Ponmudi

It seems like every weekend we go somewhere and somehow the experience seems like its simply out of this world, and I just can't imagine anything getting better or at least living up to the last weekend, but every weekend seems to do just that. Yesterday we traveled to Ponmudi, which the destination itself is nice, but the journey there and back is what made this trip so memorable.

The journey of course begins in a taxi and on these roads! Its actually getting hard for me to want to get into the taxi. At the same time however when a bus is only 6 inches from our car moving towards us and what seems like break neck speeds I no longer flinch or tense up or even gasp for that matter. We drove through Trivundrum on our way to Ponmudi and we stopped at a super market. The local super market was going to be a blog entry, and still will be, but now I will be able to compare the difference between here in Kovalam, and one in the city. Very big difference.

Ponmudi is basically a mountain top at about 4500 feet in elevation. Its about 60 km from Kovalam, but takes over two hours to get there because of, well, the road! After leaving the city, going through the smaller towns, what we would call suburbs, life is so different in each and every one of the little towns. You can always see what their main industry is, by what is on the street. Weather they are farmers, or mechanics, or masons - everything of course being done by hand. Just outside of the city, the main highway to Ponmudi they were in the process of widening the road. They were tearing down brick fences and wall of homes. Now if you lived in one of these homes, this doesn't mean you are going to move or even need to. It simply means that if your main room in the house was 10 feet long, its now only going to be say 6 feet long! We widen streets, not force people to move. Now there were some housed that were coming down completely because they were so small, and we were afraid to ask what happens to those families.

On our way, as we were traveling through one of these small villages, there was a motor bike heading our direction and the sight caught me off guard, as I could see the driver, and sticking out from both sides of him I could see hooves! As the bike passes us, sure enough, there was the driver up front, then not one, but two goats side by side facing opposite directions on the bike, then another man in the back holding onto the goats. The very strange thing was that the goats did not seem at all upset, and were just sitting there like this is an everyday occurrence. Had we been going the same direction I would have taken a picture, but it was over before I realized how strange it was. After that, only several minuets later, a rickshaw was driving by with a baby cow riding along in the rickshaw. Once again, just like this was the everyday think and enjoying the ride since it didn't need to walk anywhere. Now, just to move forward to the trip home, near the same place as these two scenes occurred, we were riding along and in front of us this time was a small truck with an adult cow in the back. This really in itself was not unusual or strange, but as the drive began to pass the truck the cow decided it was time to use the restroom and since the driver and I were on the other side of the vehicle, Daren go a full view of what the cow was up to, and both the river and I found this to be funny and laughed!

We stopped at some waterfalls on the way up. This required a short hike on our part off the main road. We started into the jungle in search for this water fall - of course following a well designated path. The hike itself was beautiful. By this time, I'm not sure what the elevation was, but the coconut trees were gone, and in their place was another kind of palm, one of which I haven't seen before. Plus there were a variety of other trees, huge vines that grew up into the trees and the vines themselves in some places were wider than the trees themselves, and of course the underbrush with large leaves to catch what little sun they could get. On our way, there was a school field trip up to the water falls, and the student were in high school. One of the teachers came over to us and started talking to us, and we instantly became his best friend. At first all the students were shy to talk to us and just smiled, but over time they did warm up to us. There are three main questions that Indians like to ask westerners, and there are the same three no matter where you go. 1-whats your name? 2-Where are you from? 3-What do you do? Then depending on how good their English is and how well the conversation goes they want to know what religion you are.

Right after meeting this large group of students the path came to the river which required us to cross using a rope to hold on to while you cross over the rocks. So, off the shoes went and across the river we go! It was quite simple, and we then go ahead of the group and there were about 30 or so of them, and of course the teachers needed to make sure the students got across okay. This is a trip that would never have happened in the states, because of this part of the trip alone! Even the girls where crossing, dressed up! The falls were beautiful, and must have cascaded about 80 or so feet from up above into a crystal clear pool of water before going down the river. The Jungle was so thick in this part that you couldn't see more than about 10 feet into it. There were a few of the guys in the water wadding, and we went in to wade as well. Soon the school group caught up with us, and since the teachers, two by now had talked to us, were talking to us, the students that could speak English started coming over that talking as well. Already at the pool was another large group of people, not sure if they were school or family or what, because there were varying ages.

Of course they all asked us the same three questions, and then I got out the camera and you would think I had just struck gold! At that point everyone that could get around us did, and we started taking pictures of them and us and the groups, then the teachers started taking pictures with us and them and it was a good old photo shoot! We even had this really young boy who wanted to say Hi to us, but was very shy and every time we looked at time he would hide behind his mother and we would all laugh. However, once I pointed the camera at him, he came out from behind her and posed! We all started laughing at that one. Shortly after that it was time for the group to leave so they all came over and shook our hands and said goodbye, and even the ladies came over to shake our hands - and they would all laugh every time we finished shaking their hands. Once it quieted down again, Daren wanted to go for a swim. So he went into the pool, and there were four other guys there that were not part of the group and three of them followed Daren in, while myself and one other guy stayed just up to our knees in the water. It was very cold water.

Soon after, we headed back towards the main road to pick up our taxi and continue on to Ponmudi. Of course passing the group on more time as a party that large tends to move slowly. This of course meant shaking hands again, and talking again, but it was very enjoyable to talk to these students. The teachers invited us to have lunch with them at the restaurant on the way up there, but we missed it, and didn't see this group again.

I will talk about the rest of the car ride up and down in my next blog; the Jungle, because it is worth its own entry. We made it to this government hotel very near the to of Ponmudi, and was excited to get there because by this time we were really hungry and really needed to get out of the car, as you will understand in the next blog - just remember we go to 4500 feet starting from sea lever! Of course we are in India and this place was run by the government, so lunch was from 12 - 2, and we were there about 2:30 - so that meant no lunch! Lucky for us there was what we would call a convenience store in the area and so we raided it for some food. Crackers, mango juice (in a box like we have in the states for lunches), and a candy bar. Doesn't that sound like a great lunch?

We ate our crackers on the way to the top of the mountain. Once we got to the end of the road there was about another 40 feet or so we needed to hike to get to the top. There were lots of people around looking out in the various directions, of course being smarter than us, having picnics that they had packed, laughing and enjoying the day. At the top, even with the elevation it was still very comfortable temperature wise, but because of the humidity there is not much to see. The mountain tops in the distance were covered by mist (fog). The sky was not cloudy, but that high up is air was very moist. It was a different type of humidity that happens down here on the cost. Even though there was water in the air, it didn't feel heavy as it does here down by the ocean. It also didn't feel muggy - like just standing there you would sweat. It was rather comfortable, but I'm sure the nights can get very cold there.

Once again, several young guys, about high school age, came over and started talking to us, and slowly but surely we had a very large crowd of people around us. All wanting the shake our hands, ask us the three standard questions and practice their English on people who actually speak English. The group that was talking to us was a Christian Church group up there on a little outing. All of the sudden one of the Fathers came over with some biscuits, that were similar to corn, but they don't have corn here so we are not sure what it was, then they brought over my favorite desert here, payasam. The best way to describe this desert which is offered in almost every restaurant is imagine combining warm rice pudding and the spices of chai tea! Its truly incredible and I can guarantee you that I will be working on making this when I get home! Payasam can be made several different ways. Some places use rice, you can also use rice noodles/pasta or tapioca. Most restaurants use rice, but this was homemade and was made of both rice noodles and tapioca. It was incredible and every time I finished mine they would bring me more! I had three helpings! We talked to everyone including the Father of the group, and of course I got the camera out and the excitement of the crowd went crazy. After taking several pictures of them, us, us and them it was time to go. We must have spent at least 10 minutes trying to leave as once again they all wanted to shake our hands, give us hugs, say good bye, over and over. At last we got away and headed towards our taxi. The feeling you get when this happens is that you are some huge Hollywood star and the crowds just want to be next to you and talk to you and take your picture. That truly is how it feels when you are in these groups - they are just so excited to be near you... A very strange feeling, and even though I enjoyed talking to everyone, it can get old quickly and I truly feel sorry for celebrities who deal with this everyday.

So the next entry will be of the Jungle. The state we are in is called Kerala, and their slogan for tourists is "God's own country" and after the trip through the jungle I can honestly say that I have to agree with them.