Rajasthan, onto Kerala

It took a few days... a week, actually, to recover from Rajasthan. With all it had to offer, I found the intensity to be overpowering. Being a man, travelling alone, made me more of target with less of a shield. This seems a bit counter-intuituve, but I believe that while the Indian men may oogle and lear at western women travelling in India, they are less likely to approach them. Being a man, they had no problem in approaching me, sometimes surrounding me, coaxing me to a rickshaw, shop or any other assortment of things. I learned later than I would have hoped that acknowleding you speak English is a questionable decision, saying you're an American was bad and saying you're from California was worse. If you're an American you might as well have 'ATM' tatooed on your forehead. California is home to Baywatch and everything Hollywood, so right off the bat, these folks have plenty to chose from in terms of making coversation. One tactic I picked up was when the quesiton is posed "where you FROM??!?!" the correct answer is "BULGARIA!". They really have no idea how to respond, as no one speaks Bulgarian, and you can then easily pretend you don't understand what they're saying to you in English. I learned this trick to the end of my time in Rajasthan, unfortunately, but I highly recommend it to anyone planning travels to India.

Being a bit short on time, I flew from Udaipur, Rajasthan through Bombay (Mumbai) to Kochi (Cohin), Kerala on the southwestern corner of the subcontinent. I knew as soon as I arrived that I had "arrived." As the plane was descending it was clear blue water and palm trees as far as eye could see. I grabbed a cab (easily and without diress) to Fort Cochin, and old Portugues Fort.

Kerala is as laid back as Rajasthan is in your face. While there were still the cat calls for taxi, rickshaw, guest house, food, etc, they were not as persistent once you made your intentions known.

Kerala is the only democratically elected communist region in the world, so I've been told. It has the highest literacy rate in India as well as one of the highest life expectancies. The poverty, trash and beggars seemed less than other parts of India I visited.

I stayed at a simple guest house with a powerful and loud ceiling fan (well needed) and did almost nothing for three days. I did not realize how much tension I had been holding in my day to day travels the previous few weeks until I was in a place where I could really relax. For three days I slept long, took walks along the coast and read. (okay, day three I also took a Keralan cooking class and saw a Kathakali dance performance (very cool)... those of you that know me, know I'm not the best at doing nothing). Having regained my strength and my mood, I took a bus from Cochin to Appelly where I would board a boat for a backwaters cruise further south. The bus ride was crowded. I had my backpack on my back and my daypack on my front and for two hours I was standing, completly crushed in the mass of humanity that had similar aspritations of travelling to Appelly. I could not turn at all... even as I felt the man behind me's hand reaching into my pocket for my wallet, I could not turn to face him. (I swiftly grabbed his hand and squeezed with everyting I had and I felt a little whimper - message sent)

I realized that I still felt a little tried from the intenstiy of the past month's experiences. After finding a guest house in Appelly, I went in search of some food. I sat down, ordered some fish curry, when a guy came and sat next to me. He introduced himself as Ameer. I kept waiting for him to ask if I wanted to visit his friend's shop, etc, etc, but the question never came. He was a really nice guy, 25 years old, and he was just interested in showing me Appelly. We walked around the immense temple festival that Appelly was holding and then he said he would take me to the beach. We hopped a rickshaw and were there in 15 minutes. We sat on the beach, with some of his friends joining us, sang Christmas carols, I helped them with the words to Hotel California, and they attempted (in vain) to help me with the lyrics to their favorite Indian pop songs. More of Ameer's friends arrived and they started building human pyramids in the sand. They were having a blast and laughing in the sheer joy of building human pyramids on the beach and then crashing down on each other in a giggling heap. After a little while I indicatd to Ameer that it was time for me to go to bed. He immediately grabbed his friend, Shake, and volunteered his services to drive me home. I hopped on the back of his motorbike and was promptly driven to my guest house. With a shake of his hand and a humble thank you, he sped off back to the beach. That night was exactly what I needed to get back on my feet.

The next day I took a 7 hour backwaters boat ride to Amma's ashram at Amritanandamayi. Some of you may have heard of Amma as the 'hugging mother' or the 'hugging saint' She is one of the few female saints in India and her ashram is an amazing place situated between the ocean and the backwaters. There are thousands of devotees that stay there. Amma was just geting back to the Ashram after a trip to Tamil Nadu when I arrived. I got my room in the ashram for 150 ruppees a night ($3). I had two roomates, Haunaman from the Isle de Reunion, close to Madagascar, and Devananda from Germany. Both were wonderful guys and long time devotees of Amma's. They were staying for a few weeks each. Amma's was a wonderful place to spend Christmas. There were people from all over the world there, everyone sharing in the experience of knowing that where we were, was special. There was a short series of Christmas songs before Amma gave her Christmas blessing. I think most people at the ashram had to be told it was Christmas, however it was a beautiful place to be.

Amma's gives her blessings (Darshan) through hugs. She has given over 33 million hugs, and has been known to give hugs for 22 hours straight without getting up, stretching, drinking water or going to the bathroom. To recieve a hug from her is to understand what all the hub-bub is about. It was 'devine.' I spent three days at the Ashram and boarded the boat for the remainder of the journey full of life and gratitude.

I moved from Amma's to the beach town of Varkala and spent two days doing yoga, body surfing, and eating great fish that we picked from the market and gave to the chef. Safe to say, I'm a fan of Kerala. (Ed, you were right: Kerala Rools)

I hopped a flight from Trivundrum (now called Theravarunandapurem... or something close to that... i'm not kidding) to Delhi and returned to old familar: Pahar Ganj. I spent the night in Pahar Ganj, now accostomed to the stinging eyes and stuffy nose of the body acclimatizing to Delhi's pollution. I left the following morning for the Delhi airport en route to Thailand.

As I look back on the last 6 weeks, it seems a blur. I came to India looking for adventure and I found it. I also learned a lot about myself, and the world. India is like no place I have ever visited. I was told that one's time in India is exactly what you make it. Some people will go running away swearing never to return, others will have uncovered something that will lead them to India again and again. I think that I am somwhere in between. India is a very difficult place to travel, but it also holds something incredibly special. India is a place I know that I will return to, but I will look forward to the next trip more afer discovering the trick of telling them you're from Bulgaria.

As for the deeper experiences I had in India... for those you will have to ask me in person.

"Many are terrified of India's unabashed display of our shadow sides and run. I have heard tales of people who stepped off the plane, breathed in her tumult, and got on the next flight home... But she liberates us who stay from the West's insistence on chirpy optimism, which she gently exposes as a lie. India makes you feel in your pores that for every birth there is a death and for every problem solved a new one arises. She is a constant reminder that the ugly is the other side of the beautiful, decay of growth, dirt of cleanliness. In India heaven and hell are not as distant from each other as they can get, one in the skies, the other deep in the earth's bowels, but meet, not as enemies, but as dancers pirouetting in the eternal paux de deux, celebrating the myster... When I persist in pigeonholing life into nicely regulated (and invariably clean) little compartments, India casually tosses my expectations right back in my lap... 'I'm losing my serenity,' I hissed at a bank clerk after having spent all day trying to untangle currency problems which would have taken ten minutes to solve at home... 'Madam,' he answered, 'it takes many years to attain serenity. One does not lose it in a day.'"
- Cheryl Bentley, Enchanted