LIFE UNLEASHED

We couldn’t come all the way to India and not make a call in at The Taj!  With a great two for one deal on air fairs it was a no-brainer to fly up north for a quick whirl wind visit to Jaipur and the Taj in Agra. 

Jaipur has some great old forts and ancient markets in the pink city.  There were elephants walking the streets and working camels everywhere. But even with all this Jaipur was just a North Indian appetizer for what was to come.  Our two days there flew buy in anticipation.

The Taj is one of those rare things in life that actually lives up to the hype.  We spent two hours the first day just sitting and staring at the back side of it from across a river and it was still one of the most stunning things we had ever seen.  When you walk up to it through the front gates it absolutely overwhelms you.  You can’t take your eyes off it and you can hardly even speak. 

The  beauty of the Taj is even made greater by the absolute hole of a town that is Agra.  Agra is a bunch of narrow alleys that brought back to mind Thamel in Kathmandu… only it smelled worse.  At night they dump trash and sewage into the river running behind the Taj and the whole town smells so bad you can hardly breath.  But enough about that - we are not the first people to call Agra a hole.  Everybody else who has ever been there has already made this point quite clear.

So…given to collapsing global property values, and savings due to poor location,  we did decide to put an offer in on the Taj.  We expect to hear back from our agent in the next few days.  Ofcourse, if we get it we’ll renovate.   First, the plain white is a little boring and hard to keep clean so we will definitely paint.  We are thinking mud brown.   Satellite TV’s a must, so you can expect a dish on the top. We are thinking the spires on the right side would be a great place to hang outdoor hammocks.  And lastly, a second mausoleum…you know, for the kids.  That should help get that value back up!

Ah Holi, what better excuse to get liquored up and throw bright coloured powdered paint at each other than Holi.  It’s extra fun when combined with visiting one of the biggest outdoor crafts markets, in Anjuna, Goa..  We went from stall to stall looking at jewellery, tapestries, clothing, bags, drums, paintings and then in between each get hit with a colour bomb to the face.  Once people got tired of painting each other they turned on the sacred cows roaming along the beach.  By the end of the day there was a pink cow, a blue cow and a green cow and a  couple of very festive rainbow cows that we spotted. Ofcourse, they were immediately christened the Holi Cows!

Oh, and if you are worried about staining your clothes with all that powdered paint; any Indian will tell you it washes out.  It doesn’t!  Total cost to attend  Holi: 300 Rupies for beer.  2 Shirts.

As we left Tamil Nadu and transitioned through our Yoga Ashram, we came out in the much more relaxed Kerala state on the western shores of the tooth shaped country. To recover from our strained Yoga muscles we relaxed for a few days on the beautiful red cliff lined beaches of Varkala before heading up to the Kerela backwaters. The backwaters are a series of man made islands set in a lake to produce suitable wetland to cultivate rice paddies. The off shoot of this was stunning palm tree lined channels perfect for cruising around on ’traditional’ wicker houseboats. More of a highlight for our trip was a homestay on one of the reclaimed islands. We fell in love with the wonderful people we met and their wives/chefs who were more than happy to give you a cooking lesson while they prepared each meal. During an evening walking tour we heard how they must constantly build up the land they live on as it is sinking back into the water and were told of the many trials and tribulations of rice growing and coconut harvesting. And just for extra effect we were sung local folk songs while being paddled about at sunset in canoes. Fantastic.

From the backwaters we went into the hills of the Western Ghats which separate Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Out goal was to hunt wild elephants and maybe even the elusive tiger. So we loaded our trusty high calibre Canon (camera) and headed off on foot into Periyar wildlife preserve, home to 43 tigers and over 1800 elephants. Alas, all we saw was a bunch of wild boar, some male deer fighting over a doe, a few guar (buffalo), 5 or six otters and what a park ranger claimed was the distant derriere of an elephant hiding behind a tree. Sure enough if you zoom up our picture you can clearly make out a fuzzy grey area which could most definitely be that elusive piece of elephantine rump. Or a rock! We didn’t expect to see a tiger (which is very rare) but we did hope for an elephant and were a little crushed by not seeing one. Ha ha Ironic being crushed by the lack of an elephant.

Leaving Periyar with a little sadness in our hearts we headed of for Munnar tea plantation a few hours further up the hills. When our guest house owner heard our disappointing elephant story he said “Elephants? You want to see elephants? Why don’t you just walk up the road? We’ve got elephants right here!”

So again we loaded our high powered Canon (camera) and set off to shoot elephants. But as we got to where the elephants were supposed to be all we found were two very said looking Danish people who pointed out two giant owls.  As the Danes left their post we took over the watch joined by skinny 16 year old Viknesh, a local teenager taking a break from his football game.

Viknesh explained he had seen the elephants that morning standing on the very spot we now stood! After 30 minutes pacaderm free, Viknesh was given a tip by a local woman who had seen them ambling along the far side of the river.   So off we went crossing the river on a very precarious looking rope bridge (and through the private property of the TATA tea plantation — with Brad giggling all the way over “TATA”). Not to long after we set out did Viknesh stop and a Cheshire cat like grin spread slowly across his face.

 “Did you here that?!?!” he asked.

“Sorry!” Brad said, a little embarrassed. “I had a lot of lentils at lunch!”.

“No, no listen” Said Viknesh.

Crunch, crackle, snap.

“Elephants in the woods below!!!”

Sure enough about a 150 meters away down a gentle slope covered in short tea trees and just back in the dense forest brush ambled four adult a two baby elephants. They must have know we had come to see them though because as we approached quietly along our ridge they turned and came out of the forest directly in front of us. The first two adults kept their youngster safely between them, shielded from the flashes of the foreign paparazzi. The mother of the second baby ambled out displaying her little calf for us and the father, the largest of all the elephants stopped turned towards us and began gesturing. When a two tonne animal stares you down you get nervous. Very nervous. However, from hours of nature shows I knew that as long as Dumbo kept flapping his ears we were OK. (the minute those ears stay splayed out at a right angle from his head your in trouble!)

 “Psssst Viknesh” I whispered. “Which way do we run if the elephant charges!”

“If you go up the hill elephants catches you.” Viknesh theororised

“So we go down then.” I said to Brad

“No!” Viknesh said sternly “Elephant will catch you”

“Right!” I concurred

Luckily, Dumbo figured that we meant no harm and guided his heard over to the dirty area that they set aside for nightly dust baths. We were overjoyed at our luck at seeing these 6 elephants. What was even more incredible was that Viknesh who sees them almost everyday was just as overjoyed as we were. And what did we learn from all this?

“Don’t try so hard and you’ll find the “Elephant” you are looking for!”

Although not every meal can be a South Indian engagement extravaganza, we can heartily say we’ve been eating well!  South Indian food is a good rival to our favourite Thai and Vietnamese.   Our first love is the Masala Dosai which is a crispy lentil flour crape stuffed with a delicious mashed potato filling.  Then there is idli -  a steamed rice patty that is perfect for soaking up coconut chutney.  On top of that you can have Vadai a clove spiced donut again for dipping in your favourite curry, sambal or chutney. 

If you’re still hungry after a dosai breakie, practically every restuarant in south India servers it’s own “Thali” meal set.  Served on a banana leaf or on a silver tray fit for a king, you are presented with anywhere from 5-15 different dishes — vegetable curry, lentil dahl, sambal, coconut chutney, lime pickle, sticky sweet fruit conserve and plenty of papads, chapatis and heaping mounds of rice to scoop it all up with.  Yummo!

Once you are sick of all that you can move on to the great seafood and choose from beautiful white pomfret fish, shark or huge prawns.

And of course, no meal is complete without Indian sweets.  My god are they good.  The Barfi fudge (okay it’s a bad name) is fantastic and come in many flavours including carrot, coconut, pistachio and chocolate.   Small diamonds of compressed milk and sugar kaju katri are covered in edible silver and look as good as they taste.  Galub Jumuns are deep fried cream cheese sponge balls that are then covered in sticky sweet syrup are defiantly unhealthy but are also a path to divinity.  If it’s too hot for tea and sweets you can always head for kulfi which is Indian Ice cream and comes in great flavours like cardamom, pistachio and mango.

A note for our friends back in Toronto.  Our favourite restaurant that we have visited so far in India is a chain called Saravana Bhavan.  And guess what?  They have opened one in Mississauga, Ontario.  If you want to experience a little bit of our travels go there and have a dosai or a Thali (set meal). You will love it.  Their sweets counter was also the best we have had …so far.  In case you live in the east end of Toronto and have never heard of a place called “Mrs. Awgga“, we also recommend Udupi Palace on Gerard in Little India.  Ask for a Paper Dosa and be embarrassed at the sheer size of it when it is served.

 Your walking down the street and all of a sudden a loud band starts playing  and people start rushing into the building in front of you. 

What do you do? 

Go in of course. 

That’s how we found ourselves sitting in the congregation of a huge wedding in the town of Mallaparam.  We then wondered if crashing a wedding was a good idea, especially considering most of the men in the room had their heads cranked around to look at us (or more specifically at Lisa) sitting at the back of the hall.  Soon however, several smiles were exchanged and assurances that we should stay for the ceremony. What a ceremony…a huge alter with crimson velvet curtains and thrones for the bride and groom, loud drums, exploding fireworks and food for about 400 guests. 

Of course, you can’t go to an Indian wedding and leave without eating!  So we were ushered upstairs by our new friends to join the feeding frenzy on the 2^nd floor.  The food was home cooking at it’s best.  Rows of tables spread with banana leaves to which numerous waiters would ladle endless portions of 4 types of rice (each with a distinctive flavour), 4 different curries, several chutneys, curd, and 3 different deserts including ice cream.

After  all that we found out it wasn’t even a wedding but merely an engagement.  I guess we will have to come back next year for the BIG event.