now.
I had this last day in India to do stuff and I will write about that and possibly Mauritius in another blog cause this one is way too long. Hopefully all the lines show up-I hear they aren’t fully showing up on my sight. Don’t know why that is.
I’m currently one day away from Cape Town and I’m really excited!
xx
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