Day 6 - Alleppey
We wake up early today expecting Brooke's friend, Vivek, to pick us up to go to the mountain town of Munnar today. I head to the beach one last time before leaving the coast, not sure if I will see it again on this trip. I run into a pack of boys playing cricket. They see me snapping pictures as I walk up and they ham it up. As I approach they play harder and yell louder. They ask me to take more photos and pose for the camera.
They ask to see the pictures afterwards and are amazed by how cool they look!
As I leave the dad of one of the children (I presume) comes out and wants me to take his photograph.
The cricket players watch as I walk away. Hard to see, but they all have the whitest, biggest smiles.
As I walk back, I run into the same group of schoolgirls I say a few days ago. They are still enamoured. I take their picture and they ask to see it. They want to take my picture, but after many tries of showing them how to use it, we give up.
A woman leads a cow
Jackfruit
After the beach I say my goodbyes to Varghese. Sunday morning seems like an odd time to tie one on, but the whiskey has already been broken out. No judgement, I would join him if I wasn't so bad at day-drinking. Especially in the heat, that just sounds like a disaster. Sad to go, and Varghese tells me I can return whenever I want. I really appreciate his genuine sentiment.
We were expecting Vivek anytime before noon. Remembet IST? Indian Standard Time applies here. A few hours later he comes rolling through the gate. He has his business partner, Sanu, with him. He informs us that there is some sightseeing around the area he wants to do before we run for the hills. After leaving the gates of Vallis Gardens, Sanu realizes that his home with his parents is just down the street on the other side, but somehow it had taken them 2-3 hours to find us. He expresses this mix-up by saying, "You made me touch my nose like this," while twirling his arm around his head only to touch the same nose he could have touched while simply holding his arm straight up. If that doesn't make sense, don't worry about it; it took me some time too.
We go to Sanu's house and meet his parents who seem older. They don't speak English but still manage to welcome us into their home. They must have known we were coming as they had prepared fish curry. Sanu insisted Brooke, Ricky and I eat first, and at the table when everyone else waited. I am not used to this hospitality and try to insist back that I do not want to put anyone out. The curry is good, some of the first spicy food I have eaten thus far and I enjoyed it. A bit fishy, but a genuine taste of traditional Kerala village food. One thing I started to realize about eating habits in India is that they generally have large meals, however fewer of them. They kept putting food on my plate but I finally couldn't eat anymore and had to refuse. I never did get a straight answer as to which was the proper etiquette to let a host know I was done with a meal. Was it to eat it all so they know I enjoyed it? Or to leave a bite to signify that I am so full I can't even finish?
Plans change at least 3 more times, but we ended up deciding to stay the night and leave for the hills the next day. Sanu takes us to his relatives house across the street. There are about 10-15 relatives there, all welcoming us into the home. Until days later, I just thought they were having a gathering, only later did I realize they were all invited there to see the weird foreigners. They gave is some fresh coconut water. Then the full coconut with a spoon and told us to eat it while they laughed at us (apparently we were doing it all wrong). They they gave us all a small mango (there are many different types in India) and laughed again while we ate it.
After a both of these "meals," Sanu takes us back to his smoking "hideaway" that happens to be just a 30 second walk from the front door. He is in his mid-to-late-twenties, and actually believes his parents have no idea that he has been smoking for the past ?? years. He leaves the cigarette butt in a little ditch that years ago used to be used for irrigating or something of the like. Then he walks into the house smelling like a cigarette, like nothing happenned. And you're telling me they have no idea? They must know, but choose to be blind. Sanu tells me if his Mom walked up while he was holding a cigarette in his hand they would automatically assume he was holding it for a friend. Same if he was holding a drink, by the way.
After a few car swaps that I still don't understand and a seemingly undercover/shady transaction, we ended up with some Bacardi and one small dirty glass. Off to the beach to "party." Which entailed about 6 of us sitting in a circle during watching the sunset, passing around the bottle and glass. This wasn't the first time I noticed it by any means, but Indians share everything. Seconds after meeting me, friends of friends would ask for a drag of my cigarette. Or they would just grab it. Or take my water and drink Indian style. Indian style drinking is never putting the bottle to your lips as not to spread germs. I never mastered this, as half the bottle would end up on my shirt every time. Back to the beach - we finished up the half bottle. Then we headed to a real party scene (I wish you could hear the sarcasm in my voice right now). It was the local "bar," but I would call it an outdoor dirt path with men sitting on a step staring, with a few private rooms that entailed one old table, a few mismatched chairs and benches, one light bulb in the corner along with one fan bussing like a small mosquitoes. Have I mentioned the mosquitoes yet?!? That's for another post. But I actually got eaten alive. No joke.
So this bar sold one thing only: . In old wine jugs. Looks and smells rotten, but what the hell. I'm here for the experience. Most vile thing I have ever tasted in my life. The Indians we were with gulped it down and acted like they had acquired the taste but I soon realized that they disliked maybe almost as much as I did but knew how to get it down. We were brought a chicken dish that must have been sitting out for days. Looked old, greasy and generally like salmonella in a dish. But I was hungry. So I ate it. And it was good. And waited to get sick, but never did!
Back to Sanu's as it had started raining really bad. His parents owned a fireworks stand and since there were other festivities going on in the village we lit off some of them he had brought home. It was gorgeous and surreal. The rain, the colorful bursts. Feeling alive in India. At that moment in time I knew why I was there.
We go to Sanu's house and meet his parents who seem older. They don't speak English but still manage to welcome us into their home. They must have known we were coming as they had prepared fish curry. Sanu insisted Brooke, Ricky and I eat first, and at the table when everyone else waited. I am not used to this hospitality and try to insist back that I do not want to put anyone out. The curry is good, some of the first spicy food I have eaten thus far and I enjoyed it. A bit fishy, but a genuine taste of traditional Kerala village food. One thing I started to realize about eating habits in India is that they generally have large meals, however fewer of them. They kept putting food on my plate but I finally couldn't eat anymore and had to refuse. I never did get a straight answer as to which was the proper etiquette to let a host know I was done with a meal. Was it to eat it all so they know I enjoyed it? Or to leave a bite to signify that I am so full I can't even finish?
Plans change at least 3 more times, but we ended up deciding to stay the night and leave for the hills the next day. Sanu takes us to his relatives house across the street. There are about 10-15 relatives there, all welcoming us into the home. Until days later, I just thought they were having a gathering, only later did I realize they were all invited there to see the weird foreigners. They gave is some fresh coconut water. Then the full coconut with a spoon and told us to eat it while they laughed at us (apparently we were doing it all wrong). They they gave us all a small mango (there are many different types in India) and laughed again while we ate it.
After a both of these "meals," Sanu takes us back to his smoking "hideaway" that happens to be just a 30 second walk from the front door. He is in his mid-to-late-twenties, and actually believes his parents have no idea that he has been smoking for the past ?? years. He leaves the cigarette butt in a little ditch that years ago used to be used for irrigating or something of the like. Then he walks into the house smelling like a cigarette, like nothing happenned. And you're telling me they have no idea? They must know, but choose to be blind. Sanu tells me if his Mom walked up while he was holding a cigarette in his hand they would automatically assume he was holding it for a friend. Same if he was holding a drink, by the way.
After a few car swaps that I still don't understand and a seemingly undercover/shady transaction, we ended up with some Bacardi and one small dirty glass. Off to the beach to "party." Which entailed about 6 of us sitting in a circle during watching the sunset, passing around the bottle and glass. This wasn't the first time I noticed it by any means, but Indians share everything. Seconds after meeting me, friends of friends would ask for a drag of my cigarette. Or they would just grab it. Or take my water and drink Indian style. Indian style drinking is never putting the bottle to your lips as not to spread germs. I never mastered this, as half the bottle would end up on my shirt every time. Back to the beach - we finished up the half bottle. Then we headed to a real party scene (I wish you could hear the sarcasm in my voice right now). It was the local "bar," but I would call it an outdoor dirt path with men sitting on a step staring, with a few private rooms that entailed one old table, a few mismatched chairs and benches, one light bulb in the corner along with one fan bussing like a small mosquitoes. Have I mentioned the mosquitoes yet?!? That's for another post. But I actually got eaten alive. No joke.
So this bar sold one thing only: . In old wine jugs. Looks and smells rotten, but what the hell. I'm here for the experience. Most vile thing I have ever tasted in my life. The Indians we were with gulped it down and acted like they had acquired the taste but I soon realized that they disliked maybe almost as much as I did but knew how to get it down. We were brought a chicken dish that must have been sitting out for days. Looked old, greasy and generally like salmonella in a dish. But I was hungry. So I ate it. And it was good. And waited to get sick, but never did!
Back to Sanu's as it had started raining really bad. His parents owned a fireworks stand and since there were other festivities going on in the village we lit off some of them he had brought home. It was gorgeous and surreal. The rain, the colorful bursts. Feeling alive in India. At that moment in time I knew why I was there.
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