It's not always about hustle and bustle blood

I found my way to the bus stop in Mangalore. As usual, my blind stubbornness led me to walk there, over a mile from the centre with my full backpack. I could probably use the exercise. Exhausted, but ready for the next part of the journey, I found a corner, dumped my bag and sat on the floor to enjoy the stares of the local travellers. An older station guard came over and aggressively ushered me off the floor and into the waiting area seats as if to say "you're not part of the riff raff, so sit on the bloody chairs like a normal person". Without an exchange of words, I agreed with his point and moved.

The Eastern monsoon had begun by the time the bus had arrived. A light drizzle turned into the Jaws ride at Universal studios. The water was hammering down across all the bus' windows as if the fire brigade was holding a high pressured hose above us - the viz was zero. The bus driver gave up after a few corners of blind driving, unlike blind flying, the instruments aren't precise enough to juggle the roads of Karnataka.

The gentleman next me, by the name of Kumar, was a pleasant Keralan on the way back to Cochin where he ran the outsourced branch of a British software company. His English was perfect having visited the London branch many times. Travelling with his wife and daughter, they were returning from a religious mini-pilgrimage to a temple near Mangalore for a day's worth of prayer.

The rain eased and we eased out of town. After a pitstop for food, I felt it was a good time to go to sleep. After wishing me a "goodnight!", watching me put my seat back and eye cover, Kumar thought it a reasonable time to watch Indian music videos on his iphone...without any headphones. The immediate inescapability and less immediate inevitability of the tortured cat like piercing shrills of the female singers constructing the four walls of the cell of my mental prison in which my patience and subsequently reasonabless would erode, are laughable in retrospect. A moment of silence would cause me to hesitantly rejoice with the hope of freedom from these acoustic shackles. But my ankles were reshackled a dozen times before I could finally rest peacefully...well as peacefully as you can get on an overnight bus.

I arrived in Cochin where I found some slightly more expensive accommodation than I had been used to, but well worth it. I immediately napped. My malaria tablets have a habit of making my dreams more vivid and overnight trains and buses have a tendency of making reality a little out of grasp, dangerously blurring the distinction, so when I awoke to discover I was still several floors deep in my travelling inferno and not at home, I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed. Regardless, I got on with my jobs, laundry, booking a backwaters tour and buying a ticket to get to Chennai.

After another surprisingly slow struggle, I had managed to secure a day train to Chennai on the coming Wednesday. The relief that I should make my flight was enough to re-energise me for the afternoon. I caught a rickshaw over to the main jetty where I caught a boat to Mantancherry, a few islands away. The mood was far more relaxed in this part of town, clearly an influence of the European architecture from the 16th and 17th century incursions of the Portuguese, Dutch, British, etc.... The Mattancherry Palace/Dutch Museum had some very interesting and well preserved murals depicting the Hindu Trimurti (Vishnu, Shiva, Brahma) and scenes from the Ramayana and Mahabharata. The rest about the maharajas of the area was a little dull.

Around the corner was the local synagogue. After my travels through Israel, I was quite excited to see this. Most interesting was the mini-museum at its entrance that had a dozen paintings depicting the history of the synagogue and the Jews in India. They had arrived in 72 AD after the destruction of the Second Temple by the Romans; this was one of the four corners of the Earth to which the Jews were sent, known at the time as the Malabar coast. They lived relatively peacefully in Kerala for over a millennium and a half until the Portuguese arrived mostly to trade, but also to unilaterally install Catholicism in the country (not that it hadn't already been tried by St Thomas, one of Jesus' apostles who was begrudgingly posted to spread Christianity in India, twice!). They swam between the islands, a rabbi with his wife on his shoulders, to rebuild their lives in Mattancherry.

The synagogue was a little different to many I saw in Northern Israel, but most the same. Same same but different, as they say here. A simple and modest layout, a mysterious curtain on the back wall hiding some famous old scriptures of the Torah and candle chandeliers hanging from ceiling with usual references to the twelve tribes of Israel (e.g. twelve candlesticks).

I got a rickshaw over to Fort Cochin, the other side of the island, the more touristic part of town. It had an increasingly relaxed atmosphere and European architecture (small ground floor, fully detached houses painted white with lots of greenery). I saw the Chinese fishing nets, rarely used nowadays due to their relative inefficiency to modern technology, they are barely a tourist attraction. The St Francis Church lay at the end of a street of mid-range tourist hotels, European cafés and seemingly expat run restaurants.

The East Monsoon struck again and I had to dive into a book shop to find some shelter for an hour. I flipped through a lot of books I wouldn't mind reading and considered buying An Idea of Justice by Amartya Sen, but already carrying several books, one still only half read, I thought best to save my money on this occasion.

The Santa Cruz Basilica was well positioned at sunset to have the red sky behind it, but camera now on the fritz and a cantankerous child standing in all my photos (until I threatened to beat him) meant that I didn't quite get the picture I wanted. On the way back I thought I'd stop in one of the many cafés for some chai and cake...or two. I had an excellent nutella like chcoloate spread (without the hazelnut) mixed with other nuts and fruit in a shortcrust pastry cup. I finally headed back to my hotel in Ernakulum after sunset.

The next day was spent touring the Keralan backwaters. The peacefulness and slow pace of the day was a welcome break from the hustle and bustle of the city. I use this term as a reference to the lads from Birmingham of Indian origin, that joined me on the tour. Dressed almost in an identical uniform of a black tank top, white checkered shorts, black Lacoste shoes, oversized glitzy watches and Ray Bans, the taller, better looking one attempted to console the smaller, fatter one by explaining to him that "it's not always about hustle and bustle blood".

The morning tour of the islands and backwaters on the houseboat lasted four hours. They showed all the locals spices and how they grow naturally. It was interesting to see all the things I'm used to cooking with in the kitchen, out in the wild all within a few metres of each other - especially because I probably wouldn't be able to tell what it is without a label. The afternoon tour was a three hour tour on small canoes amongst smaller canals, but was rained out for a short while. I spent most of the first tour talking to an older American who was working as a consultative economist in Kabul to the Afghan government. We had some very interesting conversation about state and economy building. The latter tour was spent talking to a couple very well traveled lesbians, as friendly as they were butch, they advised me on Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia and China (the latter of which I am seriously considering cutting out of my trip). I can't say they sold China to me.

We got back in the early evening. I ventured out to get dinner only to find either restaurants with little to offer or restaurants full of scam artists. For example, I picked up a menu in one place, before having it snatched away from me and another handed to me...unsurprisingly, the prices were 20% more...so I walked out. It may only be a few rupees difference, but I refuse to be treated like I'm a get rich quick scheme. Principle over practicality. Chennai, or at least the area I was in, has a hole in the market for affordable friendly restaurants. I finally found a place further away.

I was hoping to get on the internet that night to write this very blog post, unfortunately the East Monsoon came in heavy again. I got stuck in the restaurant until it closed, when I got stuck outside instead. The lightening was strikingly close and the rain torrential. We don't get weather like this in Europe.

My patience and irritability on short fuses, I was calmed by watching a young boy playing with his mum, curiously looking over at the white person. His mother smiled and told him to say hello. Shyly, he did. A smile goes a long way. I wish I had met more genuine people like that and less of tourist blood sucking
touts and rickshaw drivers.

Watching the boy cheekily play with his mother by climbing all over her, then laying out flat and not responding to any orders with a big smile, I was struck at how children up until a certain 'culturation' age have a universal culture that allows them to communicate the most basic, genuine and above all else unmistakably clear message (e.g. joy, sadness, pain, etc...). The fact that a cheeky little boy is so endearingly charming to watch and that "a smile goes a long way" regardless of culture, makes me like to think we keep a bit of that universal human nature as we grow older, even if it is watered down or crowded out.

The next day I caught my early 16 hour day train to Chennai. It gave me time to read amongst intermittent naps and plenty of train food.