Malabar Blues

Some final thoughts before setting off to Munnar. Keep all limbs inside the vehicle at all times, if you want to keep them at all. There is a copy of The Fountainhead mocking me from the bookshelf in the internet cafe, nestled between two Noam Chomsky books; Dawkins looms above them. I saw a North Indian intellectual yesterday or the day before wearing a blue scarf and red Chomsky shirt. At Cherai Beach a giant hammer and sickle was chalked across the road, next to a giant lotus flower. Scores of men young and old come there to stare and call out to Western women in their bathing suits.

Asharof helped me out again last night, when I left my camera's memory card at the internet cafe. After introducing me to more of his family he drove me back in his piece of junk rickshaw, wiping the rain off with some dirty newspaper (was he a little drunk?). He didn't charge me, but told me instead that "God knows what is in your heart." He is currently jobless, not for lack of willingness (his programming skills can't compete with youth), but because Kerala is communist he has a roof over his head and food to eat. We gave each other our most profound wishes and parted ways; he will send me a Christmas card.

When we went south to the backwaters the other day, I saw some petrol tankers labeled "Highly Inflammable."

How did I end up in India? How did I end up studying Indian philosophy, religion, culture, and history? How did I end up at Towson University? Where the hell do I go from here? How will I ever think again that comfort is worth the theft of natural resources and the mass murder of millions? How could I ever believe again that war is anything but war against children? How can I ever again be confused about who the real enemy is?

The whole financial collapse thing was going on right before I left the U.S. I've been trying to keep up with it from overseas... It seems that we are nationalizing our banking system. How many times does history need to repeat itself? Don't people realize what's really going on? It's not like we didn't see this coming, but... Maybe soon it will be enough to mobilize the angry middle class, i.e. to make the guards realize that they're expendable and on the same side as the prisoners, as Howard Zinn put it.

The British and Germans Are the Worst

Ventured out of Kochi yesterday through the backwaters not far to the south. Saw a kingfisher but was moving too fast to get a decent photo. Leaving Tuesday for Munnar and some wildlife preserves. Che is big among much of the youth in Kerala, especially in the smaller villages. A North Indian about my age bemoaned this fact to me after we were talking to some locals about it, denouncing Che as a butcher who killed whoever he wanted. I found out from a woman working in Kollam I've been speaking with online that the timed blackouts are occuring because the first monsoon was a "soft" one, and therefore did not provide enough hydroelectric power at the dams. Not much in the mood for description, but I'll leave you all with some pictures.

No Name, No Slogan

Yesterday I met two Belgians on holiday; actually Carol was originally from Germany and Susan is a Flemmish Belgian. We swapped tales of our adventures, talked film and philosophy, exchanged some useful information, and had dinner.



Today I met Asharof, a Muslim who helped me buy a few small items in my neighborhood. We spoke a long while about the various religions of India and of Indian religious character in general. He took me to his home and introduced me to his extended family. There we spoke more, about Ayurvedic remedies, Malayalam and Urdu, the Qur'an, Mother Theresa and Gandhi, Western and Keralan culture, and family. Later he took me around the island and showed me all the temples, churches, mosques, and synagogues, as well as the spice factories.

Fumez-Vous?

A French family just came to our homestay, with a little girl, and we also happened to eat next to them at a restaurant last night before the blackout. I forgot to mention, the commies here like to conserve energy, so there are mandatory blackouts for a half-hour each night. Each district is designated a different half-hour block, but everyone is prepared and life goes on just fine without the juice. There are also random blackouts now and again due to weather or grid strain, but these generally only last five to fifteen minutes.

I was delighted to speak a bit of French with the little girl, who couldn't keep to her seat at dinner. We chatted a while, but the cutest was at one moment she lept over to me shouting "regardez!" One of her top front teeth was missing, and she was inserting a toothpick in and out of the gap. When they first arrived the girl was wearing Western clothes, but by then her parents had found her some jungle-hippy threads. Then she asked me for a smoke.

Lungi, Not Dr. Murungi

I decided I really wanted a lungi, the long skirt-like articles of clothing worn by many of the men here in Kerala, because they look really comfortable in the heat and humidity. My first mistake was trying to get one in the more touristy Fort Kochi; my second mistake was asking right off the bat if the tailor had any. All of my previous haggling experiences had been fun and successful because I pretended to not be very interested in what I was buying. He started me off at about six and a half times the going rate for a lungi, and wouldn't budge much lower than six times. I should have just walked out, like I had done a few times before to get the prices I had wanted, but I was absolutely sick of jeans. I think maybe he was also worried that if he cut the price too much for me in front of the two annoying women from Maine that were in the shop, he wouldn't be able to get much out of them; they looked ready to spend quite a bit, too.



But it was certainly worth it; the lungi was my golden ticket into the hearts of Keralans.

Where have all the chaiwallas gone?

I'm frequently amazed at the arrogance and condescension the Western tourists here display toward the Malayalees. And they seem to hate one another, as if each other Westerner represents to them the inauthenticity of their retreat into tropical paradise. I even saw a woman who had just arrived in Fort Kochi outright glaring at a small child. There's plenty of yelling, as in that whole volume = understanding idea. The Americans are the absolute worst.



Sarina and I are here for different reasons, obviously, but recently it has become more pronounced. She likes going to places in the tour guide, I use the guide to get an idea of reasonable prices and go elsewhere. She likes travel by autorickshaw, I like walking. I memorize maps in a couple minutes, she frequently goes off on her own and gets lost.