I'll Be There Dreckly: An End To This Madness!

Trivandrum (map) and Kanyakamuri (map), India

In this blog: your typical city, some martial arts training, an elephant parade, and the most southerly point of India.

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Every place in India that I've visited has been distinct or unique in some way, but the city of Trivandrum, the state capital of Kerala, is the first that I can describe as 'just another city' - one without much distinction in any way. But since I was passing through I thought it was worth stopping for a day, and it also made a good hub for a trip to the most southerly point of India - Kanyakamuri, which turned out to be quite a bizarre day, even by Indian standards.

Royal Treasure

Room service is something that doesn't normally come into the vocabulary of your average backpacker trying to keep to a budget. But when you find, as I did one morning that you can have a complete breakfast delivered to your room for just £0.75 (75 rupees), how can you possibly say no? I felt like a king, a king with a paper crown.

Sri Padmanabhaswamy
temple

I set off for a city walk, stopping briefly outside Sri Padmanabhaswamy temple (a mouthful or what?), made famous when ten years or so ago a trawl of treasure - diamonds, gold, gems - was found in a hidden room, valued at between US$40-200 billion! Can you imagine being the person who found that? Next door was Puttan Malika Palace which I had a quick look around, where the standout item was definitely a solid crystal throne - is it possible to get more bling?

Museum in the park

I walked a couple of miles to the other end of town, impressed that an Indian city actually had pavements you could use for once, without resorting to climbing over piles of rubble, risking falling down a hole, or tripping over a stray cable. Passing an Indian Rail workshop I stopped for a few minutes to watch over a wall whilst men and women overhauled parts of trains, went past some interesting British Raj-era buildings that still look just as grand, relaxed for a while in a nice park, and had a brief gander in the pretty shabby Natural History Museum. The day was rounded off nicely at an old-fashioned looking cinema I chanced upon near my hotel, which happened to have a movie in English - 'Noah'. With a 20p bag of popcorn in hand and a pair of 3D glasses perched on nose, life couldn't get more exciting!

Loincloths and Sticks

Kalarippayat Training

Most martial arts seem to originate from Japan of China, but India has one of it's own, called - 'kalarippayat'. I read that the training session was open to the public, so the following morning I got up nice and early to see what it was all about. I walked into the building, finding a sunken pit where about twenty men and boys were training and grabbed a seat on the terrace above, along with a couple of other curious Westerners. It was a typically Indian experience - everyone wore a white loincloth which revealed way too much, and there was a small shrine in one corner that was occasionally paid reference to. The main part of training seemed to consist of walking along doing palm-to-the-floor lunges, reaching for the sky with both hands, or doing high kicks in the manner of Monty Python's 'Ministry of Silly Walks' sketch. I jest, but it was genuinely very impressive to watch, especially later in the session when some of them men did stick fighting exercises against each other with high speed and precision.

Lands End - Madness Magnet

Like the South Pole which has magnetic attraction for metal, the southernmost point of India - Kanyakamuri - seemed to have a magnetic attraction for madness - the day trip there was one of the most unpredictable and bizarre I've had for some time. So it was a quite fitting then that it should also be the symbolic end to my journey in India.

After the early morning martial arts - a mildly different start to the day, I took the train south for a day trip. A friendly man walked through the carriage with a broken arm and talked for a few minutes, then a little after a man with no legs rolled through, sat on a small wheeled cart begging for money. An hour later a severely disfigured man also begging for money looked my way. This doesn't usually happen on trains, the streets yes, but not trains. Reaching the town of Kanyakamuri, I walked a mile or so to what I thought was the southernmost point, and cresting a small hill what was my first sight? A man having a poo on the beach. Wrong place obviously.

Monuments on the rocks

It was swelteringly hot and humid, but at least the coastal winds now provided a little relief. I walked a mile or so later along the filthy shore towards the town, passing through a fishing village which was partly destroyed by the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami. Kids say hello, and a woman with a baby offered biscuits to me, without a word or a smile. Back on track again I took a ferry with hundreds of Indian tourists across to a couple of big rocks a little way offshore, where there stood a granite statue of a god, and a grand memorial to someone who once visited to meditate; a very Indian justification for such a structure. Traditional Indian music played through speakers throughout, and made the situation feel more like a movie than real life. It does feel that way in India sometimes.

Ceremony at the most southerly
point in India

Back on the mainland, I wandered to the most southerly point of India - I was finally there after months with it in my sights, sad in some ways, but a satisfying feeling nonetheless. A big ceremony of some sort was taking place - a man was being blessed and given a garland, and a huge line of identically dressed women were being presented with a flower arrangement to carry on their head. Fully clothed Indians were jumping around and playing in the waves below. A deaf female hawker with no teeth, a massive smile and an American bandana on her head started talking to me, for once not really trying to sell anything, but proudly showing me photos of her with other western tourists. A young Indian man asked if I'd be in a photo with him - not my first that day - and not wanting to be rude I reluctantly walked to the rocks below, only for a wave to crash in and soak my shoes. It was time to leave, and I headed back, grabbing a red banana on the way - red bananas I thought, whatever next?

Parade

The bizarre day went up another notch again when I spotted something on the street ahead. Was it really I thought? Yes, yes it really was - three elephants were walking along the street. It turned out the small ceremony I'd seen at the coast had now surprisingly turned into a huge carnival-like parade, with hundreds of people walking in line up the road. As well as the people I'd seen earlier, there were musicians, drummers, people in traditional dress, and the elephants - fully decorated and being ridden by traditionally dressed men. At the front of the parade were a pair of tractors which had a bamboo structure built on to them, and hanging from that were two men suspended by ropes, floating around like superman. I looked closer and my jaw dropped - they weren't just tied to the rope, but were suspended by fishing hooks that had been inserted into their skin! I'd never seen anything like it, I was amazed.

Hooked (note: look closely only if you dare)

The parade neared the end, and it was time for me to head back, so I headed to the train station. 'The last train was at four, you've missed it' the ticket lady said. I walked the mile or so to catch the bus instead, just getting there in time to catch it, and setting off heading north. About half an hour into the journey I looked ahead, to see that the bus was going to have to partly cut a corner to get past an oncoming bus which wasn't slowing. Suddenly BANG - one of the rear tyres blew out, presumably on a stray rock. Oh joy. Everyone piled off onto the verge, and an irritating young drunk guy started talking to me. Ten minutes later another passing bus stopped and we squeezed on. I then learnt that it wasn't going our way, so a little later we had to change bus at the next town. To add to this, the replacement bus we were awaiting was stuck in traffic - luckily it wasn't cold or wet - problems are only half as bad when the weather's good. After half an hour or so another bus showed up, and at 10pm I was finally back. Exhausted.

Martial arts, disabled beggars, defecating men, hawkers, unwanted photos, a surprise festival, a red banana, a missed train, and a bus breakdown - that's quite a day, even by Indian standards. And what a way to finish, because as far as Indian culture goes, that was it, the end of my trip - with a flight out of the country finally booked and just three days left, it was time to head to the beach.