23/12/2016 - 08/01/2016
652 km
We could never imagine how the world
can change that much only in 90 minutes after leaving Sri Lanka. We are in
India now, seriously! We left the airport in darkness and I was quite nervous
to cycle here after reading so much about this second-most-populated country on
the travel forums. Well, India is truly different from any places that we’ve
visited. So, what did we actually see during our first days cycling among 1.3
billion people?
Tamil Nadu
A bumpy road made of concrete brought
us from Madurai airport to our hotel in the city center. It took us almost 90
minutes to cycle only 10 kilometers as the road was jammed and no one cared
about the traffic rules. It was dark outside and the road was not lightened so
I was a bit scared when bumping quite often into pedastrians who took my lane.
The fresh-air in Sri Lanka was replaced by a thick layer of dust, exhauted gas
from vehicles and the stinky smell of the garbage everywhere. We didn’t dare to
take a deep breath!
We can’t talk about India without
mentioning one powerful character: the cow! Cow is the holy animal of Hinduism
and everything related to it is sacred, especially its manure. Everyone could
be jealous of the cow’s life: no enemies, no one would ever harm you, no need
to follow any rules, no one stops you from eating or sleeping at anytime
anywhere, and human admire you. Of course, it’s not so comfortable that
sometimes people like to touch your butt, then use that same finger to touch
their forehead. They believe that your poo brings them luck. That’s how the
streets here are not only so crowded but also packed with trash and cows.
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| The famous Hindu temple in Madurai |
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| The Gandhi museum in Madurai |
The most common sport in India is
cricket. But there are three other “sports” that India is the winner at all
championships: honking non-stop; trash throwing and spitting. Indian people can
honk for no reasons until they leave their vehicles. For us, that’s the most
annoying and irritating thing when being in the traffic here. Our hearing will
sure be worse after spending some months in this country. Everyone we saw in
India, from the very young age until the elderly, is way too prefessional with
littering everywhere, except into the trash bins. Meanwhile throwing the
garbage, they will spit just for fun. The process will be repeated until people
go to sleep. A country full of chaos but in an organised way that none of the
foreigners could follow.
Way better than expected, our first
week in India was quite pleasant even though we had to celebrate X’mas and New
Year in the Indian way, which means having no Western X’mas and New Year
celebration at all. We spent the nights mostly in the cheap lodges as there
were not many chances for staying at random locals. Coimbatore was an exception as we had a really good time
celebrating New Year with the Vietnamese students there. After many months
living without pork, my dream was fulfilled by the fellow Vietnamese. Many
kilograms of pork were prepared for me! Yummy! We also had a nice visit to one
worship-yoga-meditation complex that we really enjoy.
Until this point, none of us has had
any digesting problems. What a record!
Kerala
This was the second state in India that
we crossed and the journey also became more exciting yet challenging. The ride
here was the worst of all with heavy traffic on the tiny narrow roads. So many
times we were kicked out of our lane by bigger vehicles and almost fell down.
We stayed some nights at Couchsurfing hosts in Calicut and Mahé where
we had the first chance to discover the colouful Indian kitchen. There are tens
or even hundreds of spices put in jars that only the moms could differentiate. Southern Indian food is made of starch, carbs and vegetables as people are mainly
vegetarian here. However, we always easily found more than a reason to love the
harmony of spices in Indian veg-dishes. A common meal would contain: rice,
chapatti (a flat whole-wheat bread which is cooked on a metal skillet), 2-3
kinds of vegetable curries, some deep-fried crackers (optional) and one cup of
curd. In Southern India, every restaurant has it in their menu under the name:
“Meals” with a very cheap price.
When first arriving at this state, we
thought that all the richest people in India live here as we saw many big and
nice designed villas and penthouses along the road. Only after staying one
night in one of those houses, we got an interesting information from our
Couchsurfing host. Every family here has at least one member who has worked in
the Gulf for years. There, they just rent a cheap flat to save up their money,
then send it all back to India to build such a huge house for the family.
There was an incident related to the
banknote demonetization that made one of our days in Kerala unforgettable. As you
might know, on the 8th of November 2016, the Indian government suddenly
announced that the current 500 and 1000 rupee banknotes would be invalid at
post mid-night. This was explained as one sharp action of the government
againsting corruption, tax evasion and illegal activity funding. We arrived in
India almost 7 weeks after this happening but the whole financial system was
still in chaos with a serious cash shortages. The new released 500 and 1000
rupee banknotes were not yet tranferred through the country and many ATMs ran
dry. Until India, we had exchanged most of our foreign currencies so it was the
time to use our only Mastercard. Well, we tried and tried and tried so many
ATMs of different banks and none of them let us withdraw money. We were running out of cash and in Kasaragod, we
encountered a chance of having no food and lodging for that night.
That was a strange day. We arrived in
the city with empty wallet and just tried to ask around for a free camping slot
in someone’s garden. No one in the nearby villages could provide us a place to
sleep, they just gave us some food and drinks from a wedding function.
Appearing at the very right moment, a policeman listened to our story and made
a phone call to his colleagues back in the police station. Then, he appointed
us there with an unclaimed offer for the night. We had no other options and
cycled straight there where some policemen were waiting for us already. They
made some criticisms to the government’s idea of demonetization meanwhile making
many phonecalls to the local hotels and lodges. Finally, we got a free room at
a lodge in town! Yay! One policeman came with us to the lodge and arrange
everything, including our dinner. He didn’t forget to contact the local press
to spead this “inspiring story” to the citizens. We are so grateful for the big
help of the police in Kasaragod but still have to point out that the article
was made quite in a hurry so half of the information was incorrect! :)
The next days passed excitingly as we
by chance got to know a big community in India: the Indian cyclists who hosted
us for many days in many cities...
Linh
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