Fort Cochin, India; Day five

I have been so busy that I haven't had the chance to write. Also, internet cafes are harder to find here. Yesterday (Thursday) I was busy with the school and with the volunteer project. Every day working in the project seems like a whole new adventure. The teacher took us on a little tour of the slum village and showed us the way that the families live. All of the women roll incense and make 12 rupees per bundle of 1000. That's about ten cents per thousand. It was also a tiring day because everyone in the group was splitting off to go in different directions for the weekend. We got Friday off this week.

Celeste and I decided to take a trip to Kerala which is southwest of Bangalore. In the last minute scramble we found ourselves at the train station at 8pm trying to figure out the sense to the madness in getting a ticket. There were no more 1st class tickets left, so we booked a 2nd class air conditioned car for about 25 dollars. Even looking for the place where our seats were was an adventure. There was one car that had open windows in which all the people were sitting in the car like sardines. I told Celeste that if I had to ride in that car for 12 hours that she would be on her own. Luckily, our seats were in the sleeper car, in which the seats fold out like beds. The ride down was nothing spectacular, we slept almost the entire way there. The train kind of cradles you to sleep.

We awoke in the morning, feeling not so refreased, but at least well rested. I happen to be reading the guide book at the time that I noticed that the train stopping at Erakulam Town, which is the place where we had intended on going. Honestly, if you fall asleep or are not paying attention, you could easily miss your stop...there is no one to announce the stop.

We checked into a hotel that has western toilets and hot showers. What a luxury that is. Our first half of the day was spent grabbing some lunch at a little outside cafe. Apparently in India it is not a talked about subject to drink alcohol. We asked for alcohol, and the waiter told us we could purchase some at a shop down the street and then he would turn his head while we spiked our drinks. Next we got a massage and pedicure. My pedicure, only being 4.50 was worth every penny.

So next comes the part where we went on a wild little sightseeing tour with our new friend Singh a autorickshaw driver. He took us all over. We saw the most amazing things. We went to a spice market, where they have potoato sacks full of spices, a Hindu temple, the Chinese fishing piers, and a shop where I ended up buying an amazing diamond ring just because these Indians are extremely good sales people. Don't worry I bought it from a govenernment shop that has a certificate of authenticity. The Hindu temple was an amazement in itself because it was made with lots of marble. Celeste and I had to ask permission to the monks if we could enter. Just us and the monks were the only people in there. Afterwards we were to see the spice markets. You wouldn't believe the ginger factory we went to. I've never seen so much ginger in my entire life. The workers put so much effort and hard labor into drying pure ginger to be shipped out.

The shop where I purchased my ring from is a complete blog entry in itself, because of the sneaky way that these Indian people can sell you on anything. I bought a -idon'tknowwhatcarat- diamond ring for a hundred fifty bucks. haha.

Anyway, if I could post my picures of the last two days I would, but I give up trying to do so on this computer. Anyway, sorry if this blog is so scattered, I'm just tired and ready for bed. We are leaving at 8am in the morning for a boat trip though the canals and villages here in Kerala.