Travels of Note: This is India: Cochin, India

After making some half inebriated plans the night before, our drummer Frank, his roommate DJ Elton and myself got off the ship in Cochin India looking to see some sights. We didn’t really have a plan but figured once we got into town, we could look around and find something to do. Lucky for us, DJ Elton is from Mumbai and speaks Marathi so we had that to our advantage.

We walked off the gangway and out of the terminal to find a group of locals aggressively trying to sell us a cab ride into town or even a tour of the city. We thought we remembered a free shuttle into town and so we refused the offers by the locals. However they still followed us. We walked passed them and they still run up to us offering a tour of the city for $5. We told them “No thank you” but they still persisted. We walked all over the front of that terminal and couldn’t find the free shuttle. We finally decided we were going to need a taxi after all so we let DJ Elton handle the negotiations.

After a few minutes of them haggling, and Frank and I standing there wondering what the hell was going on, DJ Elton finally told us that this guy was going to drive us around for the day on his “tuk-tuk”, which was a motorized rickshaw for about $2 each. I figured no matter how you slice it that was a deal so I agreed.

We all piled into his tuk-tuk and we buzzed off. I quickly realized that the basic rules of the road that I so diligently learned and memorized when I was 15 and a half, no longer apply here in India. It was literally like driving bumper cars at the circus. We had drivers driving on the left side, the right side and even side ways. People just blaring their horns as they flew by an intersection with out slowing down or stopping to see if anyone was coming from the other direction. I was shocked that more people didn’t get into serious accidents.

We drove over a river and made it into the town area. The place was a little rough around the edges but it had spunk. I would see livestock walk down the street next to someone driving an Audi. It was really an east meets west type of town. It had modern appliance stores that would be next to someone’s old spice shop or a machinist shop. You also saw old women balancing a large sack on top of their head which reminded me of Walt Disney’s The Jungle Book. It was a lot to look at and I found it very interesting and charming.

We decided that we wanted to get some breakfast first. After stopping at a place that wasn’t prepared to serve breakfast, we relocated to a run down looking restaurant. The driver told us that this was an excellent local place to eat. We got out of the tuk-tuk and went inside. Needless to say as soon was we got inside, it was as if someone took the needle off the record and everyone stopped, turned around and stared at us. It was a little unsettling at first. DJ Elton found us a place to sit so we sat down. The table was made out of old varnished wood and on the table was complimentary water served in a dirty tin pitcher; also on the table was matching dented tin cups. DJ Elton told us no matter what you do, do NOT drink that water. Even as a native Indian, he didn’t drink the local water.

A waiter came over and gave us menus. DJ Elton asked us what we wanted. I had no idea what they served here for breakfast. I assumed this being a totally different culture; they probably couldn’t supply me with a Grand Slam Breakfast. I just told DJ Elton I’d have what ever he recommends. I also told him that I wanted to try something that the local people would normally eat. DJ Elton started to tell the man in his own tongue what we wanted and then the man replied to him; and then something strange happened; DJ Elton’s eyes widened and he looked scared. He replied back to him and then I asked DJ Elton “What’s up?”. He looked at me and told me “I can’t understand what he’s saying!” I replied, “what do you mean you don’t understand?”. DJ Elton explained that their dialect here is so different from what they speak in Mumbai, he is having a hard time understanding him. DJ Elton said his last few words to the waiter and then the waiter went back to the kitchen. I looked at DJ Elton and asked if it was all good. He said that he “thinks” he put the order in correctly. I guess we just had to cross our fingers and hope for the best.

The first dish to come was on a large tin plate that had 3 white balls on it and 2 dipping sauces. DJ Elton explained that we were suppose to take pieces of the white ball, dip them in the sauce and then eat it. The first sauce was white and DJ Elton said that it was like a coconut curry. The second was as local spicy sauce that was also good. I doused the piece of the white ball in the coconut curry and had a bite. It was actually very tasty. The white ball was sort of like masa from a Mexican tamale. The other sauce was really nice too with a little bit of spice to it. I found myself saying to Frank and DJ Elton that I could see myself eating this everyday.

When we were finished and the plates were taken away, the second course arrived. This had what kind of looked like a huge quesadilla on a plate accompanied by the same two dipping sauces. I watched DJ Elton as he led the way by ripping off small pieces with his hands and dipping them into the sauces and eating them. Following by example, I did the same. The inside was a really nice mashed sweet potato and the out side almost tasted like a blend of tortilla and cheese. It was really amazing and had just a little spice to it, which made your tongue tingle after you were done. Meanwhile everyone in the restaurant was looking at us and sort of laughing to themselves as we try to figure all their local food out. Frank looked at me and asked “So what do you think of India so far?” I looked at him and told him in a quite voice “This is some serious Indiana Jones type shit!” We all laughed.

After we were all finished, the waiter brought over some complimentary local tea. Inside the old tin cup was a light brown substance that was suppose to be the tea. I brought it up to my face nervously and took the slightest sip. It literally tasted like licking the blade off a lawnmower. It was not very good at all. I tried to drink a little more but found myself not being able to. I looked over at Frank and he was looking at me to see my reaction. He asked me if it was any good. I told him we were probably all going to get diarrhea from this. We finally all gave up on the tea and asked for the check. With Coke’s included; it came out to about $3 or $4 each. We paid in Rupees and left, saying “thank you” as we exited.

Getting back in to the tuk-tuk, we were whisked away to another part of town and stopped at a massive Hindi temple. We got out and immediately heard loud drumming coming from inside the temple courtyard. It attracted us toward the gate but then our driver shouted something at us and DJ Elton translated quickly and told us that only Hindu’s were allowed inside the gates. I turned around and said, “What if we just told them we were Hinu?” DJ Elton looked at me as if I had said something sacrilegious. I mean, how could you know what religion someone follows just by looking at them? I figured we probably shouldn’t step on anyone’s toes and just stay outside the gate. We tried to peek inside to see the drummers but it was just out of our line of sight.

Across the street there was another religious building surrounded by a moat. We walked over there and climbed over a broken fence and checked it out. In the moat there were a few Water Lilies with a boat that took you to the small temple in the middle. Frank swore there was a Cobra in the water that was sticking its head out, but I thought that it was very unlikely (check out the background of the photo, just to the right of DJ Elton. A Cobra maybe? Or the Lockness monster?).

Getting back into the tuk-tuk and starting to make our way out of the neighborhood, we took an unexpected stop. The driver told us to go look in a nearby house’s backyard. As we approached it, we realized why he stopped. In this guy’s backyard, he had an adult Asian elephant doing yard work. We poked our heads over the black rot iron gate and gave a look. He was chained at the neck and at the foot and was pulling large amounts of weeds out of the ground and placing them into a pile. The driver told us that it is legal to have elephants as pets here. You just have to pay an annual elephant tax and have a certain square footage of yard to put him in.

After getting back into the tuk tuk, the driver suggested that maybe we would like to see the beach. We agreed and he headed in that direction. Arriving at the beach, we got out and noticed the abundance of trash in the sand. We walked over a small sand dune and made it to the waterfront where several naked Indian children were playing. We all looked at it for a second and then quickly realized that there was nothing really special about this beach so we turned around and went back to the tuk tuk. I quickly dipped my toe in the water just to say that I put my feet in the Indian Ocean. The water was surprisingly warm but also surprisingly dirty. I ran back to catch up with Frank and DJ Elton.

The driver back at the tuk tuk asked if we could stop at an antique store that his friend owns. We looked at each other puzzled and told him that we weren’t really interested in going to the store. He pleaded us and then revealed that for every friend’s store he brings us to, he gets a “point”. If he gets so many points, he then gets the possibility for promotion. We told him that we would go and so we pressed forward.

The store had a lot of nice antiques but we had no intention on buying anything. We left and he took us to his friends spice shop. Frank decided to wait in the tuk tuk while DJ Elton and I went in. The shop was on the 2^nd story of this old, run down building. We walked past a beautiful courtyard and up these old, wooden uneven stairs. Getting to the top, we went in a doorway that led us to the spice shop. The store had several exotic spices in brown burlap sacks that were filled to the top. An old woman came to us and offered us some hot ginger tea. We both took a cup and looked around.

The courtyard going up to the spice shop.

DJ Elton was looking for some particular spices for his wife. I was just walking around with my cup of tea looking at all the different kinds of spices. As DJ Elton was comparing spices, another woman came up and offered me some home made ginger candy. I opened up my hand and she poured some of the candy into my palm from a clear plastic bag. I tried a few and they were very strong; but nice. DJ Elton finally decided to buy 2 small bags of spices and then we left. He told me on the way back to the tuk-tuk that the prices were too expensive and he only bought the 2 bags because the old woman looked very sad and he felt bad.

We got dragged to 2 more shops by the driver and then we thought that maybe this would be a good opportunity for lunch. The driver recommended a place so we went there and sat down. The whole block had lost power and the ceiling fans were not working. It was getting pretty hot in the restaurant but we just waited it out. Once again we told DJ Elton that we didn’t know what to order so we trusted him to order. DJ Elton pulled a waiter aside and ordered a few things. Once again he exclaimed that it is really difficult for him to understand these people here. The dialect was so different that it was almost like hearing a completely different language.

The food came and came in massive portions. We ordered some Chicken Marsala and some chicken rice as well. It was way more than we could possibly eat; but we tried our best. The food was nice but not as spicy as I anticipated. I asked DJ Elton if this food was the “real deal” and he told me that by India standards, this wasn’t very good. Either way it wasn’t bad and we ate what we could and boxed up the rest. For $6 each I would say it was still a pretty good deal.

Getting inside the tuk tuk, we were dragged to a few more pointless stores until we were fed up. We told the driver that we needed to be back to the ship. He pleaded that he took him by 3 more shops but by that time, our patience had run out. We told him we needed to be back at the ship because it was leaving. He finally broke down and agreed to just take us back. Ten minutes later we were back at the cruise terminal. We thanked him and gave him 600 Rupee; a hundred extra than what he told us.

Cochin was not a rich town by any means but it had its own charms that I found very enjoyable. It was exciting to see a vastly different culture in person and to be smack in the middle of it all. Yes, you end up looking like a goon, but you at least get the opportunity to try something new. And isn’t that what traveling abroad is all about!? -DB