Day 12

                            Day 12 :   BANG!

As if I had gone ten rounds with a sumo wrestler, that was how I felt when I woke this morning, my body was aching all over after a rough nights sleep. I could only remember waking a couple of times in the night, but felt as though I had hardly slept at all.
A quick look around the cabin confirmed that Nick was already up and out on the porch waiting for the sunrise. I went out to join him just as soon as I could lift my sore limbs out of the bed.
It was just after 6.a.m and the start of another day for us, it was about half way through the day for the boatmen who were already moving about on the water.

The aches and pains of my body were only a temporary thing, within a few minutes my body felt like it belonged to me again, and I was soon ready to go another ten rounds, but hopefully not with another sumo wrestler. This time I wanted to wrestle with Claudia Schiffer.
The sunrise was really something as it rose high above the palm trees on the opposite bank, making the early rise worth it.

Around seven Vijay called us to breakfast, and again the old man who worked as the chef did not disappoint us with the fare on offer. It was nothing more spectacular than omelette and toast followed by some fruit, but it tasted just fine to both of us.

Vijay informed us that he had arranged for his friend to drive us to Cochin, and that he would be waiting outside for us around 9.30. This gave us the best part of an hour and a half to shower and pack our rucksacks.
As we were leaving Vijay, the old chef and another man we had ever seen came out to wave us off. After settling up the bill we gave Vijay and the chef a tip, but not the other man wearing the blue shirt, who I'm sure was only shaking our hands to receive some money. He probably would have done had he let go of Nick's hand from a handshake that seemed to last for ever.

The taxi was not yet there when we came out off the Palm Grove, we stood around for a little while talking with Vijay, next to the little wooden shack that was the village store.
I saw a white car approach but never thought it would be for us, this was not the usual Ambassador taxi, nor did it have any distinguishing signs on the bodywork to indicate that it was a taxi.
The car was not too dissimilar to the old mark two cortina that Ford used to make years ago. Vijay introduced us to his friend the driver, who was obviously not a taxi driver and was simply doing this trip for the money, which I'm sure he would share with Vijay. The price we had been quoted for this trip was a little over the top, but it was hardly worth arguing over the difference.
No problem to me, as long as he got us there in one piece we did not mind who he was, or the car he was driving. This chap seemed pleasant enough, but said nothing all the way down to Cochin.
It was quite obvious by the sedate way he drove that this car was his pride and joy, and there was no way he was a taxi driver. On the dashboard was a small plastic statue of the Virgin Mary, leading me to assume this man was another one of Keralas many Catholics.
The seat covers were a bit of a give away too, what taxi driver would kit his car out with white cotton seat covers?

The journey down to Cochin took just under two hours and passed by quietly as we drove the narrow winding roads of the backwaters, through endless coconut groves, banana plantations and rice fields.
Getting nearer to our destination we checked the local town map to try and assist the driver to locate the hotel we had chosen, he was having a little trouble negotiating the small town roads.

BANG! Jesus! I nearly jumped out of my skin. I had seen the lorry coming the other way and thought it was going to be a tight squeeze, but didn't worry when the driver kept going, confident he could get past and there was no collision to be felt.

I looked around me to check what had happened, Nick was sitting there a little stunned, a small amount of blood trickling down his forehead, but I could not see any broken windows or glass anywhere!
I thought the window had been smashed, but it was not this that had cut him, what had happened was the lorry coming the other way had clipped the drivers wing mirror, and the shattered glass had come through the open window hitting Nick in the face. Luckily for Nick he was wearing his glasses, which saved him from getting these splinters in his eyes.

Our driver did not even stop; he simply shook his head, with a stupid looking smirk of embarrassment on his face as he pulled the remains of his mirror in. If there was ever a time I wanted to give someone a smack in the mouth, now was that time. There was not one hint of an apology and no recognition of the damage done to Nick's head.

The stupid smirking little driver had put our lives on the line rather than pull over slightly to allow the lorry a little more room!

When I think about all the car journeys we have made in India, with all the hair raising moments we've had, I suppose it was only a matter of time before something happened.
Today was that day, thankfully no one was seriously hurt, but we had come within a few inches from being wiped out.   And to make it even worse we were in an unlicensed taxi, not that this would have made any difference, as I would imagine there is very little in the way of insurance for passengers no matter what car your in.

The driver said he would wait outside the Delight Tourist resort while we checked it out. "No don't worry you go, if it's no good we will get a rickshaw" we told him.
Once out of this smirking driver's car there was absolutely no way we were going to get back in.

As it turned out the Delight Tourist resort was just what we wanted, nothing to grand, just the basic clean room with two beds and bathroom. And as an added bonus the man who ran this place spoke perfect English making things a little easier to sort out.
A Dutch built colonial building situated on the corner of the old parade ground in Fort Cochin is hardly what I would call a tourist resort, this place was more a nice little guesthouse run by a friendly family.

Consisting of seven guest rooms with a well tended, but small garden this was a perfect choice as it was only 500 metres or so from the sea front, yet far enough away to avoid the hustle and bustle.
Fort Cochin is the main historical tourist area of Kohci (Cochin) situated near the sea front and surrounded by numerous smaller islands. The busy town of Ernakulam can be reached via a road bridge or ferry and is situated to the east of this area.

Many different nations have at one time or the other ruled this part of Kerala, which was of great importance due to the spice trade and it's easy access from the Lakshadsweep Sea.

The first peoples to colonise the area were the Arab and Jewish spice traders who arrived around 01 A.D.
Then came the Chinese who were here in the time of Khublai Khan, they brought with them there cantilevered fishing nets, that were very sophisticated for the time.

The area is still famous today for these nets, which are still used today, strung out along the beach here at Cochin and are responsible for attracting a great many tourists. These nets are all wooden construction with rocks tied to ropes at the end to act as the balance for the cantilever arm that drops and raises the net into the sea. Teams of men operate these nets virtually round the clock, and like nothing better than to get tourists to join in with them when they haul in the catch. They then try to sell you the fish (if any) you have just caught.

The Portuguese came to the area around the early 1500's and are responsible for a lot of the architecture still found in the area. St Francis church is the oldest recorded Church in India and is situated at the end of the parade ground near to where we were staying. This church was built by the Portuguese settlers in 1503 and is still in regular use today by the local Catholic community.
Around the the 1660's the Dutch took over, staying for around 100 years before being ousted themselves by the British, who in turn took over the control of the thriving spice trade.

After settling in we booked some tickets with the Delights owner for that evenings performance of the traditional Keralan dance form known as Kathakali, we also booked some tickets for a backwater tour the following morning. While it may have been cheaper to book these tickets ourselves, it was definitely a lot less hassle, and I suppose the lazy way out, but we did not have too long here in Cochin and wanted to get as much done as possible.

We walked towards the sea front in anticipation of our first look at the famous fishing nets. It was only a couple of minutes walk, but we still had to fend of a young tout who told us he was an art student who was displaying some of his work at a local emporium. The deal was he would get extra marks if he could get people to visit. Not now we told him, maybe later!
"You promise" he inquired.
"Yes, I mean no, well maybe" I said trying to be as non-committal as possible.

Crossing Nehru square to the beach we could see that the place was getting some repair work carried out to the flagstone walkways, which was encouraging as it was in a bit of a state.
The beachfront was all wooden shack fish shops selling the local catch fresh from the nets and fishing boats that operated locally.

"What am I going to do with a 10lb fish" I said to the shopkeeper, who was trying desperately to convince me to buy. "You can get it cooked just there" he said pointing to another little shop.
"No thanks I don't eat fish" was my answer to this, which he reluctantly had to accept as a plausible reason not to buy from him. At the moment a 10lb fish was about as useful to me as would be an ashtray on a motorbike! I had not even lied to him, as I truly don't like fish.

Disappointed is the only way to describe how I felt when I saw the fishing nets for the first time. I had a picture in my mind how they would look, having seen some really nice pictures of them in books. Admittedly the pictures in the books were mostly taken around sunrise and sunset giving you a silhouette impression. This was midday with bright sunshine highlighting everything, especially the poor condition of the beach that was cover in rubbish around the nets.

In total I would say there was around 15 of these nets spaced 20 or 30 yards apart, and they were just along this part of the beach. I would have to come back around sunset to take some pictures, as to do it now would not make them to attractive looking.

We followed the main road towards the main part of town away from the fort area, passing the busy main bus station and numerous shops of all descriptions. We stopped at one restaurant to check out the menu before deciding to eat in another one a little further up the road away from the main area.

The place we chose was in the quieter area of town and very much for local people, with prices to match. The Thali's we ate cost only 15 rupees each! And the cokes we drank were on 5 rupees each. This meant we had a lunch for the equivalent of around 25 pence. The meal was not that great, but filled a hole and was well worth the money we paid.

There is definitely something about these old style colonial buildings and the rustic pastel colours they all seem to be painted in. The back streets were full of this type of building and well worth the walk around these small shady areas on our way back to the guesthouse.

There was a man marking out the lines of a smaller than normal size football pitch on the parade ground as we passed. Stopping to talk to the man I asked if there was to be a game there, he told me he was getting it ready for a local match, which was due to take place that evening with a kick off at 5.pm. I made a mental note to check out the game and see the quality of the local youngsters.

Edwin the rickshaw driver who approached us said he would give us a tour of the town for 60 rupees per hour, promising to show us everything of interest. We like whistle stop tours in rickshaws, so readily agreed to his proposal. The rickshaw Edwin drove was a customised one, with the usual black body paintwork and yellow roof it had a hand painted picture of the Holy bible on the front.
I thought that with a name like Edwin this rickshaw driver was definitely not a Hindu or Muslim, he must be another one of the many Catholics. I was beginning to wonder if the percentages quoted regarding religion were correct, as nearly everyone we had met recently was a Catholic, and according to the figures this should only have been a 20% chance?

The first place we went was to the local Hindu temple, which again was only for Hindu's, but none the less it was situated in an interesting part of the old town and worth looking at.
We went to see the compound where the Temple elephant is housed, this turned out to be nothing more than someone's back garden, with the elephant being chained from it front leg to a large stake in the ground.
We then went to Mattanacherry to see the local warehouse where beetle nut is stored, and to this day still sorted by hand like it always has been by a large group of women workers. Then it was on to the local spice market, a place where you could buy ginger, turmeric, cardamom, peppers, and cloves e.t.c. The choice of spices was almost endless. Nick knew quite a few of them, while I was just about able to identify the peppers!
We went into another warehouse where ginger was being sorted and bagged by a couple of women who were very friendly towards us, allowing me to not only take pictures of the ginger spices, but also some nice posed pictures of them.
Most of the old buildings that house these spice warehouses and shops have the names of their former Jewish owners still above the entrance.

There used to be a big Jewish community in Kerala, and especially in this area of Mattanacherry, which is known as Jew town. The modern day numbers have now significantly dwindled from a high of around 300 in the late 40's, to today's low. There now only are around 20 known Jews still living in the area.

We took a visit to the synagogue that has no local rabbi, without a rabbi the local elders are responsible for conducting the ceremonies. In the synagogue can be found hand painted Chinese willow pattern floor tiles still in remarkably good condition, considering they were put down in the mid eighteenth century.

From the ceiling hang loads of different lamps, including some very spectacular chandeliers. A local Jewish man is always on hand during visiting hours, to both inform visitors about the history of the place and extract donations through guided tours and guidebooks.

Bollywood was in this part of town with a film crew using the location for the making of a scene from a movie. Edwin said it was quite common to see movies being filmed locally as the settings around this area were so old world looking.

Also in this area we found a few curio shops selling everything and anything, but most notably was the amount of religious icons that had been purloined from now defunct churches. One thing that caught my eye in particular was a tabernacle normally used to house the communion bread in catholic churches, and as such represents the body of Christ, which is supposedly the most sacred thing in a church. This is certainly something you would not find in any curio shop in the west.

The last place we went to before heading back was sunset beach, here could be found the local Muslim fishermen and not much else. And as far as its name goes, this was probably the last place you would want to view the sunset from, as the place was filthy.

Nick felt the need to visit the bathroom so we went back to the Guesthouse. I waited outside talking to Edwin. He told me that he was indeed a Catholic and was married with two young daughters.
The rickshaw was not his own, he rented it for 100 rupees a day from his neighbour who ran a fleet of them. He did try to lay it on a bit thick about us visiting emporiums so that he could get his baksheesh, but I had to tell him that there was no way we would go.

When Nick returned we first off went to the Dutch cemetery, which as you can imagine was very old, with there having been no Dutch people here for hundreds of years.
The graveyard was very run down with the head stones and tombs in a poor state. It is said that after grave robbers had opened the tombs, some of the poorer people would use the tombs as a shelter and home in some cases.
There was no one living there when we visited, the only life form apart from us in this small cemetery was a few goats that were doing there bit to keep the grass from completely overgrowing the gravestones.

As I mentioned earlier St Francis church is the oldest in India, this was built originally by Franciscan friars who arrived here with the expedition led by Pedro Alvarez Cabral in 1503.
The Anglican Church of South India now uses this church after being anglicised by the British towards the end of 1795.
There is a crypt here that once held the remains of Vasco Da Gama, who was the first European to sail around the Cape of Good Hope on the tip of Africa. He died here in Cochin in 1524 and was interred in the church, where his remains lay for 14 years before being exhumed and returned to Lisbon in Portugal.

It was now getting late in the afternoon so we decided to call it a day, as by now we had been going around for over three hours. When it came to paying Edwin for his services he claimed to have picked us up at 11.30 and not 12.30 as we said. I told him that he needed to buy a new watch with the money we gave him, he laughed knowing that in truth it was more like 12.30 when he picked us up.

He wanted to know if we required his services the next day, but we had to tell him no, as we were going to the backwaters on a boat tour. We told him that we would use him the day after if we saw him around.

I asked Nick what the time was after we had been in the room for a little while, I wanted to go and see a little of the football match before going to the Kathakali performance. We planned to get there early so as to watch them put on the heavy make worn for each show, thinking this would be a good photo opportunity.
As we left the guesthouse around 5.15 I could hardly believe my eyes, there must have been a crowd of around three or four thousand people watching the football match. When I say people I actually mean men and boys, as there was not one woman to be seen anywhere around, this is definitely a mans game here in India. But the reason, I would imagine for no women was probably due to their more subservient role in Indian life and nothing to do with them not liking the game?
It turns out that the game was part of the Kerala state 7 a side championships, with the police playing against the fire service or someone like that. We watched a little of the game, which I was surprised to find was played to a fairly high standard and fast pace considering the state of the pitch.

The Kathakali theatre was about the size of a large dining room, so there would be no problem with the view from our second row seats. It was a good 45 minutes before the show started and the actors were on the stage putting on their make up, which takes hours to do. I took a couple of pictures then we went for a walk preferring to sweat a little outside, as opposed to staying here to cook.

We went and bought some drinks from the street vendor just outside the theatre and sat under a tree trying to look as inconspicuous as possible, if that is possible in India. It was not to long before a man who started up a conversation joined us, it started with him asking for a cigarette. No problem there, he sat down and began talking about this and that before offering us every hallucigenic substance known to man, and also a few unknown!
He could not apologise enough when we told him we did not do drugs, but then went on to explain why he did, citing every misfortune imaginable to man.
As much as I felt sorry for him, drugs are not the answer to any problems other than medical ones.

Time to move on I thought and went for a walk along the beach to the Chinese fishing nets, which did at least look a lot better set against the sunset looking out to sea.
I was about to climb up onto one of the platform of one when I heard a yelping noise, just like a dog in pain makes, but looking round as I stood there I could see nothing, although I knew it was coming from close by.
I lifted my leg to climb up and the noise stopped, I looked down and realised where the noise had come from. I had been standing on the little dog's leg! And to make things worse it now could not walk properly as it pulled itself out from under the platform, then dragged it's back legs behind as it moved leaving a long snail like trail in the sand behind it.

I felt really bad about this little dog I had just maimed for life and was telling Nick about it. We were now stood up on the path from where I could see the dog sitting meekly next to a man who was repairing a boat. I went to see if the dog's owner knew if it had any broken bones, and was then greatly relieved when the man told me that the dog was born like that!

Back in the Kathakali theatre, that was really no more than a large tent extension to the restaurant next to it, things were warming up and most of the seats were now taken. Admittedly they were full of tourists, but you would not expect the place to be full of locals.
Sat in front of us were a group of eight Germans, all of them had their cameras on their laps ready to capture every moment for their holiday photo albums.

Sat behind us was this tall, thin English guy, who we had seen in virtually every place we had been so far. His itinerary must have been very similar to ours, as he was in Mamallapuram, Trivandrum, Varkala, and Alleppey. All the times I had seen him previously I had said hello, but had never stuck up a conversation, and it did not look like he would be very chatty again tonight as he sat there staring blankly at the stage.

We were given a sheet of paper as we entered, which outlined the story we were just about to see. I had a quick glance at it and did not understand a bit of it, so had no chance of picking up the story from what I saw on stage.
Kathakali is a traditional dance form, which originated in Kerala and is performed mainly in this part of India. The Dancers are all men with women not allowed to take part. The men, who look slightly ridiculous coming across like pantomime Dames, play all the parts of women.   The dancers train for years to become accomplished at the art, which involves elements of yoga and Ayurvedic medicine and great gymnastic ability.

The show started with one of the musicians up on stage trying to explain what it was all about. He spoke for around twenty minutes explaining that there were 24 hand movements that the dancers made; these hand gestures indicated a certain emotion to go along with the mime dance. By the time he had explained the third one I had forgotten what the first one was. There was absolutely no chance of me understanding the story line now.

Still I knew Nick would pay some attention and while he did not know the hand signals, he had at least read the sheet of paper and would later explain the story to me.

While the play was a serious piece of drama it was hard not to laugh at some of the expressions and contortions the dancers managed to pull on their faces, especially the one who was playing the part of the woman.
I was just concentrated on getting a few good pictures; it felt like I was a member of a pack of press photographers at a film premier with the amount of flashes going off, the Germans were firing on all cylinders in front of me.

One of the dancers who was wearing some extremely heavy make up was sweating so much that his lipstick started to run as it mixed with the perspiration, causing a long red streak to form on his chin and make his bottom lip look twice the size of the upper one. He resisted the temptation to wipe his face, which I think would have made his make-up look a little more amusing.
The show went on for about an hour all told, and to be honest I did enjoy it, even if I did not understand what was going on. It was a real spectacle and well worth seeing. I don't think Nick enjoyed it that much, but like me, he had to agree it was a little different from the norm.

It was around 8.30 when we got out of the show, we walked into the old part of town looking for somewhere to eat. There was nowhere that really took our fancy so we hailed a rickshaw and went to a place where we had been given a flyer for. Addys restaurant was a family run establishment and could have been someone's front room, in fact it probably was at one time, as it was a part of a large Dutch colonial built building. Even now there was a young child playing freely in the centre of the room on a small tricycle, oblivious to us, or anything else.

There was no one else in the place when we entered. To make us feel comfortable they changed the Hindi music that was playing, tuning the radio to a satellite station playing American country music, we must have looked like a pair of cowboys to them.
While being on the expensive side, the food was excellent and probably the best we had eaten on the whole trip. We ate some vegetables cooked in coconut and garlic sauce with side dishes of rice and bread.

Another early night tonight, with us back in our room by 9.30. I went to the bathroom and was greeted by another large cockroach, time for Captain Cockroach (Nick) to swing into action again.