Last weekend my friends Rajesh, Bindu, and Prima met me at my house in India's most trusted travel vehicle, the Ambassador. According to The Ambassador website, The Ambassador was the first car manufactured in India, and "has been ruling the Indian roads ever since its inception in 1948." In style, the Ambassador hasn't changed much since 1948.
Our driver, Raju, was extremely to the road, except when he was answering his mobile, rolling paan (a beetle nut chew), or talking over his shoulder to the people in the backseat. Much to my dismay, throughout the first half of the trip, the roads were quite good. The problem with good roads in Kerala is that when pavement is smooth there is nothing to slow the driver. Better road quality lends itself to Malayalee maneuvers such as, the pass on blind curve with horn-blaring, the run small farm animals off the road with horn blasts, and surprise the villagers with horn toots. In Kerala, the horn is a safety device par excellance, a communication beacon, and sometimes a musical instrument. Drivers use their horns with a frequency unknown in the western world.
We traveled to the small village of Attingal just north of Trivandrum where my friend, Dr. Bindu, lives in a refurbished 200 year-old home. The home has a red tile roof, wooden construction, carved pillars and tile floors. Sadly, much of the old-style Kerala architecture has been demolished or turned into tourist resorts.
From Attingal, Raju drove us in The Ambassador to the beach resort, Varkala. The back-roads were in very bad repair. This meant slower driving, but motion sickness. The trusty Ambassador climbed slowly (shocks creaking and groaning) in and out of the potholes, once again proving that it "rules the Indian roads." Throughout this portion of the journey, Raju ground the gears of the Ambassador and spit large gobs of red paan juice furiously out the window. Sitting in the backseat, Raju's red spittle occasionally sprayed me in the face. The Ambassador's window was jammed down and I suffered the consequences.
When we reached Varkala- a village on the sea fast becoming a tourist destination, we visited a large Hindu temple. Usually only Hindus are allowed inside, but for some reason, (probably my well-folded sari), I was allowed in to do pooja (prayer) and have darshan (a look at the God) of the enshrined Krishna statue. Kerala drums and instruments played continuously for Krishna's enjoyment. Outside the main shrine were several smaller shrines to the Kerala Nagas, (snake Gods). At one shrine we paid a small amount of money to have a priestess sing to the snake Gods. At a Nagaraja (Snake King) shrine under a special type of tree hundreds of plastic dolls hung in a sort of . At this shrine women come and offer dolls in hopes of getting pregnant.
On the Varkala beach one can pay a preist to propigate your ancestors with coconut offerings and Sanskritic prayers. I declined. Actually the Varkala beach was almost non-existent. Usually in the monsoon season the sea will rise up over some of the beach, however this year the sea has risen so much the beach is nearly gone!
From Varkala beach we visited the Sivagiri Mut Ashram. This is the ashram of the great Kerala caste reformer who preached that there should be "One caste, one creed, one religion, one God for all humanity." This saint, Sri Narayana, is very popular with lower caste people in Kerala. His shriine was very tranquil and well kept.
Next we enjoyed some backwater boating. Basically we went through the backwater canals scaring birds, burning diesel, polluting the backwaters, and disturbing villagers who were fishing and washing their cows. Actually dispite the drawbacks (namely the stinky two-stroke engine) it was a very pleasant trip thorugh the backwaters. Finally we took our meal at a hotel. Rrestaurant's here are called hotels- emphasis on ho, mind you. Of course we had Kerala meals- sambar and rice! What else.
