Rob and Anna's travel adventure

Pondicherry-Mamallapuram, India

I like traveling in India, but Pondichrry was the first town I couldn't wait to get out of. Too touristy, to "gringo-ish", too "sweet", too "not-so-much-India" for me. The city has a French history roots, and is pretending to be French, but not in a good way in my opinion. Don't get me wrong, I love France and I love French people. As a matter of fact, last summer cycling in Europe, France was my most favorite country to travel in. However, Pondicherry seems to attract snotty and snobby French people, the city is way over-priced, and I don't frankly get what all this fuss is about? I love India for being India, if I wanted to visit France, I would go to France, so you can see that Pondicherry made me irritable. It could be due to the fact that hotels were over-booked and over-priced. Luckily, for the first night we met a decent tout (very rare occurrence here in India to meet a decent tout), and he helped us with an accommodation. It was pretty basic, and was called a "capsule house". Basically, it was a roof of the historical house converted into a room. The walls, windows and doors were simple bamboo waved sheets, they created a kinda soothing sound when the wind was blowing, but we had only one single bed in the room, so well needed sleep was out of the question. Luckily, the next morning Rob was able to secure a very nice room for us in the posh ashram (yes, India seems to have quite a few luxurious cults and ashrams), the room was about 10 USD by the way. Our room had a picture perfect view over the ocean, and a large balcony over the garden intended for meditation. We used the balcony for slightly different purposes though. The first function was to dry a long over-due laundry, and the second was food related. Rob and I decided to treat ourselves to a big amount of ice cream. So, we brought the ice cream to the balcony and enjoyed it while watching the waves, and people strolling on the beach. But, the room was available only for one night, so the next morning we headed out away from Pondicherry. I must admit however, that I do have a few pleasant memories about this stop-over (besides a great ocean-front room). Rob and I took a stroll on the beach, and we were taking photos of locals - ice cream sellers, fruit stall sellers, etc. Some of them felt so honored that we found them interesting, so they began feeling very comfortable with us, and moved their business closer. We sat down under a beach umbrella, and soon enough several local Indian families joined in and filled up our area. So, there we were, surrounded by a dozen of relatives, smiling at us, offering us food, pushing their babies to us for photos, etc. At some point an old toothless babushka joined us with a big smile on her face, we took her picture too, and showed it to her, she gave even bigger smile, and we all began laughing, like one big family of strangers. At one point I looked to my right, and saw a group of foreigners sitting at an expensive coffee house surrounded by the security gate. They were looking in our direction with a sort of envy look - there they were sitting lonely and isolated at an expensive establishment protected "by a security gate", and there we were sitting under a free beach umbrella, right on the sand, surrounded by a large group of happy strangers. It was obvious who had more fun, and it made me realize again why I like traveling in India. India does not care for expensive fun, it is spontaneous, unpredictable, and crazy, with good hearted strangers that make me feel so good here, and and make me feel like a part of one big family. I really like Indian people, they touch my heart in so many ways. And, except for annoying touts, I can not imagine a better place to feel more welcomed.

After Pondicherry we headed out to Mammalpuram, located right on the ocean, or to be exact, on the shores of the Bay of Bengal. Mammalpuram felt definitely like India we got used to it - crazy, loud, fast, unpredictable, a little seedy, but very friendly and comfortable. The usual creatures everywhere - cows, goats, dogs, monkeys, basically business as usual. The entire village is the World Heritage site, because of the incredible rock carved temple art. The temples were constructed from one piece of rock carved by hand. You try creating a house from a big bolder, using only a chiseling knife! Anyway, they were a work of art. Among other things, we did the usual - went to the ocean to meet the sunrise, and to the temples to meet the sunset. Some of the temples are erected high in the sky, on the rock, so we had to climb there. But, what was unusual about the climb, was the following. As soon as the sun began setting, and we started climbing, we were joined by an invasion of monkeys. Apparently, monkeys LOVE watching the sunset too. They quickly climbed the temples and surrounding rocks, completely oblivious to our presence, took the best seats for the sunset watching, and just were having a great time. A little bit too much of a great time to be exact. I came to a conclusion that not only us, humans, feel romantic about sunsets and sunrises. A few monkeys seemed to be inspired by the sunset so much, that they began making luuuuv right in front of us. They couldn't care less if they were watched, or not, they just wanted to do it right then and right there. I must add, that every night we would go to watch a sunset, every night we would see the monkeys rushing to see the sunset too. And, a few still felt that powerful emotion of sharing the beauty in a passionate way. How could you not feel that way about the dramatic sunset, right? You have to appreciate their feelings in that way, after all we are all related...

posted by Rob and Anna @ 12:58 AM