South India Trip Part 1: Kochi and Alleppey

Yeah for Kerala! Well built roads, clean streets, friendly people, rich history, and beautiful waterways! We picked up Richard in Kochi, after a few minor hiccups.*

In Kochi we saw St. Francis Church, which has passed through the Portuguese, Dutch, and British as a Catholic, then Protestant, and now Anglican church. It was also home of the tomb of the explorer Vasco da Gama before he was reintered in Portugal 14 years after his death.

Next was the fish market, where we saw the 700 year old technology of Chinese fishing nets (which is pretty much a tourist racket now, but still pretty interesting). We then went to one of the fish stalls and literally up our lunch for the day

Kingfish!

This is what a kilo of Kingfish look like grilled

Next was off to old Jew Town near the Paradesi Synagogue, the oldest synagogue in the Commonwealth. It was a little sad that we couldn't see the synagogue becuase it was closed Friday and Saturday, the two days we were there.

Source: Wikipedia

We also got to see the Keralan murals of the "Dutch" Mattancherry Palace (sadly photography was not allowed). We have a friend in Goa that does this style of artwork, so it was really neat to see on such a large scale.

An example of a Kerala mural (Source: http://enchantingkerala.org)

By far, the coolest thing we saw in Kochi was the Kathakali cultural show. We're not talking high art here, obviously this was for tourists, but we thought they did a spectacular job walking us through the various parts, including getting to watch the performers put on their makeup. I'm planning on doing an entire post on this style of dance later, when I can put together the footage I took. Needless to say, it was quite a lot of fun to see.

Yesterday we spent on the backwater canals of Alleppey. It was so relaxing being on a boat, away from the crowds, the traffic, and especially the car horns of the city.

Could you imagine if this was home?

Quickest way to get around

Could this be our houseboat?

We're pretty pumped because today we'll be spending the day on one of the cruising houseboats. As anyone who knows him can attest, more time on the water makes Richard a very happy man.

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* Our train to Delhi was 6 hours late so we missed our flight to Kochi (despite budgeting an extra 5 hours to get to the airport). Last minute we had to cancel our tickets and rebook new ones for later that evening.