Blind leading the blind

Till yesterday I was in a Homestay in a village in the Kerala backwaters after a slightly sleepy New Year..something I ate kept coming out the wrong end. Ewww!!!

Anyway have just spent the last four days soaking up a peaceful village existence (granted without the day to day hard work that most villagers have to do).
I stayed with a Syrian Christian family (essentially part of the Orthodox Christian tree) and found it really hard to leave the hammock where you could lie back, watch all the bird life in the rice paddy and try not to fall asleep again. To tour around we caught ferries around the backwaters or walked down little pathways next to the backwaters where the villagers lived their lives, house on one side steps leading to public washroom on the other. And everyone smiled and waved Hello without needing to practise their English.

It was heaven until I met the Other Tourists. This stay was a bit of a lash-out for me as usually I would spend half what I spent with George in a day but the comfort and rest was worth it..

I dont travel that cheaply but one girl from Canada...who talked incessantly about her 'like' self... reminded me you can do India without seeing anything outside your taxi window on the way to the airport or you can take a slow boat through a village and bump along with the locals trying not to notice that you have become the on-board entertainment as they all stare at you.

So when you think its nice to gather around a room in a hotel meeting fellow travellers its better to stay in cheap accomodation where the people are likely to be on a similar wave length. Even so it can be a tricky one on arriving at Fort Cochin (mini Europe with the Europeans forgetting that they are in a conservative country.. more skin than some beach resorts)... I found that it could get worse when I met the 'nice' Belgium couple who gave me a beer.. and then mentioned their love of the Right wing politicians in Holland after a few of those Kingfishers opened the conversation to politics???


I am running with the wrong crowd lately.. I suspect Dorothy got lost somewhere on the Yellow Brick road...


Fort Cochin makes me feel as though I am in Europe with European prices but finally found a ridiculously expensive Yoga class to try.. for a stretch for my decrepit body...