THRISSUR, COCHIN and TRIVANDRUM Dec. 3rd – 15th

^{Ooty to Cochin: Fort Cochin: Kathkali}

^Thrissur

^{Kerala Backwaters: Temple Festival}

^Trivandrum

One evening during our stay at Ootycamund, I had received a phone call from Mrs. Simi Koshi, the TCL rep for Cochin. She explained that she could see from my itinerary that I was due to spend the weekend of December 4^th/5^th in Thrissur[1] prior to examining in that centre, moving on to Cochin the following Thursday. “Why don’t you spend the weekend in Cochin and travel back to Thrissur Sunday evening” she said. “There is nothing to do in Thrissur and the hotel is not good – there is so much for you to see and do here in Cochin”. Pat having done her usual preparatory study in Lonely Planet – re the Thrissur Hotel it said “…close to the bus and railway stations, is the best in town, though the claimed swimming pool does not exist and the restaurant is awful” – I readily agreed and took up her offer to book a room for us at the Riviera Resort.

            Thus it was that, at 9.30am on Friday 3^rd, we set out from Ooty bound for Cochin in the hands of driver Chela whose rosary beads round the driving mirror of his Ambassador plus statuette of Ganesh on the dashboard suggested that he was keeping his options on divine help well and truly open. We ran down through Keti and Coonoor, glimpsing the railway on several occasions, with Chela negotiating the dozen or more hairpins with some aplomb. At one point we were held up by an enormous mobile hotel, a pantechnicon with couchettes in the rear of the vehicle and ordinary coach seats towards the front. Luggage was being towed behind in a separate van. Das Rollende Hotel – Rotel Tours was proclaimed on the side of the vehicle that, I noticed, was left-hand drive. I suppose, given the state of India’s roads and the attitude of its drivers, whether one is sailing along in a left- or right-hand drive coach makes little difference but I was full of admiration for the driver, who was swinging this juggernaut round the hairpins with accuracy and confidence. Beyond Mettalayam and its textile mills, we joined NH47 and by noon we were in Combattoire. The Palghat Hills could be seen far over to the west, the steep-sided cliffs rising in places to 2,000 metres. Many walls and houses were covered in the lotus symbol of the BJP party but, once we had crossed the border from Tamil Nadu into Kerala, these were replaced by symbols of that state’s government. Kerala has the distinction of providing, in 1954, the world’s first democratically elected Communist government, beating Bengal and Chile by several years.

At the border checkpoint, we waited while Chela took our permit into a small hut to be checked. Lined up alongside us were several coaches festooned with marigolds, religious paintings and images of Ganesh, the occupants happily waving to us and hanging out the windows to try to engage us in conversation. Chela told us that these devotees of Ayyappa were on a forty-eight day pilgrimage to Sabarimala and could well have begun their journey hundreds of miles away in Maharastra or Uttar Pradesh. Later, when we were stopped for lunch, we saw more coaches similarly crammed with pilgrims and we also spotted a sadhu, a holy man who traditionally wanders the highways of India in search of enlightenment and who relies on gifts of food or money from passers-by who, in turn, feel blessed because they have helped the man in his religious devotion. Wearing only a loin-cloth, his body coated in ash and orange/saffron “paint”, this particular sadhu would have found it difficult to pick up gifts as he sailed by on a motorbike, his long, tangled hair almost parallel to the ground such was his speed.

Just as Sisters Judith and Lisa from Pondicherry had said, Kerala was greener, more lush, more thickly carpeted with trees than Tamil Nadu and it became obvious why the place is so-called – Kera-la literally means the land of coconut trees. Near Palghat (or Palakka in Tamil), we passed the first of many political procession/demonstrations we were to see over the next two weeks. These just added to the clutter on the roads that, at this point, were quite straight and flat. Some of the driving was reminiscent of the Mysore-Bangalore route and we noticed many badly-damaged vehicles by the roadside, some of which were complete wrecks. An auto-rickshaw had been more or less flattened and it was difficult to see how the driver and any passengers could have survived the impact.

We passed through Palaghat Gap and Thrissur Forest where an elaborate, narrow, fifteen-arch viaduct caught my eye – presumably for irrigation and, from the age of its stonework, built by the British. We were reminded of the long (and distinctly complicated) history of Christianity in the area when we passed a “St. George Jacobite Syrian Church” and then a “Catholic Syrian Church”. Other, secular, signs also perplexed us, one being the “Bombay Dyeing and Vivaldi Showroom”.

Cochin is really the term for an area of islands, waterways and peninsulas rather than for a single urban entity and we approached our destination through the “city” element, Ernakulum. Chela had no idea how to locate the Riviera Resort Hotel and we soon found ourselves in the main thoroughfare called, as ever, Mahatma Gandhi Road. The address I was given was Thevara Waterfront and so it seemed sense to make for the water and ask. Chela, whose English had proved very limited, seemed reluctant to do this and so, when I spotted a blue tourist information sign, I asked him to pull over and come with me into the office. I then realised why Chela had not wanted to ask a passer-by for directions. He was Tamil-speaking and could not understand the local language, Malayalam. The two pretty girls staffing the counter, who thankfully spoke some English, had never heard of the Riviera Resorts but I asked them to ring the contact number I had been given and the details from the hotel receptionist plus the revelation as to location brought smiles to their faces. The next problem was getting Chela to understand where to drive. The receptionist had said that she spoke Tamil so he was given the phone but it soon became apparent that her accent /dialect did not match his. I was left to jot down some basic instructions and, after guiding him through various back streets and lanes, Chela eventually swept us through the security gates into the brand new complex of condominiums, restaurants and swimming pools known as the Riviera Resort. It was clean and tidy, with lawns and pathways alongside a wide waterway/inlet, the far edge of which was framed by coconut trees. Our immediate impression was “How all very Singaporean” and comparing any part of India with the ultra-clean, hygienically wrapped Lion City was a new experience for us.

Needless to say, we were delighted with our surroundings. We wished Chela well and hoped he could find his way out of the labyrinth of roads we had just negotiated, and then checked in to our 10^th floor suite. We found two large bedrooms, each with bathroom and toilet, a kitchen and spacious lounge/dining area. The view from the balcony was stunning. Across the inlets and waterways, busy with small craft, forests spread to our right while, in the other direction, we were over-looking the city with Fort Cochin and Willingdon Island beyond. We both had the same thought – a fortnight here would be rather a good idea. When the phone rang, it was Mrs. Koshi welcoming us and arranging to meet us for dinner.

Simi Koshi was a reminder to us why, in recent years, Indian women have won the Miss World competition more often than any other country. A tall, slender figure, very beautiful, and with a captivating smile and haunting eyes, she introduced us to her teacher at the Amadeus Academy of Music, Antony who, Pat felt, would not have looked out of place playing the lead role in a Bollywood epic – a strikingly handsome pair who entertained us with utmost politeness at dinner in the ground floor restaurant. Afterwards, while Pat excused herself for domestic chores, I was shown the music school which was on the ground floor of a nearby block. There were two studios and an office with reception area, all tastefully decorated. This was Simi’s first examination session and both she and Antony were understandably anxious about the way the examinations were conducted and that I was going to be satisfied with the administrative aspects of the session. It became clear that, almost certainly, Simi’s initial approach and suggestion that we spend the weekend in Cochin instead of Thrissur, was so that she could pick my brains a full week ahead of her pupils’ exams. At the same time, she knew that we would enjoy the additional time exploring Cochin and so the arrangement worked well. I was able to reassure both Simi and Antony that, from what she had told me, everything was in apple-pie order and, for their part, they were happy to know a little more about the actual procedures vis-à-vis ear tests, sight reading etc.

When Pat re-joined us, we were taken to Simi’s flat in the same block where we met her husband, Sunni, and her two children, an eleven-year-old lad called Cherry, and Chelsea, a very confident nine-year-old. Sunni was Managing Director of a firm specializing in glazing and, we gathered, had the contract for the whole of the Riviera Resorts. His training at University in Jaipur was in metallurgy and his professor had studied at Sheffield University. The whole evening had been very pleasant and we retired that night with very good vibes about Cochin and the first of our two brief visits.

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Antony had organized a driver and the ubiquitous Ambassador for our day of tourism, and so, by 9.30 the next morning we were whizzing across the bridge to Willingdon Island and then across a second bridge to begin our exploration of Fort Cochin. From the bridges, we were able to appreciate the scope of the port activities, highlighting the trading history of this part of India. Throughout the day, we were to be made very aware of the Dutch, Portuguese, Chinese and British influences on this fascinating corner of South India.

We began at India’s oldest European-built church. Originally a wooden structure, built by Portuguese Franciscans in 1503, the church was re-built in stone some fifty years later. Vasco da Gama died in Cochin in 1524 and was buried in the church although his remains were transferred to Lisbon some fourteen years later. The Protestant Dutch captured Cochin in 1663 and, in the next century carried out extensive restoration. At the end of the eighteenth century the British occupied the area and the church became an Anglican place of worship; it is now used by the Church of South India. The building was similar in size to an English parish church and we were particularly taken with one feature not found in Britain. The rope-operated fans (punkahs) were still obviously in use.

From the oldest Christian church in India, we moved on to marvel at the Chinese fishing nets that dotted the shore. Constructions like these have been a feature of the Kerala backwaters since the time of Kubla Khan. Working on a cantilever principle, the triangular nets were suspended on a huge framework of forty-foot-long poles with rocks the size of footballs acting as counterweights. We stood beside one of these contraptions and watched, fascinated, as a team of four men heaved on the ropes to lift the net, for a surprisingly small catch. One particular man smiled at us and answered a question I had directed at Pat. “No, this is not the normal catch but there is a lot of weed coming from upstream – sea-cucumber – and it blocks the nets”. He reached into the water and dragged up the thick leaves of said plant and, with a resigned sigh, slung it to one side. We complimented him on his English and he shrugged. “Yes, I learn at school but there are no jobs here even with good English, so I fish.” He must have known what I was thinking because he then said, “Would you like to help on the ropes?” After the allotted ten minutes for the already lowered net to fill, I found myself hauling away with three of the team while one of his companions, grinning, took a break. Pat, meanwhile, was taken photos of my efforts and when, not to be outdone, she joined in with me the next time, the men were beaming with excitement – I don’t suppose many Caucasian women before had helped them in their work and the delight on their faces at this novelty was obvious.

After this strenuous exercise, we were both ready for a drink and so we sat in a scruffy tent, still within view of the shore, sipping 7UP and watching men repairing boats and smaller fishing nets as various pigs, chickens and goats wandered about amongst the activity. The sky was a rich blue, the sun was hot but there was a cooling breeze from the sea and, not for the first time, words like “idyllic” and “sublime” came in to our minds. Our reverie was a little interrupted by a group of Japanese tourists that we had noticed earlier and which now descended on our little restaurant to grab platefuls of lobsters. These were devoured at a rate of knots only known to such tour parties – they were soon off and away, their feet hardly touching the ground, on to the next “sight”.

Thank goodness we could be more leisurely. The original Santa Cruz Basilica, built by the Portuguese in 1515, was on the site of a Hindu temple which itself stood where the Chinese maintained a Buddhist temple – the Hindus threw the large statue of Buddha into the sea. Thus three religions had laid claim to this site over the centuries. The present Portuguese building, which we now entered, dated from 1902 and we welcomed the cool shade of its highly decorated pastel-coloured interior. Groups of local children were taking turns at the microphone reading out their prayers in English and supervised by a diminutive nun who barked comments after each effort – we presumed a rehearsal was taking place. The statues of Christ from the Passion were particularly gruesome – much blood and gore – and we wondered what the poor little souls practising their lines made of these images of torture and how they related them to … well, anything really.

From Santa Cruz we meandered to an area of Dutch influence where there were merchants houses, built to several storeys and with neatly tiled roofs. The Mattancherry Palace was built by the sixteenth century Portuguese but substantially renovated in the next century by the Dutch – its alternative name today is “Dutch Palace”. Considering that the Protestant Dutch, when they took Cochin from their European (Catholic) cousins, destroyed ten of the towns’ twelve churches, we must today be thankful that they spared this beautiful, two-storey, quadrangular building especially as its courtyard contains a Hindu temple. Now a museum, the first floor was originally the Coronation Hall of Raja Veera Kerala Varma, the palace’s first occupant. The turbans, palanquins and dresses of subsequent rajas we found to be exquisitely displayed particularly since they were surrounded by astonishing murals of scenes from the Hindu epics, the Ramayana and Mahabharata. Our own epic, Lonely Planet, had promised us a mural that featured “a cheerful Krishna using his six hands and two feet to engage in foreplay with eight happy milkmaids”. As with other pieces of eastern erotica we saw on our tour, we discovered that it was very difficult to make out exactly what was going on without standing on our heads or otherwise suggesting to other visitors an embarrassingly inordinate interest in the subject.

As well as playing host to generations of Chinese Buddists, Portuguese Catholics as well as Dutch and British Protestants, Cochin also absorbed a Jewish population. Nobody seems at all certain how long ago the Jews appeared in Kerala. Some authorities claim they have been in this part of India since the Diaspora, others suggest the 6^th century (fleeing from the persecutions of Nebuchadnezzar), others again that the first Jewish settlers were descendants of the Queen of Sheba. Situated in the heart of the busy spice trade area (still known as Jewtown), we found the 1568 synagogue. Inside, we admired the beautiful Belgian chandeliers and the impressive central brass pulpit. It was a haven of tranquillity from the noisy bustle of the spice merchants along the street and, for some time, we sat quietly, fascinated by the hand-painted mid-18^th century willow-pattern floor tiles. These had been brought to Cochin by Ezekial Rahabi and, “so the story goes”, they were originally intended as a present from the Chinese Emperor to the then Rajah. However, the local Jews told the Hindu prince that cow’s blood had been used in the manufacture of the tiles and he refused to accept such a present, donating them to the synagogue in grateful thanks for the warning. One of the reasons visitors stare for so long at these tiles is that every one – and there are several hundred – is reputed to be unique.

Outside, in Jewtown itself, the air was pungent with the aroma of turmeric, cardamom, cumin, ginger and garlic and men were heaving great sacks onto bullock carts. Their premises were cheek-by-jowl with an assortment of shops including the nearest thing we saw anywhere on our travels to a bric-a-brac shop. No doubt the owner would rather call it a curio shop or even claim he sold antiques, but the mixture of Indian artefacts plus European vases and even some pre-Raphaelite paintings and Monarchs of the Glen, seemed rather strange.  It was also odd to see the nameplates outside business premises reading, for example, “Cohen, Attorney at Law”. There are very few Jewish people left now in Cochin. Over the past few years, many have gone to Israel although why any Indian-Jews would wish to go into the maelstrom that is the Middle East from this Keralan paradise beggars belief, particularly as many of the emigrants would be of advanced years. Soon, there will be nobody here to maintain the synagogue and it seems very sad that this unique building and its artefacts should fall into disuse, disrepair and eventual dereliction. One cannot imagine the local communist or the national Hindu governments paying a great deal of attention to the last remnant of Indian Jewish history.

As we drove back across the bridges to Ernakulum, it was the turn of British influence on the area to capture our attention. We glimpsed several enormous ships in the harbour, the creation of which was the brainchild of Robert Bristow, an Englishman who was Resident Chief Engineer in the 1930s. He dreamed of making Cochin the largest port on the Arabian Sea and spent five years supervising the dredging of a channel deep enough for huge 75,000-ton ships like the ones we could see from the bridge. With the silt, he constructed Willingdon Island on which he built the dockside terminals and a railhead. (The airport was subsequently built nearby.) In his book Letters From India, Quentin Crewe tells of opposition from the locals who thought that, since the island was made of sludge, it would sink, taking with it the bridge, as soon as a train passed over from the mainland. Thus, Bristow

… loaded a long train with pig iron. In the middle was an ordinary coach. In this, he and his family sat. The train drive onto the bridge and there it sat while the Bristows confidently ate their picnic lunch.

Incidentally, Crewe also claims that Bristow dredged up the statue of Buddha that had been thrown into the sea when the Chinese temple was sacked some five hundred years before. The Harbour Executive Officer, a Mr. Milne, kept it in his office, taking it back to England when he retired.

That evening, we realised an ambition we had nurtured as soon as we knew we would be visiting Kerala. Along with Simi and Antony, who had organized the tickets, we went to the See India Foundation Theatre in Ernakulum for a performance of India’s most spectacular dance-drama, Kathkali. The “theatre” was simply a structure built on to the side of a house, the soil floor and individual folding (none too comfortable) metal seats gave one the impression of being in a tent. We arrived some forty-five minutes before the start of the actual dancing because part of the evening’s entertainment was to watch the very elaborate makeup being applied and to listen to the explanations from the leading authority on Kathkali, P.K.Devan. And what an entertainer he was! He had a gripping, individual delivery. It was slow and yet spellbinding. His elongation of vowels – “deeemon”, “religeeous” – combined with the occasional extra dipthong (as in “sayants”) made his style singularly engaging. He explained that all of the materials for the makeup were natural. Coconut oil featured prominently, for mixing with the sap of trees (dyed with fruit and spices) for the bright colours, burnt for the black paint around the eyes – “all very good for the skeeen, you ladies should know.” His audience was mostly Caucasian and cameras flashed away as we watched, entranced by the way the makeup artist applied layers of dried bark to produce the exaggerated cheeks on the dancers. Also exaggerated were the enormous skirts worn by the dancers, these being one of the most individual features of Kathkali. Devan explained that this was because “art is larger than life”.

The maestro then took us through some of the “alphabet” of poses, signs and movements the dancers have to acquire during their fifteen years of training – there are twenty-four different hand signs, for example. There is much use of facial muscles – one of his colleagues demonstrated as he spoke – and the raising of eyebrows, rapid shifting of eye direction, shaping of the mouth was all achieved in an astonishing virtuoso display. “Ladees, this will do WONDERS for your skeen – no lines!” chortled Devan. As regards colours, he explained that green was “for the good guys, red and black for the bad” and that yellow was used for “weeemen and sayants”. This last is significant because, traditionally, Kathkali dancing was performed only by men – he linked this with Greek theatre and Shakespeare[2]. He could give us no date for the origin of the dancing, guessing at five or six hundred years, probably based on performances in temple courtyards or in villages – “it just eemerged and is still eevolving.” Kathkali performances normally last four or five hours but that evening we were given an abbreviated show lasting about an hour and a half. The stories enacted are taken from the Hindu epics, the Ramayana and Mahabhatra and, for our performance, there were two dancers accompanied by Devan on cymbals and a drummer (more specifically, a chendra player). It was not difficult to follow the basic story (to which Devan gave the simple title “The Prince and the Deemon”) and we found that the “bad guy” gave an almost pantomimic performance and was able to draw a good deal of sympathy for his character even though he came to the inevitable sticky end at the sword of the green-faced Prince.

The final part of the evening comprised Devan giving a very amusing, brief, “simplified” explanation of Hinduism. “The lotus is the Hindu symbol because it grows, not in clean water, but in mud, and yet it is so beautiful. It therefore signifies good growing from bad.” His talk ranged over many aspects of Indian life. “Why do Indians wag their heads from side to side like this – because they are reeelaxed, there is no tension – you should try it”. All of this went down well with his tourist audience. Devan has been giving daily performances for the past thirty years. He and his family have devoted their lives to Kathkali, taking it all over the world. His father, Gopala Paniker, was still dancing at 97, having been feted and awarded many honours by the Indian government. Devan’s brother, Ananda Shivaram, was the first Kathkali dancer to visit Australia (in 1947) although the poor man had to sleep in the foyer of the Majestic Hotel in Adelaide because his landlady refused him entry when she discovered he was Indian. Thus, Devan, now well into his seventies, continues a tradition and art­form that is unique to Kerala, and we hoped, after an enthralling evening, that he has devotees in sufficient numbers to ensure the continuance of the Kathkali dance.

The air-conditioning in Simi’s car was welcome after such an exhilarating though hot and sticky evening. She and Antony drove us to the sumptuous Oberoi Hotel on Willingdon Island where Sunni and the children were waiting for us in the restaurant. The buffet meal was superb, the company excellent and it was a delightful way to round off what had been one of the most memorable days of the tour thus far.

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Our journey back up to Thrissur was remarkable only for the time it took me to convince the driver that I meant what I said about speed. Both he and Antony, who had fixed the transport, had smiled as I told them that we did not want to travel over 60kph. For the first time I nearly had to shout to the man to slow down. The road between Ernakulum and Thrissur, as we had noted on the way down, was every bit as dangerous as the infamous Bangalore-Mysore stretch and it was with some relief that we pulled up outside the Casino Hotel. Pat had been feeling a little grim (settled before we left only by Immodium) but she perked up somewhat when we were greeted by the Thrissur TCL representative, Father Thomas. Extremely handsome and wearing the long white gown of the Carmelite Order, he was Richard Chamberlain in Thornbirds! He was quietly spoken and, we were to discover, articulate and intelligent. Proving to be an excellent rep, he was solicitous without being overbearing, providing just the right amount of support and local advice. He settled us in (he seemed on good terms with the manager of the hotel) and I dealt with some business matters before he departed, after which we were to discover how right LP was about the hotel restaurant – very poor. But since we were still on a Cochin “high”, it seemed to matter little and we decided to relax by watching TV – Robin Williams and Gene Hackman in the film of La Cage aux Follies plus Joanna Lumley retracing her grandfather’s footsteps in Bhutan.

Monday morning’s breakfast had me chewing my way through some inedible cornflakes – why did I bother? I was, however, interested in my companions. The hotel was hosting a conference by the Kerala Forestry Research Institute and there were delegates from the Congo, Australia, China, Indonesia, South Africa and Brazil. I chatted to Professor Leonanto from Sao Paulo University who told me that reports in the Western press about the disappearance of rain forests in the Amazon basin were grossly exaggerated. “Only 6% have gone”, he said “so the problem is much worse in Indonesia”. I wondered if the Indonesian delegate would have given the reverse opinion.

My examining in Thrissur was at the Chetana Academy of which Fr. Thomas was the Principal. I had imagined that the name was of local Indian origin but discovered that it was an acronym. The “Centre Hastening Education, Technical and National Advancement” had four sites, one for Kathkali Dance, another for Multi Media activities, a Recording studio and – my place of work – the  Music Academy. The premises were purpose-built with practice studios and classrooms round a central recital room, which was where the exams took place. The Grade examinations were mostly in keyboard, guitar and violin, the standard being quite good. As was often the case, it was at Diploma level that the lack of background and sheer technical certainty militated against real success. One ATCL violin candidate performed the entire programme unaccompanied – Beethoven’s A major Sonata does not quite work in this guise especially when the player counts through the bars rests presumably for me to “imagine” the piano part. On the first of the two days, several candidates were missing because of the absence of buses. A strike – hartal – was being held by members of the Muslim community to mark the 7^th anniversary of the demolition of the Babri Masjid (mosque) in Ayodhya, an event marking a severe downturn in Muslim-Hindu relations, effects of which still ripple on. Since I therefore finished early, Pat and I were able to wander into the main part of the town. The Vadakkunathan Kshetram temple was literally at the centre on a small hill, the roads of the town orbiting this famous building. Keralan temples do not have the tall Dravidian gopurams towering over their entrances. Instead, as here, the roofs are red-tiled, in three tiers reminiscent of a pagoda. Since the temple contains some beautiful artwork and murals, we were a little disappointed to discover that it was “Strictly Hindu Only” although, even if we had waved some rupee notes in front of the Brahmin priest, we would still have not been able to enter because it was closed to all-comers on that particular day.

That evening, Fr. Thomas took us to the Recording Studio to meet his colleague, Fr. Paul Alengathukaran, a short, stocky, smiling man dressed in ordinary slacks and shirt. He had spent six years learning about the recording industry in Philadelphia (where several of the Order, including Fr. Thomas, had studied). We met his assistant, Ganesh, a local lad who trained with Fr. Paul and who told us he had no ambition to move to the “big city” or to Bollywood since he loved the area, his home and working with “the fathers”. The studio itself runs as a commercial enterprise, being used by session musicians making pop albums and for recording film sound tracks. Fr. Paul explained that they have a veto on the material if they feel it “unchristian” and that they offer special prices to groups making sacred recordings. I wondered, but did not ask, if “sacred” implied only Christian. The fathers believe in getting involved in commercial life as it gives them a chance to instil and maintain moral standards – a rather Boothian why-should-the-devil-have-all-the-best-tunes philosophy. We toured the impressive, fully-equipped, studios and, in the Control Room, listened to several tracks by artists unknown to me. One such, called Rivers, was a magical mixture of Indian and Western instruments, rhythms and harmonies. We then returned to Fr. Paul’s office where a meal, brought in from a local restaurant, awaited us. Pat was still not feeling like over-indulging but I happily tucked in to the soup, toasted sandwiches, vegeburger in a bun and prawns in batter followed by ice cream and cookies.

Since Fr. Thomas had timetabled all of the exams for the Monday and Tuesday, we had most of Wednesday free. At 9am, I conducted a Teachers’ Meeting at the Academy attended by eight somewhat serious-looking teachers and half a dozen senior students. They asked some searching questions and raised several issues that I was delighted to discuss with them although I found it hard to achieve my usual aim of keeping the meeting light and informal. However, once Fr. Thomas brought matters to a close, they all seemed to relax and bustled around taking pictures of everyone present. Pat had been sitting reading in one of the offices but she joined us to take photos of the presentation they made to me – a wooden hand-carved face of a Kathkali dancer. This was doubly welcome as a memento of both Thrissur and Cochin.

Before long we were boarding the ungainly Tata Sumo, driven by Sadju, which Fr. Thomas used as his runaround and were on our way to Guruvayoor, some twenty miles north of Thrissur, home of the Sri Krishna Temple. This temple is an important site on the South India pilgrimage trail and, since we were in the festival season, the town was crammed with garlanded buses disgorging hundreds upon hundreds of bare-chested devotees, wearing either black or orange lunghis. In the good-natured melee, they resembled supporters of different teams at a football match. The temple was approached via a long street bazaar where there seemed to be an enormous amount of brass and gold-coloured objects for sale. Architecturally, the bazaar was marred by a very functional tin roof with ugly concrete posts, no doubt constructed to provide visitors with shade from the sun or shelter from the monsoons. It certainly was not in keeping with the simple elegance of the red-tiled roof of the temple. Being “Hindu-only”, we were only able to people-watch although we also walked the circumference of the temple walls and could catch glimpses of the huge “tank” where men were bathing while others sat in contemplation. We saw no other caucasians and, once more, were delighted that our host was able to bring us away from the tourist spots to enjoy the sights and sounds of ordinary Indian life.

Fr.Thomas had bought some bananas and cans of drink for our mid-morning snack that we took in the Sumo as we drove on to Punnathur Kota. Here, we found the elephant compound, open to the public, where the beasts from the Guruvayoor temple were kept. It was very kind of Fr. Thomas to include this in our day’s outing and I am sure that many visitors enjoy walking around the wooded acres looking at the elephants. He was not to know that what we saw was, to us, very upsetting. Each one of the elephants – and there were over twenty – was chained by each foot to posts driven into the ground allowing it minimal movement. They were thus only able to sway backwards and forwards, waggling ears, waving trunks and swishing their tails. One did not have to be an animal expert to realise that the animals were distressed. We were told that every third day they are taken down to the lake for bathing. This apart, their only walking would be to the temple for festivals and processions – we could not discover from the guide how often that would be. It was indicative that we were told not to approach the elephants with our cameras but were guided to one particularly young and placid beast for the obligatory photos. We were not comfortable even at this point but we had to balance our distaste for the manner in which the elephants were kept with a wish to be polite to our host.

From Guruvayoor, our next port of call was the Amala Ayurveda Cancer Hospital and Research Centre. Here we met the charming Father Walter, the Administrator, whose first duty was to take us to his flat on site for an excellent lunch. Fr. Walter spoke with quite a strong American accent. He, too, had studied in Philadelphia (Social Studies with a Masters in Business Administration) and, as we observed on our long tour of the institution, his ready smile, his wit and his ability to remember everyone we met by name endeared him to staff and patients alike. Established in 1978, the 600-bed hospital is, Fr. Walter explained as we moved along corridors and in and out of wards, a non-profit, charitable institution which has built up a reputation, throughout India and beyond, for its work in treating cancer through ayurvedic medicine and homeopathy. The Centre handles 4,000 new cancer cases and 35,000 follow-up cases each year. Fr. Walter was obviously, and rightly, proud of his hospital and we noted how moved he was when talking to a father in a side ward about the man’s 14-year-old daughter who was dying of leukaemia. Many of the patients we saw were beneficiaries of a free food scheme – some 200 patients too poor to pay are provided with two daily meals, costing the hospital about £45 per day. Local people donate rice and vegetables and a team of volunteers helps to prepare the food. Another scheme provides for free treatment in terms of scanning, surgery, medicine and transport for relatives – another £75 each day.

At times, we felt that we were intruding on the privacy of patients as we swept along from place to place with Frs. Walter and Thomas. We were quite obviously “visitors” and many of the patients stared at us, some blankly, others inquisitively. Though housed in quite unsalubrious rooms, the hub of the medical work in the hospital was the ayurvedic pharmacy. In Sanskrit, ayu means knowledge and veda life and ayurvedic texts date back 2,500 years. Much of the work in the pharmacy would be based on traditional methods of treating the body through the use of herbs and oils, so we were fascinated to see what looked likes mounds of twigs and pieces of bark lying on the floor ready to be turned into healing potions. Our noses told us that there were nutmeg kernels, cinnamon, cloves, cardamom pods, fennel and coriander seeds in the jars on shelves around the room. The staff explained that all of us fall in to one of three distinct personality and body types – vata (air) pitta (fire) or kapha (earth) known collectively as doshas. Only after this individual feature has been determined can the physician recommend particular herbs and oils. Massage is used not so much for muscular relaxation but to help the oils soak through the skin and into the bloodstream. We drew parallels with the homeopathic approach becoming more common in the UK and it was agreed that there is a great deal of overlap. We concluded our visit with a draught of a tonic that sounded from its description as though it would cure anything and everything – “Very good for the stomach and for the head” – to us it tasted of Venos Cough Mixture.

The hospital was thronging with people. Staff moved purposefully, we noticed many resigned faces in the orderly queues in corridors, we saw the latest X-ray machines, visited the Prayer Chapel (used, Fr. Walter said, by people of all religions) and met three German women who were there for a fortnight of ayurvedic treatment. Sitting in their sparse but clean-looking apartment, away from the main body of the hospital, they told us that none of them was ill but that they enjoyed the total break from their lives in Europe and felt enormous benefit from the treatment. We presumed that this “health farm” aspect of the hospital provided a means of revenue – Fr. Walter explained that many Indian hospitals offered similar services of which many Indians as well as Caucasians took advantage.

On our way back to Thrissur, we made a detour to the top of Vilangan Hill for splendid views across paddy fields and coconut groves. The late afternoon sun cast long shadows across the landscape and we watched a passenger train creeping through trees and then crossing clearings in the bush, on its way to Trissur and its eventual destination, Port Cochin. It was, apparently, Fr. Thomas’ first visit to this local beauty spot and he appeared more light-hearted and relaxed than earlier in the day (he had a very bad cold) and he seemed to enjoy chatting to other visitors, even reluctant to leave.

That evening, we had a chance to quiz Fr. Thomas about his Order as we dined at the Fathers’ residence or illam. In the local language (Malalayam) this means “House of Brahmins”, a useful borrowing from the Hindu religion, the Brahmins forming the upper caste of educated leaders. The 3^rd Order of Carmelites was founded by one Father Kuriakose, in 1832, and the fathers regard themselves as “active contemplative”, hence the community-based activities in education and culture. All of this was discussed over a simple meal of salad and raw vegetables, cold fish cutlets, dahl and Kerala rice with its distinctively large, soft grains – fruit and cake for “afters”. I wore my kurta, only to be told that, in this part of the world, it was called a jubba and, although the dozen or so dining that night had greeted us very graciously and sung a lively Grace (“Rejoice”), they had then sat at another table leaving us with Fathers Paul (from the Recording Studio) and Thomas for company.

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The next morning, we were on the road by 8.15. Father Thomas had decided he would have a day trip to Cochin to see Simi Koshi and, together with driver Sadju, we would have been a party of four. But, inevitably, the Trinity College London taxi service provided a free seat for another passenger – Father Paul had a “meeting” in Cochin also. We would have picked up another passenger en route in Chalakudy but, on the outskirts of Thrissur, we had a puncture. As we disembarked, I had a look at the blown tyre. It was bald and I marvelled that, on the none-too-smooth surfaces of local roads, it had lasted as long as it had.

While we stood around on the roadside in the bright morning sunshine, Pat remarked on the nearby houses. We were presumably in the Hampstead of Thrissur because the houses were large, brick-built, detached, with spacious gardens to the front. What had caught Pat’s eye was the distinctive Kerelan tiled roofs sloping low down towards the ground. As she took out her camera, Fr. Thomas stepped forward and said, “I know the people who live here. Come, I will introduce them to you and you can see their house inside”. Before she knew it, Pat was standing in the kitchen of the house being invited to join a family for breakfast – Fr. Thomas knew the two daughters through the Chetana Academy. He explained that we were just waiting for a wheel to be changed and therefore there was no time for a meal. Nonetheless, the folk were delighted that Pat wanted to photograph their house and so what started out as a casual snap turned into a full-blown photo-shoot.

Once on our way again, Sadju began to make up for lost time and my nerve failed. I had to explain to Fr. Thomas that the speed we were travelling at made both Pat and I very frightened. Fortunately, our host took us seriously and instructed Sadju to rein in his penchant for the Grand Prix. Father Thomas was born and bred in Kerala and so was able to answer many questions with which we plied him during the journey. Near Amballor, he told us that there were over 200 tile and brick factories in the area and customers for Keralan tiles came from all over Andra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. We commented on the prevalence of the lunghi as male apparel compared with further north and he told us that it was possible to tell a Muslim from a Hindu depending on whether the garment was tucked in to the left or the right of the waistband. We agreed that, since most men seemed to be permanently in the process of adjusting and re-tucking their lunghis, it was difficult to put this knowledge to the test.

We passed a Carmelite school of some 2,000 mixed students at Dipthi. Crossing the River Chalakudy, and opposite a huge distillery, was a “Divine Retreat” where between 15,000 and 20,000 people arrive per day for a week’s sojourn. Apparently, the courses are attended by Hindus and Muslims as well as Christians – “Ecumenical but Bible-based” was how Fr. T. described it. I could not help wondering if this was conversion by stealth but, since this was a sensitive subject with many Christians in India, I did not raise it. We asked about the “Syrian” Church and he explained that Christian “bishops” arrived on the Malabar coast in the second century AD from Syria, Turkey and Jerusalem and the early Kerelan church rites were based on the teachings of these “missionaries”. When the Portuguese arrived, they were surprised to find Christianity established and even more amazed that the locals had not heard of the Pope. Subsequently, there was a move towards Rome but the church was still referred to as Syrian (or Syro-Malabar or sometimes just Malabar!).

We dropped Fr. Paul in Ernakulum for his meeting and arrived in the Riviera Resorts mid-morning in time for elevenses with Simi and Antony. Having made our farewells to Sadju and Fr. Thomas, we checked in to our rooms and, again, savoured the view from our balcony. I had noted Fr.Thomas making a beeline for Simi’s school with the Thrissur results (which I had handed to him as we bade him farewell) and concluded that he wished to pore over these as soon as possible. From the balcony, I could see that he was now standing outside in earnest conversation with Simi, report sheets in hand – the rep’s post-mortem!

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That afternoon was to prove one of the most relaxing few hours we spent on the whole tour. The previous weekend, I had asked Antony if he could book us tickets on a short trip to give us a flavour of the famous Keralan backwaters – hundreds of miles of waterways which fringe the coast and wind far inland. We knew we could not do justice to this complex of lagoons, lakes, rivers and canals in an afternoon but to be so near and not sample this unique area seemed unthinkable. Antony took us to the quay where we expected to join a tourist launch and it was not until the boatman pushed off and started up the engine did I realise that Antony had hired for us our own 20 foot craft. It could easily have held fifteen or twenty people on its two decks. As it was, we glided out from the harbour, sitting in solitary splendour on the top deck, conscious of the gazes from passengers crowded onto a similar boat waiting to cast off. True, they were probably paying Rp60 while we had paid ten times that amount but at £9 we felt the next two hours to be quite the most delightful way to spend an afternoon.

There were two “crew”, both young men, and we chugged quietly across the harbour, following the edge of Bolgatty Island. We passed more Chinese fishing nets, some used, others derelict, weaved between sundry fishermen who, in small boats, were tending to the catch nets strung between poles, the latter being marked by improvised pontoons of bright red plastic bottles or bags. Children ran along the banks and called to us, others plunged into the water to demonstrate their swimming prowess. At intervals along the banks there were small rush-sided, canvas-roofed shacks built out over the water with a narrow plank leading from the bank, up which, presumably, people had to back to occupy these no-need-to-flush latrines. We could see into the small villages where there were occasional temples or churches. In some of the tiny settlements, the houses seemed to cling to just a narrow spit of land and yet there were the usual cows, pigs and goats wandering about on the lookout for food, and areas had obviously been cultivated. Everywhere, the vegetation was lush and full. Small punted ferries crossed in front and behind us, overladen, as with all forms of Indian transport, with people, animals, packages, bicycles, vegetables and fruit. Children waved from these craft, too. We could see across the strips of land into further backwaters and canals and every picture the eye took in was framed by the coconut palms against an azure sky. The peace and tranquillity was mesmerising.

We were in quite narrow straits when I realised that we had been travelling for well over an hour and since the boat was booked for two hours only and I knew Simi would be meeting us, I asked if we were about to begin the return leg. The lad smiled and said “Another ten minutes, you happy?” We were, blissfully so.

Simi had obviously anticipated our late return as she was nowhere to be seen on the quay. If the boatman gave us the extra half hour as a ploy to extract a larger tip, it worked – Rp50 each sent them off smiling as broadly as we were ourselves after the most torporous and quiescent afternoon either of us could remember. When Simi arrived, it was a reminder that I was actually in Cochin to work. She took me to her studio to meet all of the candidates for the following day’s examinations. I sensed, as I had the previous week, that she was slightly tense about the whole venture – this was her first exam session and therefore her anxiety was understandable. I chatted to the youngsters and told them to think of me as another teacher, a friend of Antony and Mrs. Koshi, and that I was looking forward to hearing them play. Having thus discharged my duty, Pat and I were left to enjoy a quiet evening on our own. Neither of us spoke much over dinner as we each were still under the spell of the Keralan backwaters. This was one more ambition achieved and, at that point, we agreed that, apart from visiting a temple festival (and with the Taj Mahal and the Golden Triangle to come), we had managed to tick off all of the items on our Indian “must do” list.

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The examination session went very well indeed.  One lad, when I was beginning my Ear Test mantra, was listening carefully to every word. “I shall now play a melody twice through and you are to sing …” – “or hum” he interjected, as I drew breath. This was indicative of the level of preparation and, with the playing being very musical and detailed, the day produced Merits or Distinctions for every candidate. Because the Amadeus Academy was in its initial stages, all of the exams were in the lower grades. Nonetheless, I was very impressed with the start Simi and Antony had made on their business venture. When the session finished, I stopped to consider how anxious they both had been about the exam session and so, knowing that I would be handing over the detailed results the next day, I sat them down in the exam room and told them how very well all their candidates had performed. When I said that all had received Merit or Distinction marks, they grabbed each others’ hands in relief and joy and I swear there were tears in Antony’s eyes. Obviously, the basis of their work had been very sound and it will be interesting to discover from my colleagues how the Academy progresses in subsequent years.

Pat, meanwhile, had been on the move. Antony had arranged a taxi for her and her first port of call was the home of Simi’s hairdresser where her hair was conditioned, cut quite short and blown dry – this, with the obligatory head massage, for the princely sum of £1.75. Next stop was the Indian Airlines office to re-confirm our flight from Trivandrum to Delhi. During the hour-long wait in a very congested office, she mused on the ability of Indians to wait patiently in this situation. There were only two girls on the desks and customers were dealt with in a desultory fashion, seemingly with no concept of providing a service, let alone an efficient one. There was a “manager” (with Bobby Charlton hair-do) who seemed to drift about with little sense of purpose and no awareness of the crowded waiting area. This, of course, is part of the power of middle management. While people wait, they are under control and letting go of that control by dealing quickly with enquiries is not part of the Indian office game. Pat sat and fumed but nobody else seemed the slightest bit put out as they were obviously used to the situation. There was also the realization that, by complaining, they might be put to the back of the queue.

After eventually being dealt with, Pat was not surprised to find her driver fast asleep in the Ambassador. Her next ordeal by office was at the KLM premises. We had been advised from Trinity’s travel agent that KLM had abandoned flights from Amsterdam to Sheffield and that we therefore would have to fly into Manchester at the end of the tour. Fortunately, the problems of timings and costings were quite quickly resolved – how lucky I was to have my own PA to deal with such exigencies.

That evening, by way of celebration, Simi and Antony had said that they wanted to take us out. When they picked us up, we were both bowled over by Simi, wearing the most fabulous cream sari with beautiful gold embroidered edging. She told us that she did not often wear saris, preferring “western” dress – we were not the only people to admire the effect as, throughout the evening, heads were turning, both men’s and women’s, from all sides. They took us first to a very select department store which would have graced London’s Oxford St. in terms of quality (and price). Simi thought that we might like to buy shoes or books or Christmas presents and, had we the money, she may have been correct! Antony bought me two cassette tapes of drum music – I had expressed an interest in the chenda and he insisted that I should have an example played by the master of the instrument, Mattanoor Sankaran Kutty. It is a tape I have played quite a lot subsequently. I find the music initially hypnotic in its simplicity – a great deal of Indian music was “minimalist” before the West invented the term – and then, as the rhythms become more complex, a physical excitement takes over, combined, of course, with an intense admiration for the technical and musical skills on display.

Our visit to the very grand White Fort hotel for dinner was something of a disaster. As soon as I entered the restaurant, the noise from the over-amplified five-piece band dulled my senses and was obviously going to render conversation impossible. A quick decision had to be made and I think our hosts were glad that I had been frank rather than endure an uncomfortable evening of deafening noise and no conversation. We felt a little awkward about this because, as we moved back into the foyer, it became clear that Antony knew members of said band. However, as a penance, I agreed to sit at the (white) Chinese grand piano situated near the entrance, and strum a few ditties to the obvious delight of Simi. Several youngsters, at the hotel for dinner with their families, came across and chatted to Pat whilst two African gentlemen came up and started talking to me as I played. They were Nigerian Members of Parliament attending an agriculture conference and were very anxious to give me their cards “in case you come to our country”. Who knows when I might find it useful to have the telephone number of a Nigerian MP?

With dinner abandoned for the moment, we moved on to the Tripunitura Temple. With hindsight, we can only presume that, in conversation with Simi and Antony, we had mentioned our temple visits (Kanchipuram, Vellore, Mahabalipuram etc.) and that they had decided we would enjoy visiting a South Indian temple. Little did they know how much they had struck gold because, unbeknown to them, a festival was under way and the streets leading to the temple had been closed off for stall holders selling cheap jewellery, statuettes and photos of the gods, cassette tapes, pink, yellow, green and red powders (and fruit) for the pujas. There were many sugar-cane sellers ready to push the cane through their crushing machines to produce sweet, sticky drinks, boys selling pop-corn, cards and candy floss. The area was alive, whole families were trailing around, and there was a magical carnival atmosphere.

But the real magic was to come. As we approached the temple, we could see the “Hindu-only” notices beside the very ornate lamps with their elaborately carved turtle bases. Since reading of these South Indian festivals in Michael Wood’s compelling The Smile of Murugan, I had been hoping that we could witness one such event. I was not prepared to go native and, as Wood had done, go into the temple bare-chested wearing a lunghi but, from his writing, I had been fascinated with the idea of watching a real festival. Just when I thought that at least we could at least glimpse some of the activity inside Tripunitura through the wide southern archway, Antony, who had slipped away from us, came back to say that he had “made a few enquiries” and that we could go in! Whether these “enquiries” involved a few rupees or whether Antony had discovered that the Brahmins were not very strict I never discovered but the next moment we were removing our sandals and entering the temple. We had gathered earlier in conversation that Simi was a Christian but she now confessed that this would be the first time in her life she had entered a Hindu temple. It was at this point that she also regretted wearing such a lovely sari – she had not thought it would be dragging round the courtyard of a temple. “I would have worn jeans if I had known” she cried as she walked barefoot across the gravel – “It is so dirty!” Antony said that he, too, was a Christian but that he had lots of Hindu friends and would be able to answer our questions.

What greeted us as we moved inside was breathtaking. The twenty foot high outer walls of the temple, each with its own gopuram/gateway, enclosed an area about sixty yards square. In the centre was the sanctum sanctorum and the covered walkway leading to this had elaborate paintings on its ceiling and on the supporting pillars. Huge arc lights illuminated the scene and we gasped as we turned to our left and saw a line of fifteen elephants, fully caparisoned with painted trunks and foreheads, one mahout sitting on the floor directly under the beasts’ bellies, another sitting astride. In front of the central elephant was a small bowl with an image of the deity. Separating the elephants from the crowd of people were four priests holding flaming torches – the lighted cross beam was held at shoulder height on a wooden staff. A semicircular area had thus been cleared and across this, presumably under the direction of the priests, members of the crowd would walk to put money or other offerings in the bowl, making namaste as they left. At the far side of this area there were eight trumpeters, playing fully circular instruments, bleating out fanfares, competing with the recordings of Carnatic song blasting from enormous wall-hung speakers. Occasionally, we were aware of large bunches of sugar-cane and palm leaves being dumped in front of the elephants who fairly nonchalantly stuffed them into their enormous mouths. Many people were just standing watching the proceedings while others stood with their heads bowed, their hands against their foreheads in namaste. Yet more milled around in conversation, lads further over played football. Other people sat in little groups chatting – men, women and children together.

Nobody seemed to mind our presence, in fact many people smiled at our obvious fascination, some of the amusement being caused by the very ungainly way I picked my way barefoot across the gravel areas before making the comfort of the paved pathways. People often made way for us to take photographs of the elephants, the Brahmins, the trumpeters et al. Antony introduced us to a friend, Mr. Nair, who explained that the festivities would go on until 4.30am and that the next stage would be the arrival of the drummers. As we spoke, we were aware of being swept back by the crowd as the elephants were moved some ten yards forward and we found ourselves in the middle of an enormous group of chenda players and cymbalists who were preparing to add their musical weight to the proceedings. With the trumpeters being reinforced by the addition of some twelve shenai, the sound, once they began their performance, was incredibly loud and raucous, the wind instruments playing antiphonally with the percussion. Antony wanted to move us up to a balcony along the outer temple wall but we discovered that it was for “private use of royalty”. I was not sorry to remain in the thick of the action – it was one of the most exhilarating musical experiences of my life!

We moved around the back of the sanctum to admire the carvings on the stonework of the northern gate and with the central building between us and the “orchestra”, it was possible again to hear the Carnatic vocal ragas being broadcast over the PA system. Returning to the front, we noticed that ever more devotees were flooding into the sanctum to make darshan in front of the resident god. Meanwhile, the organized musical cacophony was becoming more and more hectic. This was because, with the animals lifting a hind leg to form a step, priests were climbing on to the elephants’ backs and opening enormous plumes of feathers and leaves. We gaped in amazement at this beautiful choreography. We gathered that the music would get more and more frenetic until, in a frenzy of drumming, the climax of the event would come with the deity being paraded round at the head of the procession of elephants. But this would be at about 1am and we had already been in the temple for two hours. The time had flown by and we both felt we could not impose on our hosts any longer so, regretfully, we found our shoes and made our way back along the ever-more-crowded street to the car. Antony wanted to buy Pat a necklace “for your reminder of this night” and she chose a simple but very attractive piece with small clusters of scrolls at the front.

As if they had not been generous enough of their time (as well as gifts), we now moved on to find a restaurant. Several we tried were closed but eventually, at midnight, we were in a vegetarian establishment tucking in to plates of dosas with their accompanying pickles and spices and washed down with plenty of tea – the night was still quite warm. Simi and Antony were both surprised and amused by the way we had been practically struck dumb by the temple visit and I explained that, apart from the fact that it realised an ambition we had both harboured, the surprise element had made the evening all that more memorable. At the same time, we felt that they were pleased to have made our last evening so very special.

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As one who is interested in (though not obsessed with) railways, it was a little disappointing to have come so far in our tour without experiencing rail travel Indian style. True, we had had short trips at Darjeeling and Ooty but these were of the tourist variety only – no booking of seats, dealing with luggage, meals and squat toilets. We had discussed this with Simi and Antony and suggested we might make our final move between centres, from Cochin to Trivandrum, by rail. They were both immediately discouraging. “If you travel air-conditioned, the windows are very small and usually dirty – you will not see anything”, said Simi. “And if you go first class, the carriage will be very sticky, hot and crowded” added Antony.” “We will find out about the train times if you wish but …” and this rather hung in the air. Although we were often horrified by the dangers of road travel, we nevertheless appreciated the flexibility it gave us to begin the journey at the time of our choosing, to stop whenever we saw fit – for photos, lunch or “comfort breaks” – and generally to feel more in control of our journey.

Therefore, on Saturday 11^th December, we bade fond farewells to Simi and Antony and set out in a spanking new Ambassador, driven by Vimalkumar, for the six-hour ride to Thiruvananthapuram[3] (Trivandrum) where my last group of candidates would be making their final preparations. Vimalkumar proved to be an excellent driver, keeping the needle hovering on the 60kph mark and we were able to sit back and enjoy close encounters with scenes of Keralan life that would have been very difficult from a railway carriage window. Coir mills abounded with the matting hanging out to dry on the central reservation of the dual carriageway of NH47 as well as filling areas in the mill yard. At Shertallai, we noticed elephants working in the sawmills – doubtless, their lives were less harrowing than those of the temple elephants we saw on the previous evening or those chained up at the Punnathur Kota compound. At Alappuzha there were glass factories, film studios and, next door to a large Homeopathic Pharmacy, a cathedral-size Roman Catholic church with a large grotto/shrine to the side of the walled frontage. To remind us of Christmas preparations, the shops here were full of huge, five-pointed, three-dimensional highly-coloured cardboard stars.

Kerala seemed to be spending a good deal of its resources on up-grading the roads. Near Ambalapulai (as well as many other sites) there were masses of road workers. The men beavered away with what looked like garden hoes. The women carried on their heads flat basket/trays full of stone chippings, moving in a human chain to and from the heaps of rocks where others were squatting, hacking away at the large rocks, reducing them to ballast. These migrant workers worked alongside their “homes”. The open-sided shacks were made of blue plastic sheeting and inside we could see children sitting, while others played outside.

At Purakad, the smell of fish told us the sea was nearby and before long we could see the Arabian Sea glinting through the coconut palms as the road ran parallel with a ribbon of fishermen’s shacks on the beach. Fish sellers were walking in the road with their wares on platters, hoping to attract custom from the car and lorry drivers. Others kept their fish fresh in plastic tanks the size of milk crates that were either on the roadside or fixed on bicycles. Spinning mills marked the approach to Kayankulum where we stopped for a Limca and banana lunch.

Much of the clear blue water we saw was that of inland lakes and backwaters. Thus, after lunch, it was Kayankulum Lake which sparkled through the trees on the coastal side of the road while later we crossed a bridge across the entrance to Asthamudi Lake which stretched away inland, its palm-sided banks lined with cashew nut plantations and with many small fishing craft drifting like leaves across its surface. We were now passing through Kollam (new name for Quilon), a typical small Keralan market town. The narrow streets were lined with wooden houses with red-tiled overhanging roofs. In front of some shops, we noticed pepper laid out on coir mats to dry – various shades of green, brown or black. The scene was made even more colourful by a passing funeral procession and we were able to catch the smell of the burning oils and incense as we passed. Again, we reminded ourselves that this sort of experience could only have come our way in a taxi and we were glad of Simi’s reluctance to send us by train.

The first undulations in the terrain appeared after Attingal where the road had crept slightly inland. The blue and yellow (global colours, obviously) of the cement company advertisements abounded and I was amused to see that many nearby hammers and sickles had been painted in blue, doubtless not to waste the paint or miss the opportunity to fill a space on nearby fences or rocks. As we approached Trivandrum, passing the University of Kerala, the Communist Party flags began appearing in traditional red often fluttering alongside the yellows of the Janata Party.

Our original booking was at the Kovalum Beach Resort, ten miles south of Trivandrum and, on reading LP, we had not been looking forward to “thousands of tourists from Britain and Europe on chartered jumbos for a two-week dose of ozone, UV and a sanitised Indian experience… chaotic beachfront development, an uncontrollable avalanche of garbage … “ and so it went on and on. Therefore, when we pulled in to the front of the South Park Hotel on MG Rd. (“…a swank, new, centrally air-conditioned hotel (with) one of the city’s best restaurants” LP) we said a silent prayer of thanks that the booking had been changed. The hotel was buzzing with activity since it was hosting the Inaugural Conference of the Global Alliance for Justice in Education. This was declared on huge banners across the foyer – I had no opportunity to talk to delegates to discover on whose initiative this movement had begun still less to find out what was meant by “justice” in this context.

We met the TCL representative that evening. Sister Mary Raphael was a gentle, slightly hesitant lady with the lovely face and welcoming smile we had come to expect from the sisters. Trinity had recently appointed an Englishman living in Kerala as co-ordinator (on a temporary basis) for the area and Sister Mary explained that “Mr. Michael Mott had suggested you would be more comfortable at this hotel in town rather than marooned on a beach”. He was right, of course, especially as Pat, when I was working, was going to be far happier close to shops and temples in the vicinity of the hotel than sitting under a coconut tree near “desperate souvenir sellers and hordes of ogling sightseers” – LP again. Sister Mary was less happy about Mr. Mott’s insistence that “the examiner will want a rest day on Monday and therefore exams should be held on Sunday” and, initially, nor was I. But I have learned to be sanguine about these things, knowing that there was probably local politics involved in some way and that it is best not to get involved by asking any supplementary questions.

Thus, I spent my Sunday examining Sister Mary Raphael’s pupils at the Holy Angels School – all Piano (and one Electronic Keyboard – “I am trying out the exam” said Sister MR) and all very well prepared, most gaining Merits and Distinctions. Pat came with me on the Tuesday and was looked after by a very attentive elderly (retired) Sister Audrey whose cataract operations had left her wearing glasses with half-inch thick lenses and who, when she smiled, reminded Pat, somewhat unkindly, of comedian Dick Emery. Nonetheless, she took Pat on a guided tour of the school but then saw it as part of her companiable duties to talk, endlessly throughout the day, about her experiences in Kenya. Much of the talk was of a Mr. Simpson (“Do you know him?”) and “all the good work he does for our poor Catholic boys. It nearly broke our hearts when we had to return to India.” Pat was looking forward to, perhaps, sitting outside in the attractive school grounds, reading. But tales from Kenya continued and, unfortunately, were all repeated to me during an over-abundant lunch at which we could only pick. When Sr. Mary had a chance to talk to Pat after lunch it was to “pick her brains” about schools in England, their curricula, parent’s days etc. When Pat explained that she was not a teacher, the Sister’s face could not hide utter astonishment. “Oh, I felt sure you would be”, she cried. However, she also talked to us about some of her work with the children and we gathered that she was keen on English Country dancing. We could only imagine that this was a remnant from British rule – why else would anyone want to teach Indian children to “Strip the Willow”. Since our daughter-in-law is a folk lorist and has strong connections with the English Folk Song and Dance Society, we promised to send Sr. Mary some material to help her – tapes and books[4]. Her other request was at the other end of the musical spectrum – a video of Lloyd Webber’s “Joseph and his Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat” so that she could teach the children the dance steps for a forthcoming production. Nothing if not versatile was Sister Mary Raphael.

My final candidates of the tour were a poor Grade 8 Violin and a rather weak Piano Diploma, which, after Sr. Mary’s well-prepared students, was disappointing. Michael Mott had accompanied the violinists and some singers and thus, at the informal teachers’ meeting at the end of the session, I was able to meet the TCL Co-ordinator for South India. Sr.Mary had asked me not to mention her problem about his reorganization of her timetable and the change in hotel booking. She seemed rather in awe of him. Similarly, Simi Koshi in Cochin had had a slight altercation with him but did not want to be confrontational especially as her centre was new. Thus, I decided these matters were for my tour report and Mott and I chatted about Trinity business and the theory courses he was planning to run. He mentioned that he had read in my CV of my interest in Male Choirs, that he knew the conductor of the Trivandrum Male Voice Choir and told me I would be very welcome at the rehearsal that evening. “They only use Tonic Sol-Fah” enthused Mott, “They must be one of the last choirs anywhere in the world to use it exclusively”. I agreed, and the prospect of hearing a group of Keralans rehearsing with TSF copies under the direction of a Mr. Thomas, intrigued me.

We met at 7pm and travelled by autorickshaw to the rooms of the London Missionary Society in a former Congregational Church (now Church of India). On the way, I asked if Mr. Thomas was Welsh, thinking that the choir could be the result of ex-pat fervour. During my university research, I had discovered cor meibion in such unlikely places as Patagonia and so this concept was not as silly as it sounded. “Lord, no”, came the reply. “If you asked everyone in Kerala with the name Thomas to stand up, half the state would rise!” I had forgotten that the apostle “Doubting Thomas” had spent his final years in South India and thus many Christian families bore his name. The man in question, wearing a white lunghi, stood in front of a group of eighteen men who wore a mixture of Indian and Western attire. When I arrived, the rehearsal had started and the men were seated at tables, very much in the tradition of the Austro-German liedertafel movement familiar to Franz Schubert, whose music they were singing. After formal greetings, the men formed a semicircle in front of the tables and, with Mr. Thomas blowing a C on his pitch-pipe, they launched into a performance of Schubert’s “Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty”. (There was no piano in the room – another reminder of times past in terms of male choir rehearsals.) They sang a rather serious, short, prepared programme, ending with a Spiritual “Have a little talk with God”. The sound produced was balanced, with no yelling tenors, firm basses and the singing was beautifully in tune, the result, no doubt, of never tuning to a piano and always performing a cappella. Their English was very precise – Mr. Thomas was obviously aware of final consonants. I was invited to rehearse the choir and spent some time on the Schubert, particularly working on phrasing. Not wanting the singers to think that I was criticizing their diction, I explained that many English groups also found it difficult to shape words such as “Holy” and “Mighty” and tended to sing the second syllable far too heavily. We rehearsed this and other details for fifteen minutes or so after which, having taken some photographs, I withdrew, leaving them to prepare for their forthcoming concert. Before I left, and knowing that availability of music would be very limited, I promised Mr. Thomas I would send some partsongs from the vast amount of material I had acquired during my research into the history and development of the British male choir. I hope it was of use and that the choir flourishes but, like MVCs all over the world, the average age was fifty plus …

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On planning our free time in Trivandrum, we had originally intended to hire a taxi and drive down to India’s “Land’s End” – Cape Comorin. This two-hour journey would have meant that we could witness the confluence of three seas – the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea. For this and other reasons – Gandhi’s ashes were immersed in the seas here – the area is “most auspicious” for Hindus and there are a variety of temples and memorials to see. However, having experienced so much taxi travel and knowing that the final three days of our trip were to be spent on the roads between Delhi, Agra and Jaipur, we decided to remain in Trivandrum, enjoying a leisurely stroll around the town. Thus, we spent the morning roaming MG Rd., discovering a variety of buildings. The Sri Padmanabhaswamy Temple was strictly Hindus only but we could admire the seven-storey Dravidian carved gopuram and its reflections in the nearby sacred tank. Close by was the Palace Museum (unfortunately closed) with its typical red-tiled, tiered roofs. In contrast to the mosques and churches from previous centuries, the impressive State Assembly building was spanking new, yet the architect had incorporated features of Keralan buildings (notably the tiered roofs) in a most striking manner. The impressively large iron gates, guarded by immaculately turned out uniformed soldiers, held a large logo involving elephants and coconut palms.

Outside the white-pillared Secretariat Building, we had to push our way through crowds of people, on the pavement and in the road, who were holding a demonstration. Several police were present, their lathis (four-foot long wooden batons which all Indian policemen carry) in evidence but not being wielded, as the crowd seemed quite good-natured. We had no idea what the protest was about and since processions and meetings of this kind seemed to be a daily feature of Trivandrum life, many of the population were also ignorant of the significance of these events. For example, on the end of the afternoon, a procession was passing the hotel and, from the banners and the multitude of hammers and sickles thereon, we deduced this was the Communist Indian Trade Union (“CITU” on most banners was a clue). But when we enquired what the march was specifically for, the Receptionist merely said, “These things are happening all the time”, a waiter suggested “There is a strike at the Secretariat” and the Concierge added, enigmatically, “Today is the rising of the party”. He reckoned that the procession would take an hour to pass and would involve between 5,000 and 6,000 marchers. There were two bands, made up of a motley collection of brass instruments, playing music I could not recognise as Western or Indian, such was the cacophony. The road-wide banners separated groups of marchers – we noticed that women were not interspersed with the men but marched as a separate group.

During the afternoon, we had left the hurly-burly of MG Rd. and taken a taxi to Veli Lagoon. We walked along the river beside gardens with modestly flowering bushes, small granite statuary, seats and children’s play areas before crossing a pontoon bridge (fee, 50 paises) leading onto the beach. Being a weekday, it was not at all crowded. The beach horses hung their heads, looking as sad as their owners since business was next to non-existent and the stall-holders purveying drinks and sweets were similarly under-occupied. The public toilet was a similar construction (of rattan and coconut leaves) as we had seen on the banks of the backwaters near Cochin. The lagoon was delightfully quiet and we sat, more or less alone, on the orange-coloured sand, watching waves crash energetically whilst fishermen hauled their massive nets into gondola-shaped boats and tiny crabs skitted about our feet. It was all perfectly relaxing and we knew then that we had made the right decision in staying in Trivandrum and re-charging our batteries before the whirlwind of tourism at the end of the week.

On our final morning in Trivandrum we had time to wander down to the Post Office so that I could register my packet of final results to London and send a letter to Ootycamund. Inside, we found a large notice listing the counters, numbered 1 to 12, and what could be transacted at each – fine if one could read Tamil. But along the front of the wide and largely empty counters only one number could be seen – No. 8. A plastic table notice told me, in English”, that this was the window I needed – “Multi Purpose”. The airmail packet caused the counter clerk no problem but when I offered the letter to Ooty, he waved me dismissively to the right – “Number 1”. Counter No.1 was marked “UPDSC transactions” and apparently this included inland letters because the clerk took the envelope, weighed it, wrote “Rp15” on it and handed it back to me. I looked vacantly at him and he said, “Buy stamps”, waving me back down the counter. We walked past an assortment of large plastic buckets in blue, orange and red. The notice above said “Prompt Self-Sort Greetings Cards”. Each bucket had on it the name of a state or city and one presumed this was a temporary arrangement for the Christmas rush. Beyond, at a separate table, a man sat furiously franking letters, which he pulled from a cardboard box. We then found a small counter set apart, in the corner of the building, where there was what looked alarmingly like a tightly packed, twenty-five-man scrum. This was a “queue”.  The front row forwards had their moustaches pressed against the glass panel of the booth and, while several women sat at the main counters chatting and doing the equivalent of painting their nails, one girl was dispensing the articles for which most people visit a Post Office  – stamps.

Pat moved to one side and I joined the scrum as a sort of wing-three quarter. Being taller than my companions by about a foot, I could turn and carry on a conversation with her. In my best Victor Meldrew voice, I said to her, “I don’t believe it! There are three or four clerks over there doing nothing – why can’t they sell stamps?” This brought smiles from many of the scrimmage whose English was obviously better than I thought. “This is India!” offered one gentleman, with a mischievous grin, adding “We know the system is stupid but we have to be patient – hey, let this man through”. With heads corporately wagging, they all somehow moved as if to let me get to the desk. “No”, I said, “Thank you, but that is not fair. If this is the system, then I will be patient. But why don’t you complain?” “Who to?” came a voice. “The manager or supervisor”, I suggested. “He would only keep us waiting for one hour to register our grievance – that would be our punishment for complaining”. “And then nothing would be done”, said an old man in a lunghi. They all grinned resignedly – no malice or grumbling. “Come”, said another, seeing that I only had one letter in my hand, “You buy”. So I moved forward and leaned over a few heads of persons who, being so tightly packed, could not move. “One fifteen rupee stamp, please”, I said, offering two Rp10 notes. “Now I suppose she’ll say ‘No change’”. This brought more smiles followed by guffaws when, with a spread of her hands, the clerk said, “Have you five, I have no change”.

Pat, meanwhile, was demonstrating that her patience with this aspect of Indian life was coming to an end – or was it that she had paced herself and, knowing that we would be back in England at the weekend, was allowing her pent-up frustrations to surface? She charged up to some of the unoccupied clerks and remonstrated on the waste of everyone’s time, surely they had some stamps, etc. etc., only to be waved dismissively away in the direction of the stamp corner. Fortunately, time was something we did have that morning. As we strolled back to the hotel, we even had time to stand and watch the daily protest march. This time it was a demonstration by the Kerala Cooperative Employers’ Association and was led by several hundred pink-saried women. But, again, we could not find out precisely what was at issue and nobody we asked seemed to care – just part of daily life in Trivandrum.

Sister Mary Raphael was waiting for us when we returned and I was able to hand over the examination results to her. We talked again about the changes to the Ear Tests that were then forthcoming and I did my best to assure her that she would soon get used to the new style tests and she and her pupils would enjoy them. She was not convinced, not least by her own perceived shortcomings. Obviously a very dedicated teacher, her enthusiasm and commitment to her young charges was moving, just as her own innocence was touching. As we left her and made for the stairs to our room, I turned to see that she had remained sitting on a low wall in the foyer. She had already opened the envelope and was reading avidly through the reports.

Later that day, we left Kerala, happy to be moving closer to our reunion with family, excited at the prospect of our mini-tour of Rajasthan but also with some regret that our time in the land of coconuts had ended. Kerala is undoubtedly a part of India we would like to visit again. In one sense we had covered a lot of ground but a fortnight’s holiday would be needed to explore the backwaters and the many other interesting towns and temples – even Fort Cochin deserved more than the day we spent there. Anyone thinking of spending a holiday in India and who was not concerned about seeing the Taj or “doing the Golden Triangle” and who was able to think further than Goa, must surely consider Kerala. After all, it is the “true” India, far from the Arayan influences in the North. It has a different pace, more space and beautiful scenery wherever you look. Indiaaah!