Sunday, March 6

Sunday, March 6

We met at the #1 yoga hall at 8 am to attend a scheduled yoga class. There was no one there at 8:10, so Heather led Jen and I through a nice practice. After the practice we read the note on the board stating that the class was to be held at the #2 yoga hall. Oh well. Sweaty from the class we headed straight to breakfast. After a brief time getting our daily dose of the internet we took a walk around the "neighborhood." Not far down the road we stopped in a local tailor shop and I had him make me a jubba. It's a cotton short sleeve shirt with no collar three buttons neck to mid chest and a bit longer than a t-shirt. He made the shirt in a little over two hours and it cost me $13. Heather picked out a nice pale orange material. It will be a nice addition to my wardrobe as all I brought with me were t-shirts.

Speaking of my wardrobe, so far, I've lightened my backpack by leaving/donating three t-shirts, two pair of Prana pants (bought on sale), four pair of socks, and one long sleeve t-shirt to various hotel staff along the way. Practicing non-attachment.

The resort we are staying in has been built in a jungle along the coast. It is a dense lush jungle filled with palm and mango trees, all nature of beautiful smaller plants many adorned with red, yellow, and white flowers. Orchids are happy here. Birds are really happy here as are the geckos. I am amazed how few bugs (specifically mosquitoes) there are here. At dinner tonight there was a kathakali performance, which is a traditional Kerala performance between a man and a woman. The costumes are very ornate and the man's face is painted a bright green. Google it. Anyway they had these bright lights on the performers but there were only a couple of bugs flying around. Hopefully they're using an ayurvedic approach to pest control.

So far the food along the way has all be fresh, delicious, and not spicy at all. I'm a total wimp when it comes to spicy foods. I brought a 96 pack of Tums and I haven't taken one. Oh yeah, I poured out half the bottle last week so I down to 48. I'm getting used to room temperature showers. At the last hotel didn't know I needed to flip a switch 20 minutes before I wanted to get in the shower, so three showers there were without hot water. At the resort they have the same switch system for heating water, but the water heater is the size on one you'd have in an RV so the hot water doesn't last long. So I just pretty much dive in. The days here have been hot and not so humid but humid nonetheless, so that makes taking a room temperature shower feel pretty good.

I have a really nice room here at the spa. Only problem is the head of my bed face is against the wall and the elderly German couple next door also have the head of their bed opposite mine. The wall must be a piece of wood because I can hear every snort and cough. It really sounds like they're in the room with me. Weird. Thankfully I brought earplugs with me.

We walked to the beach tonight to watch the fishermen shove off in their boats for a nights fishing. There boats are maybe 30 feet long and five feet wide at the center and like everything in India are brightly painted. When I say shove off...well, they really do. They use these large wooden rollers about four feet wide and as thick as a telephone pole to roll them through the sand to the shore. Once they get them to the edge of the surf they wait for a big swell and three or four push like hell. Once in the water they all jump in and a couple of guys grab the oars and, once again, paddle like hell to keep the bow pointed out to sea, while the guy in the back is trying to start two 9.9 hp motors as quickly as possible before a big swell comes and capsizes the boat or pushes them back on the beach. It was quite a spectacle as maybe fifty boats were put to sea this evening. They travel offshore about 40 miles and fish all night. They return around 4 am the next day but sit off shore until around 6 am when they start coming ashore with the nights catch. We're getting up early to watch them when they arrive. Should be quite an event to witness at sunrise. Having said that off to the room temperature shower I go.