Location: Fort Cochin, Kerala. Date: 07 May 2010.

Jared says: After quite a hectic morning in Alleppey, stepping in to an air conditioned train and easily finding a couple of unoccupied seats, we were expecting it to be only a two hour respite from the full on pace of an Indian city. How pleasantly surprised we were that after a quick and painless rickshaw and ferry ride, costing the grand sum of 30 rupee ($1NZ), we arrived to the sleepy island suburb of Fort Cochin. The Lonely Planet sure got this one right, “a place in India where the number or goats on the streets outnumber the rickshaws”.

We spent the first couple of days relaxing and enjoying being able to walk to close eateries and stores down the narrow quiet streets. We did struggle at times in what was a well priced quality homestay, as we kept up the cost-saving measure of no AC and opted for sweat and a fan (which remained on 24 hours a day), as our cooling option from the 35+ degree highs.

On the third day we went on the obligatory rickshaw sightseeing tour and had a whirlwind view of the Portugese, Dutch, English inspired area. There were the obvious stops at the arts/souvenir/antique shops, which had an amazing range of well priced jewelry, fabrics and clothing, statues, carpets, and other nic-nacs, the majority of which were painstakingly hand made. The spice markets were a highlight of the 2 hour trip, with such an array of smells and tastes all around. We also saw a number of churches, temples, and museums, with some 1700s Hindu murals in the Dutch Palace of a religious devotion to equal Michael Angelo’s work in the Sistine Chapel, although on a smaller scale.

We continued the day on the tourist trail, heading to a traditional Keralan dance/play called Kathakali. It proved to be both an interesting and enjoyable display of outrageously costumed, expression orientated acting, to a beat of continuous drumming and chanting that was a little mind numbing while accurately depicting story we were seeing.

After that rather busy time, today we will be spending most of the day sitting, as we will head to the hills by bus, where we are expecting a respite from the heat to be the reward for an anywhere between and 6 and 1/2 hour journey, based on the enormously varying timeframes we’ve been told.

Tessa Says: Fort Cochin, a suburb of Kochi (population 1.4 million, LP 2009) is a beautiful quiet little town fringed with a fishing market. We had lunch at the LP highly recommended restaurant “Dal Roti”. Coming so highly recommended Jared decided to try the Mutton (goat) Thali – the first meat he’s had since being here! Unfortunately this upset his belly and meant that he couldn’t come for the cooking class that we had booked for the evening, so I braved out alone. Leelu a boisterous Indian woman, with Dubai residency ran the class which cost 500rp. I was in a group of five people, a freelance Australian camera man who had been filming the IPL and his girlfriend. He loved his cricket but proclaimed the IPL to be a very “garish, and distasteful sideshow.” And a family of Indians who live in Holland and have been their whole life. They spoke a mixture of Dutch and Hindi together. The daughter said that Indians kept approaching her telling her she was from Goa and she would say “No, I’m dutch!”

We cooked five dishes, including chappati. Below is a recipe for Thoran which is a shredded vegetable and coconut dish.

Thoran

For 2 People

300 grams of any vegetable (we used cabbage) diced or shredded finely.

1 Onion chopped

1 Chilli chopped

1 cup of shredded fresh coconut (if only desiccated coconut is available soak in warm water for 30 minutes before use)

Salt to taste

½ tsp cumin

½ tsp tumeric

Mix ingredients well, depending on vegetable add water, if using cabbage just sprinkle some water on, if potato/carrot use ½ cup of water.

Place mixture onto medium heat and steam vegetables until tender. 5 minutes for cabbage, longer for firmer vegetables.

Accommo: Orion Homestay, nice double room with tv and hot water, no AC, 500rp. ***1/2

Eats: Del Roti, strong flavoured North Indian food that although it upset Jared’s belly, we still went back to eat their Kati rolls a couple of times. ***

Talk of the Town, our regular breakfast spot with cheap and tasty Indian favourites. ***