Day Ten 26-10-10 (travel day)

At 8am I woke up to say goodbye to Liny’s uncle, auntie and cousin. They where all off for work. After breakfast we prayed for a good journey, together with Liny’s grandpa. And around 10am we where off to go to Kovalam, which is beach place. It was a 2.5 hour journey in a car, but not an ordinary car, we went with the famous Moris Ambasador. These cars are old, but extremely comfortable on Indian roads. The back seat is like an air cushion, you sail away inside the seat and when there is a bump in the road you hardly feel it (which is the opposite of the Susuki Alto where whe went around with and when you went over a bump you get a concussion )  

On the way I took some peculair shots of the scenery.

Once in Kovalam we where presented with a beautiful scenery.

This place is well known by liny as she came her as a little girl. We also went for lunch at the place they recognized her so we got nice service and a bit less nice food. I ordered some pizza for a change of all the curry. The pizza was not what I expected unfortunately. This visit was also the first time that we where at a proper beach so I couldn't stop myself from taking a dive in the sea. I went in my underpants, what is something quite normal in India. For some reason, men find it sexy here to jump in the sea in their tango underpants. I on the other hand, didn’t had a swimming pants yet so I went in my shorts. Liny was so kind to take some shots of me swimming .

At the beach place we were overflown with sellers who wanted to do business. It was a bit of season time still so the people where extra eager to sell stuff to us, because there was no one else. So I was went in a bargaining mode. I bought a massive cloth that you can have for decoration somwhere on the sealing of wall and a “shawl” (the piece of cloth that you tie around youre waist) On the way we also met a drunk chap who was helping me a bit with bargaining. The guy was absolutely waisted and was talking to all the people on the street. Because the guy was so well know there, I asked him whether he could show us a good place to get a massage (Kerala is famous for its ayurvedic (medicines) stuff and massage). The guy took us of the boulevard so we got a bit suspicious and reluctant to go along with him. Luckely on the end of the steet we saw more white people, so it was fine. He took us the hill to a very nice massage place. But the guy didn’t want to leave us that easy and that made liny scared of waiting for me for an hour (the time it takes for the massage) by herself. Therefore she decided (against her will a bit, because she doesn’t like people to touch her body) to get a massage as well. Not knowing what was about to happen, was I made to strip down completely (Liny as well what made her feel quite uncomfortable, is what she told me) . The guy who was giving the massage was a young chap (around 30) and luckily didn’t look gay. He tight me some kind of thong that only covered my “huhuh”. The massage was reaaaaly good! The herbals he used and everything did me really good.

The massage was actually at the exact right time. We went after the exam in an “open-air bus” towards Cochin. The bus looked dodgy and had fast passenger on the side written and on the back super fast. When I saw these text and the bus

I thought it just says those things to make the bus look cool. However, once the bus started it went mental! In the A/C bus that we took from Chennai to Nagercoil, the bus was provided with a curtain in the front of the bus what was to prevent people getting scared of the way the busdriver drove. In this bus, the facility was not there so we could see the actual driving. It went a bit like this:

You have to imagine that you sit in a bus from the 50’s. The suspension is almost completely gone so you feel almost every bump in the road. However, the driver doesn’t care about us so he drives with 60kmp/h through the dense traffic (see Chennai pictures for examples) And when he cant pas, he turns his horn on constantly and flashes his light. So basically he is always horning and swinging from lane to lane. And because he wanted to do right to what it said  on the bus (fast passenger) he was overtaking every car, lorry that came in front of him. He always wanted to be the first everywhere. Overtaking went that crazy that he was overtaking a lorry and he things that he can just make it he did it, even when a lorry was coming our way. This made the lorry that we were overtaking to hit the brakes fully or if he didn’t want it, we did it so we could swing back behind him and give it an another try as soon as a little gap emerged. So yeah you where being clutched in the bus a lot. That in mind that I’m quite easily car sick. But for some reason, it didn’t affect me this time. I was a bit sick in the A/C bus but in the “air-bus” I had no problems what so ever. So yeah, the the massage came in very handy because the seats where crap and I was being clutched in all directions possible and it was a 6 hour absolutely crazy journey. Once in Cochin we where very quick in the hotel which had A/C so we could have a nice sleep.

PS: when I have the possibility to upload the movie that I took from the bus it will be there

Day Nine 25-10-10 (rest day)

After waking up around 9 we where on our way for shopping. Because Liny was born in Nagercoil, she has a weakness for the food here. Therefore, we bought a big shopping bag full of snacks that are only available in Nagercoil. What is something different then in European countries. Sainsburry is everywhere with the same products same for Albert Hein. So in the beginning I was a bit shocked (because we needed to carry an extra bag with us) but afterwards it turned out that I had benefits of it as well.

Shopping with Liny with went with a supersonic speed. She knew all the shops in and out and knew exactly what she wanted. It progressed as follow: The auto driver came. We drove to the first bakery, literally 1 minute later we where out with some boxes filled with cake. She knew it all exactly. That’s how it as well went with the following shops, bakery, bakery and two shops. The auto driver raced to each shop where we popped out quick en before he could turn of the engine we where back already.

Once all sorted we came home and lazed around the house a bit, played with the dog and had some food. Once Kenny was home we went out again to get the famous ice-cream where liny was talking about for only 10 rupees. This ice cream was of very good quality (liny came to the place from when she was a kid) I had a lot of ice cream in Italy which was really good, but this one could math up with that quality. So yeah, if you come in Nagercoil, get some ice-cream.

After that we visited a internet shop to print out the tickets for the bus train journey from Chochin to Goa. Around 830pm we where back where Amutha was cooking dinner for us. After the curry we where of to bed.

Ice cream

food shopping

Day Eight 24-10-10

After the sunset of last night we planned to go for sunrise today. So once home after sunset we walked towards the car where Keny made a very interesting comment. He asked Liny; now the sun went into the sea, where is it now? We all laughed about it ( I even thought, that I could ask that question at his age, 12)Once home I went straight to bed.

Unfortunately I left my windows open in my room. This resulted in a plague of mosquito’s all over my body. I couldn’t sleep because of that so I started counting. I counted around 80 bites in one night. There where six on my face itself so my face was a bit swollen because of that. My legs where completely covered with bites as well as my chest, shoulder, back, arms and hands. So I decided to wake up Liny because I didn’t know what to do with myself. She came in half a sleep and said that I was stupid by leaving the windows open, and she asked me not to scratch once bitten. Anyways, I slept for an around 3 hours that night before I was woken up by liny again to go and see the sunrise. Unfortunately, liny was the wake up person so she needed to wake up everyone in the house while she had a tough job to get up her self. This made us all run a bit late for the sunrise, so we had to race a bit. This is quite unusual for Liny’s uncle (Jeyanth) because he is better known as the slowpoke of driving. Normally his speedmeter doesn’t come above 40kmp/h and is usually around 30. This time we went around 70 to 80

On the way we saw the sun already coming up and we thought that we would miss it. However we reached in time. Because of the racing skills of Jeyanth we reached Kanyakumari in 15 minutes instead of 30 minutes.

The result is as follow. (remember where we stood at sunset and we took a picture of the statue (Thiruvalluvar), now we stood closer to the statue facing east).

 

During the sunrise it was utterly busy around the whole shore line. It was busy now and it was off season. In a couple of weeks the shore line will be filled with thousands of people from all over the world and the country as season time begins. This morning however, most people came the because of religious purposes. North Indian’s worship the sun, so when it comes up they pray. Straight after sunrise they all march into the temple. 

Afterwards we walked a bit around at the beach and I (foreign boy) went walking around in the sea:

We drove home and I slept a bit more. Around 11 I woke up and got breakfast. After breakfast we planned the last journey around Nagercoil. Yesterday we went south and this time we went north, into the mountains. Here some shots from underway:

Pay attention to the guy in the middle of the next picture when you enlarge it. The guy is in a metal tub to pick lotus leafs which are used for wrapping.

At a dam where we stopped, we saw something EXTREMELY rare and I was considered very lucky to see that. None of us have seen this ever before. Basically is was jiggy jiggy time for two massive Cobra snakes! As soon as Liny spotted it right next to us, I zoomed my camera completely on it. We where around 50 meters away from the spectacle!

On the way we also saw a wild monkey

The road that we where driving on through the forest was a road that overall went through a rubber estate. The trees that grow there produce the milk to make rubber of where we make out car tires off and all other rubber materials. They basically scarf the tree so it losses it milk. This milk is collected in a small bowl at the bottom of the tree and harvested every day. Six trees produce around a liter of rubber milk per day. After five years the trees will be chopped off and replaced by new ones.

Once home, I went to sleep AGAIN. Woke up at 5pm and went for another bike ride. That’s it for day Eight. Tomorrow we plan to do some shopping but first a nice sleep AGAIN.