Coming Home Early

Cochin is absolutely gorgeous. The people are wonderful, the food is good, the climate is about 10 degrees cooler than Chennai. Still, I have decided to come home a few days early. I'm not much of a beach guy and, additionally, Fort Cochin is in the middle of bloody nowhere. It's 10-100km to do anything.

As my faithful readers know, I trusted Chandrasakar with my life. I've had 8 people drive me around since and I've honestly thought I was going to be in an accident at least as many times. So that fact saddled with the fact that anything cool is really far away, and the forecast for monsoonal rains has been fairly accurate, I've decided to pack it up.

Over the last two days, I tried to have as many adventures as I could. I've (in order):

• Lost my luggage with all the goodies for people back home (apparently, it wanted to see Bangalore first)
• Walked the seawall at historic Fort Cochin
• Visited the chinese fishing nets
• Saw the Dutch museum
• Saw the spice market (400 years old, or so I was told)
• Spent some time in Jewtown (Cochin has a very diverse religious community, including hindus, buddists, muslims, catholics, and...I'm not kidding 14 jews...there used to be hundreds, but most went to Israel in the '50s or '60s. Most of the remaining people are in their 60s or 70s. The youngest is 35. I expect she'll be quite lonely in a decade.)
• Took an extended tour of the city in an autorickshaw that broke down three times (Glad I only paid 50 Rs.)
• Oh, I also spent about an hour on my cell phone trying to re-arrange my travel plans (I'm gonna hate next month's bill)
• Drove into Cochin proper to pick up my new ticket
• Saw an amazing Kathakali performance (http://www.kathakali.net/) I can't even begin to explain. I'll post pictures when I'm home. The internet cafe here is a little weak.
• Passed out exhausted at 9:30

Today, I went on an eight-hour tour of the Kerala backwaters in a covered houseboat. The backwaters are amazingly beautiful. It was so tropcal and peaceful. Again, I'm at a loss for words, so I'll probably write more about the experience when I get home. The short version is I met some cool tourists from all around the world, visited some native villages, ate a traditional Kerala lunch (brave, as I'll soon be trapped in a plane or an airport for 40 or so hours), and took in the amazing beauty of this part of the world.

Right now it's bucketing rain, so while I am finished with this post, I'm gonna kill some time in the cybercafe.

Next update from Singapore sometime tomorrow or the next day.