India May 2011 - Final words / Impression

My lasting impressions of India are hard to quantify or qualify with words. Our small snapshot was exactly that; small. As i've written a number of times in this blog, what makes India so special is the people. It is they who live their lives as best they can. It cannot be said they are a 'developing country' unless you are talking economics, because actually their way of life is developed in the way that only they know how.

India May 2011 - The last day - Mysore and home

Our last planned adventure, at least for Sarah and I, was a planned trip to Mysore. Fred had another week or so on the sub-continent. The plan was to get up early and with the four of us (Praful, Sarah, Fred and I) head out to Mysore in Praful's car. We planned to get up early to try to avoid some of the traffic. I think by the time we go away at 8am, the roads were already clogging up. The road out to Mysore is 125km but in the end it took 5 hours with a breakfast stop. If there wasn't a huge traffic jam, there were speed humps or other obstacles slowing us down. It was tiring for the driver and also us in the car. Luckily his new little Ford had temperature controlled airconditioning and was as comfortable as we would get in any other form of transport.

India May 2011 - The Indian Wedding

Crashing out at Praful's pad was a welcome break. He has a great apartment with an open living room and big terrace. After not really sleeping properly a little afternoon nap was very enjoyable and needed. We had lunch at Forum (the big mall nearby) and did some last minute shopping to a) kill time and b) for the realisation that our Indian adventure was quickly coming to a close. Praful had cooked dinner for us, which we thought was amazing even if he played it down as peasant food! Actually he had kept the chicken an extra day because he had expected us in Bangalore the day before not planning for the delay. Praful was a superb host! We made our way to bed relatively early as the wedding was to start the next morning at 6am.

India May 2011 - Getting back to Bangalore

The problem was, we weren't meant to be on this train. We had booked, but like in an earlier blog, we had learnt how this reservation / waiting system works. We hadn't made it through the waiting list and were stuck at spots 5,6,7 on the list. Just about everyone we asked said we should just get on and find a seat. Sarah and I were skeptical because our waiting list positions hadn't moved in a few days, indicating the spots were fixed. Maybe because I was looking forward to a sleep on the train or because of stupidity we still tried our luck. When the conductor arrived and asked for our tickets we pleaded innocence and asked where our beds were. He was quite abrupt with us. I tried to negotiate and push him to work out a solution for us. We had just sat down in an empty cubicle.

India May 2011 - Allepey

Allepey is proclaimed as the "Venice of the East". Based in northern Kerala, one of the southern most states in India is basically a small fishing town with a large tourist population. Kerala is / was one of the only communist run states in India, thus seeing the hammer and sickle flown high was a common sight. Venice of the East because of the back-water areas, that have made this part of India famous. And it was for the back-waters that we had come.

India May 2011 - The Train Ride

Having heard a lot about the great train rides in India we had somewhat high expectations. These expectations were matched and exceeded.

Booking a train in India is not a trivial as hopping on a German fasttrain ICE and finding a seat and paying the conductor. As some routes are only provided once a week, a significant amount of planning is required. As there are only a limited number of seats, booking is essential. However instead of closing off the booking list when the train is full, your 'expression of interest to be on the train' is lodged and you are put on the waiting list. This list gets whittled down as people cancel their bookings. These cancellations are pretty high as many travel agents buy up tickets and if they can't sell them, simply cancel at the last minute. We had Avinash book nearly a month in advance for a sleeper train and was positioned around 25 on the list. Two days before our trip, we were 10ish on the list and by the afternoon before our scheduled departure had secured a seat each on the train from Gokarna to Mangalore and a bed each on the sleeper from Mangalore to Allepey.