Thursday 12 February 2015

Day 30 (India): Kollam


Kerala is famous for its backwaters: a 100km-plus chain of canals, channels, lakes and ponds, that you can explore by various boat services and tours. I did one from Kollam today, which punted us through tiny villages that are only accessible by water. This what a potential traffic jam looks like (pic).


Sometimes when you travel you have to accept that other people's behaviour may seem strange, even downright offensive, but you accept them with a smile. I don't mean the Indians. They were polite and friendly. I mean the rude and arrogant French tourists sharing our punt. It was still a lovely trip, though (pic).


On the tour we enjoyed fresh coconuts, picked for us by locals who shinned up palms to get them, saw how coir rope is made, and had some tea, made frothy thanks to lots of dramatic high-altitude pouring (pic). It was quite a trip down memory lane, how real tea used to be made by our grandparents' generation: full of sterilised milk, oversweetened with five sugars, and tepid.

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