god's own country

I spent my saturday here:



But more on this later. Have to get earlier things out of way first.

The gift of long weekend, one week back, was very well received and very well utilized. When I was a young and dreamy girl, I saw an ad in the paper which showed a young couple in the rains under a canopy of lush green trees. The ad was for Kerala in the monsoons and my young heart melted looking at the picture and I have wanted to go to kerala since that day. If it's in the rains, better!

And I got it baby! More than 10 years later but I did make it happen. Yeah, I rock like that.

And just like that it was another awesome adventure. Adventure I call it because it was. Most of the drive was through forests; we even stayed in a foresty area though there were some houses nearby but it was in the midst of a forest; none of the doors in our house had latches!! What?? Yup! Midway through the first night, I thought someone would come in and slit my throat (I do blame a certain guy who put this idea in my head just as I was about to slip under my blanket).



It was officially accepted by my friends that lack of sunshine drives me nuts. So much so that it's not even funny. What happened was that the first day we landed there it was raining continuously and the sunshine person that I am, I was majorly depressed. I even suggested that we go back after all that driving we had done to reach the place. Nuts I know. Good sense prevailed my friends who put their foot down and that proved to be a good thing because sun smiled for us for the rest of our trip. Smiled less, burnt is more like it. And I loved every bit of the warmth on my skin which pissed off my friends further because it was HOT. I think they might have cursed all the sun drama that I do.

But I welcomed the sun and drank in every bit of its warmth. and my friends concluded that lack of sun causes serious harm to people around me.



As usual, we enjoyed lazy mornings of refilled tea glasses.



And evenings of friends huddled together and sharing and cribbing and laughing.



We went to a 5000 years old temple. Yes I went to a temple. I do that sometimes. Mostly because it was a pretty walk through a forest and the temple was 5000 years old. And I'm only 97% atheist. I even prayed.



It helps if the temple has a run down moss covered smaller ignored building that no one would come to.



We met the coolest old man with a pretty young wife who also happens to be the world's best cook. She made the most awesome fish curry and her chicken curry was to die for. Serious.



And I call him coolest because he drove his jeep over the most treacherous mud path right on the edge of a cliff. With all the ease and composure of a pro.



We met some of our jungle friends on our way. It was quite poetic the way deers galloped right in front of our car as we drove through the forest.



The icing on this trip was bluff. Yeah baby. My first real card game. I couldn't get enough of it, I'm dying for an encore. If you didn't know, I suck at cards. You should see me shuffling.



Another discovery was 'puttu', typical kerala breakfast, and that it makes me wanna throw up. yeckkkksssss!! You know what calls for another yeckkksss?? - leeches who tried to be our friends on our random walks through random forests. What were we expecting in a dense swampy forests after heavy rains, anyways?

The kerala ad in the paper years back had no mention of leeches or puttu (I wonder why). But it did show a good time and good time I had!