Kovalam Trip-Oct'09

After almost two and a half years we made a trip to Kerala. Good it was with friends or else we would have ended up eating Puliyogre and Curd rice in kovalam beach with our family. In India the added fun to each tourist spot is the dominance of the state cultures and values(???) they force on them.
We started off from our friends place by 11am (surely not a time to start for sight-seeing but that's how our gang trip works out...the guys take a long time to come out of their hangover and make a plan for the day...Unlike US/UK I cant plan the trip as we dont have maps or any clue to decide on the optimal route. so my job ends in listing out the places I want to see and obviously a long shopping list). after an hours travel we reached "Padmanabhapuram palace" just to get disappointed seeing the board 'GOVERNMENT HOLIDAY' - Gandhi Jayanti...!!!! We are so grateful to Bapuji that we close all major tourist spots too, on his birthdays. it sounded so ridiculous to me as anyone's common sense would say, that was the day(weekend) when most of the people would plan such trips...anyway we just sighed off and started our travel to "Thirparappu Falls". Thirparappu Means A Pavilion Of Beauty And Sacredness - It holds good for the falls but not its surroundings. As all other tourist spots of India this was also less maintained with more crowd. The water pressure was so high in the falls as we had heavy downpour that day couple of hours back. I was so worried to even step out of the room as it was still drizzling and if I go out I am gonna make my son get wet in rain for the first time. Luckily after 20min. the drizzling also stopped and my husband(at times reading my mind right) volunteered to baby sit for next half an hour. I rushed out to the falls and had great time playing in water for half an hour. I could see my husband struggling to hold my son from coming to the falls. My son was pointing to me and saying he wanted to go there...:) I quickly changed and took my turn to babysit. As our friend was in a high profile Government job we got a decent room to change our clothes. If that was called 'decent', I was wondering what kind of rooms others were using!!!!

We started off from that place by 6pm and reached a hotel in Trivandrum at 8pm. In "God's own country"-Kerala unless you pay everywhere as if it is "God's own money" you wont get a good reception...:) The next day morning, we started off to "Padmanabhaswamy temple". All guys were against it and all girls instead to visit the temple and traveled with a pride of winning the argument till we reached temple. Already my husband was irritated for deviating a fun trip to pilgrimage trip, he was totally pissed off on seeing the board "Men in dhotis and women in saris"...even I wondered who the hell would have made such rules...but luckily all girls were in saree. My husband was given the most dirtiest dhotis they had and he trying to act smart wore it on top of his pants...One of the pandit saw that and started giving him a long gyan starting "Thambi, intha tem(p)ble-a...." losing his patience and temper my husband stopped him and changed back to only dhoti. my frustration was also increasing as all this drama took 20min and we had only next 15 min for darshan. From 11.30am - 12noon it was nap time for God(/Pandits...) I insisted on making an "archanai" (special prayer to God with all possible special demands). My husband furiously answered me "God is within you, don't try to fool yourself"...Having made the greatest sin for that day I thought I will at least please God by offering Ghee lamp. For 20 bucks the priest gave me a ghee bowl which I have to pour in a big lamp. He said think of all your family members and their nakshatras and pour the ghee. I started with my Dad, Mom (i wondered her memory power of remembering everyone's nakshatra),sister&family,brother&Family,siter-in-law...by the time I reached to my son I heard my husband calling/searching for me. I think I have got this habit from my mom who always has a list of 10+ people with their nakshatras to test the patience of the priest...by the time she would say the 5th person's name, the priest would say "I will do it on God's name.." but she wont leave him until he pronounced all tongue-twisting names and nakshatras rightly and completes the pooja. My son enjoyed running around the temple and we started off to Kovalam at 12.30pm.

Everyone jumped off the car and rushed to the beach. My son seeing the beach for the first time was observing it so closely. For the first half an hour he was bit scared off getting his legs wet in water and facing the waves. once he got used to it, he was so excited and we all had good fun time for next 2 hours. As hunger struck us we were forced to leave for lunch and had good fun in sea side restaurant. We again played for another hour and reached hotel by 10pm. I wondered how my priorities have changed in my life. during college days I used to play in beach for more than 4 hours without having any food. now all that I was worried about in this romantic place was about my son - if the water would suit him or not, how long he has played in water, what food can I give him etc..etc...

The next day we went to "Neyyar Dam". Kids enjoyed the crocodile park. The lion safari got canceled and we got a chance to have a long walk along a beautiful greenery patch. Everyone of us had so many sweet memories to share and this was the most memorable time of our trip. we left the dam by 4pm and waved bye to Trivandrum by 6pm.