Back To Kochi

Breakfast musak was Bill Evans again and reception were still enjoying "Sonny". Cultural differences aside, if they played Indian music in my office, I would still notice that it was the same song day-in, day-out. Clearly Indian reception staff are remarkably patient.....or deaf.

Talking of receptionists, the donkey at the hotel in Madurai kindly knacked all my Wi-Fi settings, hence the delay in posting this.  Unable to connect, I made the mistake of asking for help and got the office trainee. He grabbed my phone and gleefully altered every setting he could find. I was so busy ensuring he didn't do anything too insecure, that I completely failed to watch what he had changed and the upshot is that it hasn't worked with any password protected network since. The next time I go drinking on the USS Enterprise, I'll ask Spock to fix my Wi-Fi and not the laundry boy, whose usual responsibilities are restricted to sorting the socks into pairs. 

#firstworldproblems huh?

Anyway, "A quick 160kms up to Kochi tomorrow". I really should learn to keep my trap shut. The journey took 4 hours with no stops. That's an average of 40kph / 25mph because there is more or less continuous development between Kollam and Kochi, with little open countryside. Essentially, the entire journey was through built up areas, with all the traffic that implies. Plus, the road surface was destroyed in places, with potholes into which you could fit the Marianas Trench, twice over. 

Still, 50kms, in came a moment of light relief when I saw a rather official looking sign, pointing down a side road and bearing the words: "The Home Office Minister's Camp". Is he indeed? Well, truth be told, I'm not that butch myself but I don't put signs up about it.

Eventually, I crawled into Kochi and checked into to my last hotel of the trip. (Nope, Wi-Fi still knacked). My next job was to drop the bike off, which felt very final. Tomorrow, I jump on a plane and return to a country where there is, at least, reasonable compliance with road traffic laws. I'm not sure I could live with the full-on, clamouring chaos of life in India and it's a lazy cliche to say that "it just works somehow" but I certainly loved every minute of my time in Southern India 

And yet, there is an Indian elephant in the room. A large, leaky-bottomed pachyderm or, in short, the whole "Dire Rear" thing. Did I suffer any such unpleasantness? Well regrettably not. I say "regrettably", only because I'd got a page of nonsense ready for when that particularly messy ship docked. But no....a combination of a healthy constitution and basic precautions seem to have kept me safe (I only ate Hobnobs the whole trip - Arf!) 

As Carruthers and I arrived at Chennai station, we saw an unfortunate tourist chap being very unwell at the end of the platform and I felt so sorry for him. I wanted to give him a supportive hug but a moment's consideration about the realities of such a gesture.......

So with my patronising hat on, ride around India on an Enfield or something equivalently different. I realise that everyone has already done Goa and backpacked around the continent as students but the fun, for me, starts with derelict trains, spaceships, temples, unstable cakes and a wonderfully kind, friendly people. 

Plus, you'll never need to buy another comb. 

Oh and in case you thought my summing up was inane, let me share this gem I overheard in a restaurant last night:

"India's, like, all old and stuff but I prefer Mexico"

....."like all old and stuff". It's so lovely to hear the speech centre of a brain being allowed out entirely on its own.

P.S. I think this lady won although she doesn't look very pleased about it

Madurai to Kollam

A tough one today, covering some 280kms, which doesn't sound much but I crossed over the Western Ghats again (a mountain range and not a double-barreled posh couple) on some dreadfully torn up road surfaces. Anyhow, all done now which leaves me in Kollam, with a quick 160kms back to Kochi tomorrow. Stupidly, I didn't check the mileage on my departure but the total will be something north of 1500 kms by the time I'm finished. Not an interstellar distance but not too bad considering I was drinking stout in Bangalore for three days and went to Chennai by train.

Tonight, I am drinking in the Golden Tavern Bar, Kollam and Kollam means that I'm back in Kerala. Kerala has a funny relationship with alcohol and it's hard to buy booze, other than in swanky hotels. There certainly seem to be no bars in Kollam, so I went out hunting swanky hotels. The Golden Shower Tavern is not swanky, although for legal reasons I should state that the hotel it is attached to, may very well be. 

The Golden Rivet is quite like a working men's club and is rather jolly. Full of slightly drunk men singing and laughing loudly at the bar (Seated at the bar, laughing, rather than laughing at the bar itself, obvs). They couldn't be less fussed that a soppy English guy has come in to drink beer and look at maps. No photo, I'm afraid, coz it's very nearly as gloomy as the USS Enterprise last night. Still, it's nice to give your cone photoreceptors a holiday too.

So why am I not drinking in my hotel, I hear absolutely nobody ask? Well, the Hotel Nani was built by a cashew nut magnate (yup!) who frowns heavily upon drinking, or indeed, any form of fun which doesn't feature cashews. Beyond their consumption, I am not aware of anything remotely fun that's ever been done with a cashew nut. If you are, please keep it to yourself. 

However, despite its prudish, nut-centric philosophy, Hotel Nani is totally lovely in every way and......they've given me another comb! Back of the hair-net! From a combophile's perspective, I am having the best holiday ever 

Yes, I realise that you're scraping the barrel, comedically, when the comb photos come out. I am sorry about the lack of content today but some days, stuff happens and on others, it doesn't. So here's a pic of my personal favourite from India's Got Talent. 

I don't think his head is that flat in real life - it was a cheap telly - but he had a lovely voice. Obviously, most of the other singers sounded like a flatulent, bagpipe-playing goat being pulled through a jet engine but that's just my cultural ignorance 

Anyway, back to Hotel Peanut for the chef's speciality curry. Ooh I wonder what the protein might be? The obvious thought is something on the nut spectrum but I'm not ruling out finely sliced goat in jet fuel.

Taking of regional music, I was in reception, waiting for my room to be made ready and sat through a jazz-funk arrangement of the song "Sonny", played on an ocarina. (It's such a scandal that there are so few songs written for that beautiful instrument). I've now been through there on 8 separate occasions and heard the same song every time. If I worked here, I'd have gone bat-sh1t crazy by now and lumped somebody.

Strangely, my nut curry (behave at the back) was accompanied by the jazz pianist Bill Evans playing "I Should Care". Wasn't expecting that in Kollum.

Turuchirappali to Madurai

On my way out of Trichy, I detoured to see the Golden Rock Railway Works, which is where they glue the wheels back on their wonky locos. If you were 10 and simple, you would have had a field day because the Indian railways spend on fences, like they do on simplifying the purchase of tickets.

Well, by the grace of God, I am simple and have the sophistication of a perenially held-back 10 year old so it was brilliant! I won't bore you with train pics but trust me, it was larks.

Ok, just one photo then:

After a spot of knackered-train spotting, I had a very quick, easy ride to Madurai. I checked into Hotel Supreme which is pretty good in many ways but best of all......Its got a spaceship in the basement! Seriously, I'm sitting on the flight-deck of the Enterprise, watching India's Got Talent; Sitars, squeaky women singers and, although it's in Tamil, when they need a cliche, they dip into English ".....Give it all you've got, ai?" 

[If anyone knows who won, don't tell me coz I'm taping it]

And remember, I'm watching this strange program, from onboard the USS Enterprise. If they haven't spiked my drink, then I've overdone it and I'm having a psychotic episode. I feel a bit like David Bowie must have done, when he'd had enough of hanging out with Iggy Pop in Berlin and decided to clean himself up. 

This is a publicity photo from outside the Hotel. In reality, it's way more gloomy and, apart from me, completely deserted

By the trunk of Ganesha! The toilets on this spaceship!! Why would NASA build a spaceship in Madurai and then cheap-out on the bogs? Some Andrex and a working flush would seem to be the bare minimum for a 5 year mission, I'd have thought? NASA, literally, sort your sh1t out.

That's the thing about Mr C. You make plans and then he pops round and you're suddenly on a spaceship with a couple of lads, woofing idlis and watching Indian talent shows. Come on, we've all been there.

Oh, and the room came with another comb. Get in!

Happy Republic Day

It's Republic Day (Jan 26th) in India so, as a patriotic treat, here's a photo of a pretty little Enfield which was parked in the courtyard of the hotel in Puducherry and belonged to the boss. I had asked to park my bike alongside but was flatly refused. I suspect this was because my one looks rather scabby and dirty at the moment. Then again, it's possible that he was just jealous because I'd covered more kms that day, than were showing in total on his speedo. Ha! 

Leaving Pondy, I turned my maps app on, just to get onto the main road. I mount the phone in a clear front pocket on the tank bag which is directly in the sun and at one point, looking down, I saw that the screen had gone blank. Muttering a few oaths, I carried on without it and managed not to get too lost. When I was able to stop, I noticed that the phone had shut down due to overheating. Blimey, it's quite hot round here.

Right, so there's a chain of coffee shops in India called Cafe Coffee Day (silly name but still). Attentive readers may recall a hot pink fairy cake with a tendency towards landslides - Well that was the same mob. They're trying to be trendy and aspirational and jolly good luck to them (although the tea and coffee was a bit grim). I guess they are like Buckstars in the ROTW, only they probably pay their taxes......and don't have extremely litigious libel lawyers.

Anyhoo, I'd just got out of Pondy and onto the big roads, when I sailed passed a CCD outlet at the roadside. As I say, not the best coffee on earth but clean and air conditioned and very welcome on a hot day. It was too late to pull over safely (although when has that stopped anyone in India?) but I made a mental note to keep an eye out for another one along the road. 

Sadly in the next 180kms, I saw only the most grim places where you might stop if you were on the GI diet (Gastro Intestinal diet or the "Sh1t Yourself Thin" diet). Eventually, I pulled over (outside yet another nasty cafe) for a swig of water and a gander at the map. But...Stripe me! There was a nice CCD outlet just 30 metres away.

Sadly, as you may be able to see from the photo, it was on the opposite side of the road and between us stood 4 lanes of psychotic traffic and a couple of concrete walls. Forget riding over there - To make it on foot, I would have had to post Team GB Olympic qualification times for every event in the heptathlon (including, and especially, the ones where you throw things at people). So I took a quick photo but then, to really rub it in, when I turned back, a dog had trotted out of "my" cafe and was having a big sh1t near my bike. Hmm!

So over there, was a nice place with tea and air con, whilst on my side of the road was the Dog Shit Cafe. It has to be said, God, that as metaphors for life go, this one really lacked your usual subtlety.

Still, nil desperandum: I was nearly at my hotel but I had overshot by a few metres and tripped over the Hotel Splendido Marvelloso. Ooh, it was lovely! Clean, modern rooms, hot water and reasonably priced. Obviously something would have to go dreadfully wrong. Ok, the Wi-Fi wasn't working but who cares? 

Ok, the neighbourhood needs a bit of gentrifying and that new flyover will be a problem but still, showered and happy, I went to the bar....to discover that it was closed for Republic Day. Arse!

Never mind, I shall try another bar. Double Bottoms! Every bar in town was closed for Republic Day!

Aside:

Prior to leaving, I'd been told that drinking milk in India is pretty well equivalent to licking a rabid dog's back end. Not keen on such things, I'd brought 500gms of Tesco Cheapest Powdered Moo from the UK. After one day, I realised that the whole milk thing had been misrepresented (and possibly even the dog's bum bit), so I left the powder in Bangalore. (In Carruthers' gearbox as he'll no doubt discover).....End of aside

Soberly, I trudged back to my room for a cuppa and an early night. Hotel S-M had supplied many tea bags in the room, so Jackie Collins and I were going to enjoy a quiet night in (I feel wrong just writing that). But when I looked, I had tea bags, sugar but no milk.

As the speccy braniac in Scooby Doo says: "Jinkies, some days, Ganesha really has it in for me!"

Puducherry

Well we didn't get up early, on account of Mr C and the Chennai Licensing Authorities, so we really needed to crack on and get some miles done. Sadly, Carruthers' bike had other ideas and the thing was proving difficult to turn over, let alone start. The kickstarter was slipping and since this connects via the clutch, the repairs would seem not to have been 100% successful. We couldn't even bump-start it because that requires a working clutch too. But after 20 minutes of precision swearing, it fired up and Carruthers headed off, not to Goa but back to the repair centre for a new clutch. For all I know, he's still there.

Supportively, I left him to his woes because I had a long 350km ride down to Puducherry and watching him, watching a man fit a new clutch, would have been pointless. 

The scenery en route was pretty ordinary by Indian standards, although they do like a nice temple around these parts e.g. This be-scaffolded beauty is in Tiruvannamalai

 

Otherwise an uneventful journey so let's skip on to Pondy itself:

Having been a French colony, the style of the place could accurately be called French Colonial (I know, I'm like Dan Cruickshank's idiot brother). More so than any other Indian town I've visited in this trip, it is strikingly chock full of European tourists, which is a bit of a jolt. And then, since they are either rich elderly types, buying authentic Hindu antiquarian art (made last Tuesday) or neo-hippy kids rocking dreadlocks, the place might be much nicer without them. Oh well "chaque une..." as they say in the French colonies 

 

I popped out to "Bar Trying Too Hard" which thought it was edgy but, in truth, just looked like someone had put a couple of decks in your local curry house. It served lame cocktails and, of course, no Indian beer except Kingfisher. It was run by a short balding chap who claimed to have DJ-ed all over the globe and taught Carl Cox everything he knows. I didn't catch his name but I overheard the staff use a couple of words to describe him and from those, I think he must have been called "DJ Phat Khan"

All in all, it wasn't looking promising but they completely redeemed themselves with the best fish curry I've ever eaten. It was absolutely bloody yumbles.

However, DJ P-K then played The Birdy Song, (OK, I made that bit up) so I necked my Kingfisher and went for a wander.

Next stop was a trendy biker bar which was rather jolly, although being India, they really only acknowledge the existence of Enfields. Still, they had a very nice one sitting in the downstairs bar. 

I plodded around a few other bars in a futile search for homebrew stout but all I could find, other than Kingfisher, was Fosters....or "Fisters" as I saw written outside one place. I very much wanted to go in just to ask "Do you serve Fisters?" "Absolutely sir. Whatever you get up to on your holiday, is of no concern to us" 

Boom! Boom!

Basil

All That Way, Just For A Photo

Up with the flatulent sparrows at 4:30, which wasn't made easier by the not so early night. A "proper" taxi took us to the railway station where we queued for our morning cuppa and watched the cockroaches scurry around in the food cabinet - We decided not to eat. 

The train was punctual, although not the cleanest seat I've ever sat on. (Mind you, nothing prepares you for the toilet). Anyway, we bimbled along for 300kms through stunning scenery and crumbling stations. I'm glad to have made the trip because there was a temptation to just give up at the ticket-buying stage. 

However, unlike the 6:40 to Kings Cross, you get served brekkers on the Chennai Express. Just the usual bread and jam plus some nasty vada and something unidentifiable in a foil dish but welcome nevertheless. Not wanting a day-long visit from the Toilet Fairy, we cravenly skipped the foil/foul things

Once in Chennai, we hailed a taxi up to the Enfield factory from "Chiselling Taxis". Predictably, on arrival, the fare had doubled so we gave him the agreed amount and told him forcefully how very unlikely he was to get any more.

Predictably (again), we couldn't find the Enfield factory but this was to be expected since it was down a dirt road, which led off a dirt road. I guess they don't put much store by a business' address in India.

From "Rue de Merde", we walked 2kms to the beach just so we could say we'd paddled in the Bay of Bengal. Then we walked the same distance again back to the nearest approximation to civilisation. It was really quite a lot of walking in the midday sun. Still, we finally jumped into a tuk tuk and chose a top notch restaurant in downtown Chennai, as recommended by Lonely Planet. Well, when you're in the Yuen formerly known as Madras, it would be rude not to have a Madras and an impudent Kingfisher.

The eatery looked very basic and was rammed with locals. So, dead authentic but the service was glacial and the food, not really what we were after and certainly no beer. Still, an absolute snip at £1.60. As we left, we noticed another place around the corner and popped in for seconds, fat knackers that we are. Stonking nosh but an exhorbitant £3.50 and still not a sniff of a Kingfisher.

Having not managed a cheeky beer in Chennai, we headed off to the airport and found, to our immense horror, that the bar was closed for a public holiday. I argued that, with my big ears and nose, I was almost certainly the reincarnation of Ganesha and should be allowed a drink but all I got was a punch in the trunk for my blasphemy. Fair enough, I suppose.

So we killed an hour at the airport in bored abstinence. I could really have done with a toy-drum but they're so hard to come by in India.

Once on the aircraft, the stewardess came marching down to find us. Fully expecting that something was seriously wrong, in fact she just wanted to confirm our meal choice....Ah yes! - When I was booking the flights, they kept demanding more and more useless information and eventually wouldn't let me proceed without choosing a meal, (obvious nonsense on a 1 hour flight). So in a strop, I selected "Bland Meal" and I suppose she wanted to see what sort of person would eat such a thing. 

Once airborne, we got our meal and it really was pretty bland. The plain chicken sandwich was safe enough but the watermelon was a bit too racey for me.

Back in Bangalore, we decided that an early night would be letting India win, so we got the taxi to drop us at StoutStrasse for a date with Mr C. In your face, India!

Shopping In Bangalore

Got up early to see the helpful people at Thomas Cook about airline tickets. They'd been hopeless with train tickets but planes are very much more their bag.... Or not. Apparently, they aren't the best with flights either. A bit rubbish of them but I'm sure if you wanted a weekend in the Cotswolds, they'd be tops. 

To improve our mood, we went to a modern coffee shop and as well as my darjeeling, I ordered a pink cup cake (Yes, screaming I know) Unexpectedly, the top of the cake slid off and further investigation revealed that it had been warmed. 

Since when has anyone, let alone your average Indian in 35C heat, wanted a warm fairy cake?

On the way back, Carruthers was a accosted by a tuk tuk driver who told him that he shouldn't waste his time with gaudy tourist shops and instead, he should go to the Open Market. He'd only charge 10 rupees for the privilege of taking us there. Can anyone else hear warning bells?

Soppy as the day is long, we trotted along and gave the honest tuk tuk driver 50 rupees for his troubles. He then drove to his brother's tat shop and proceeded to stalk us for the next 30 minutes because we didn't go into his chums' shops. Eventually, the phrase "Will you cluck off and stop following us, or we'll call a gendarme?" seemed to work and we could explore the market in peace.

...Well, except for the toy-drum sellers. Do I look like a toy-drum sort of person? But these chaps don't take "No" for an answer. Fortunately I found an phrase which they did take for an answer. 

Walking back, we found a second home brew pub but this time it was hidden deep inside an abandoned shopping mall. Genuinely, no other shops were occupied and the escalators were switched off - Very Scooby Doo. We ordered a couple of stouts and even more of a mystery was: Who thought that this foul brown filth would pass for stout?

With an early start on Sunday, we weren't at home when Mr C called, however, we did nip out for a cheeky couple, early doors. We popped to our local for "cricket and ladies' night". After two days they had finally got a new cylinder of gas so they could serve something other than bottles. Scarily, they pretty well chucked the cylinder into the cellar and without any of that shroud nonsense we have in the UK to stop the valve breaking off. Carruthers and I were poised near the door for a sharp exit, should they have dropped it.

Obviously we then nipped over the road to "Bar Heineken" where of course, they only sell Tuborg and Fosters. Mind you, they sell it to an impressive crowd:

Oh and less you think that I obsess about tigers, here's a street banner depicting one of the first recorded cases: