Here I am… Very bad, indeed… It’s been 9 weeks or so since coming back from India and I haven’t posted anything yet. Could give many excuses how busy I was or something, but the truth is that simply the idea of spending significant amount of time in front of my laptop to try and put my Indian experience into some nice words was too painful.
Could post something in the meantime, but it would be somehow not right – after all you cannot avoid some responsibilities and pretend they are not there.
So it is high time to write how India was…
Hot!
This was my first impression after leaving the airport in Chennai. I can swear it was snowing when we were taxing at Heathrow and despite middle of the night it was nicely warm.
I’ve heard some horror stories about weather in Madras (very hot and very humid) but I was lucky not to experience that. We went to see Mahalakshmi Temples and on the way there I could witness damages done by Tsunami a year before.
Anyways the highlight of the day was a visit in crocodile farm. I must say I have never seen so many different kinds of those animals in one place – there were ponds with literally hundreds of these reptiles.
Can you imagine this ‘baby’ is already 1.5 years old? Definitely I wouldn’t like to meet face to face with its parents!
After one day in Madras Srini and I moved to Kochi. Kerala is not THAT popular with Western tourists (still quite a few of them tho!) and despite being compared to Goa, Kerala is relatively peaceful. Kochi, the capital of the state, is rather small city (small for Indian conditions I mean). Despite British (obviously!) influences, the city was also under Dutch and Portuguese colonisation and many Catholic churches from that period remained till today. Actually quite a few people from that region is Catholic.
We spent also some time down south in Verkala. It was actually nice to spend two days on the beach, swim in Arabian Sea (very salty), eat delicious sea food and simply relax.
I have to admit that whole trip was very relaxing for me. I’m usually very planned and organised when on holidays, but during this trip I absolutely switched off and let others do the job: Mathai organised and booked all accommodation, transport and some additional events (New Year’s Eve for example) and Srini did all talking (which wasn’t that easy as people there talk mainly only in a local dialect – Malayam).
Even New Year’s was organised for us – quiet interesting I must say: in a lovely place, in a heritage villa just on the banks of backwaters with a bunch of people I have never seen before. Last year’s New Year was also quite eventful so I’m already wondering what the next year will bring!
The wedding
After two days in south of Kerala we came back to Kochi for our London friend’s, Mathai, wedding.
The day before the wedding I spent shopping hectically to buy some Indian outfit – Srini brainwashed me to wear something Indian for Indian wedding and me silly believed that it was a right thing to do so spent whole afternoon looking for some salwar kameez I liked (side note: do not try to do the same on Sunday on 1st Jan! Quite likely most of the shops will be closed like in my case!!!). In the end I managed to find something even though whole time I’d been looking for something very different in style! 
The wedding was an experience itself – nothing like I have ever experienced and nothing of what I’d been expecting. I knew that the ceremony will not be anything I have seen before, but I had some, let’s say ‘expectations’ (let’s be frank – we’ve all seen “Monsoon Wedding” and most Westerners expect something similar):
- ceremony was Syrian Christian Orthodox (to my surprise I learnt it’s a dominant religion in Southern India) and in Malayam. None of our bunch, despite quite a few Indians in it, knew what was going on (my North Indian friends just like myself couldn’t understand a word of what locals were saying) so all we did was observing and trying to get up and sit whenever people around us were doing so (it wasn’t that helpful though as everybody in the church seemed to have different perspectives on when you should stand and when you should sit).
- It was extremely colourful (somehow I expected it though) as the sarees worn by women were simply stunning
- It was enormously HUGE! I knew there will be quite a number of guests involved, but what I’ve seen simply blew me off my feet! The reception was held in the indoor stadium to hold all the guests! Now the estimated number of the guests – 1800!!!! Now, that’s what I call big! Feel like beating that anyone???
- It was SHORT! The reception started around noon and I thought it would go till at least evening. Being used to at least two days long weddings in Poland and hearing of days long weddings in India I was shocked when after quick lunch and wishing to the couple (this wasn’t that quick actually – try to imagine all those 1800 people queuing to the stage where bride and groom sat and wishing them all the best one by one with a compulsory photo session involved!) Anyways by ca. 3.30pm I was back in our hotel and quite relieved about that, because the day was really tiring…
Backwaters
A day after the wedding together with a London bunch and Mathai and his wife we went to backwaters. Kerala’s backwaters are famous of their beauty and tranquillity and the best way of exploring them is from water (obviously!), from a houseboat (yet again Mathai organised that for us). It was very chilled out day – we layd on the deck watching the scenery around us, ate awesomely delicious seafood had chats and nothing but that! 
We spent a whole day going through the system of canals and lakes. I’ll never forget the peacefulness and charm of this place…
Hyderabad
While being in South I think I forgot how crowded India is. Hyderabad reminded me that India is a country of a billion people – being only slightly smaller than London seems twice as much populated, making Delhi, Bombay or Calcutta impossible to imagine! Looks like I started exploring India from the less populated end!
Not only population but also landscape is very different than the one I’ve seen in Kerala – placed on Deccan Plateau, seems desertier and I missed all those coconut trees I’ve seen down in South. Also there was much more heritage buildings and I especially liked Golconda Fort, – views from the top of it over Hyderabad were simply stunning. On top of its military function it was also a magnificent palace of
the Hyderabad Nizams. 
And there is Secunderabad, the twin city, total opposite of old Hyderabad – very modern, with many shopping malls and Banjara Hills also called Hi-Tech city with uncountable amount of IT related companies and not only. This part of the city is very new (most buildings being build within last 2-3 years) and I must say that this was second most modern place in terms of architecture I have ever seen (Dubai being first). Quite impressive and I definitely didn’t expect anything like that.
All in all (want to summarise it as I don’t want to make it too long:)) I had really fantastic holidays – I had a chance to explore some of India’s culture and history, but also laze around a bit and simply relax and forget about everything. Awesome feeling!
I know I will go back there soon for sure, because there is much more places I want to see. Luckily (or not, depends how to look at it) some more friends of mine are getting married in India relatively soon, so I cannot complain about lack of opportunities to go there :)).
At the end couple more of my additional comments about India:
Food – one of those things India is famous of. Spicy, fresh and simply delicious. I’d been asked all the time whether I find food too spicy, but luckily I a) am used to spiciness and it wasn’t a problem for me and b) I like spicy food. Other good thing is that food is cheap and available almost everywhere. I must admit that I ate in some dodgiest places possible, but to my surprise I had simply NONE digestion problems during my stay!
South Indian food is much different to those curries most of you is used to – dominantly vegetarian, more spicy and with heaps of coconut in it (that was the case in Kerala as they have coconut trees simply everywhere!). All those idlis, dosas (paper dosas being my favourite), sambars and other things names I don’t remember to eat and sweet and hot coffee or lime water to drink! Also experienced eating with my hands of banana leaf – yet again one of many new things I had done for a very first time in India.
Transportation – I was lucky to take almost every possible mean of transport during my stay in India: trains, cabs, autorickshaws, bikes, boats (including so called country boats) and more. Each and every one was an experience itself and specially autorickshaws and motorbikes gave me lots of fun. Also a lot of dust in my hair and between my teeth, but every pleasure has its price apparently :):):)
During my next trip I need to have a bus ride as this one thing is missing on my list!
People – Indians are lovely and very friendly. The only shocking thing I couldn’t get over was that they are staring at white people like they have never seen them before (I was doubting at one moment if India was ever colonised by British as it is simply impossible that after all those centuries of European occupation white faces still bring so much attention!). Whenever I go there were always couple pairs of eyes glaring at me. And it wasn’t discretely done from a distance – no, no! They were staring with their jaws open (literally!). My reactions to it of staring back at them were making things only worse, so I gave up after some time and simply ignored it. Still the feeling was more than strange.
For more photos from India click here
Labels: Travel
