If you're looking for a book to read while lazing on the beach at Kovalam Ancy's is the place for you. With more than 2,000 books in a variety of languages you're sure to find something that tickles your fancy. And Ancy's is now on Facebook. I'm going to work with Joy on building Ancy's profile on Facebook. Hope you'll visit the page which is a work in progress.
Sunday, February 05, 2012
Monday, March 28, 2011
Farewell to Kovalam
This is rather a fraudulent post since I am already back in Canada. But surely blogging has some poetic licence.
There are things about Kovalam I will not miss. It has become too noisy of a place for one so elderly and sedate as me. The beach is not that clean and I count myself very lucky that in a 9-week stay that saw me jogging barefoot every couple of days on the sand I didn't cut myself on any of the glass or other sharps present. The list of other items seen on the sand is pretty gruesome - cat and dog corpses, intestines of some creature one day and on more than one occasion dirty diapers.
Live dogs are also a problem at Kovalam Beach. Certain dogs are known to be aggressive - biting without provocation - but no one does anything about it. As a British tourist that was bitten in the upper thigh said to me it's only a matter of time before a dog bites a child in the face and does some really serious damage. That will be very unfortunate and is bound to happen. Apparently the nearby capital city of Trivandrum has an even more serious problem - one newspaper article said there were 25,000 stray dogs in the city - and this Indian Express article suggests that relief is unlikely to come anytime soon.
All these negatives aside I would still encourage anyone looking for a bit of rest and relaxation to give Kovalam a try. You can get some very enjoyable 'body services' (reflexology, ayurvedic massage, esthetic services) at prices that are a fraction of the cost at home. You can swim, eat some tasty seafood and enjoy cold beer while gazing out at the azure ocean. Just choose your hotel room carefully if noise is a concern for you and be willing to settle for further back from the beach if you really crave quiet.
It is hard to know what Kovalam's future is. Some articles point to Kovalam's dismal performance late last year and early in 2011 in terms of foreign tourist numbers. This Reuters article suggests that the problem is nationwide and another article (which I can't find online anymore) suggested that some of the blame could be laid at the feet of the international travel press which no longer included Kovalam and Kerala on their lists of 'must visits'.
The artificial reef project remains controversial. The picture below shows a boat that was offshore for several days in early March 2011. It is my presumption only but it certainly makes one wonder if there is something wrong with the large fiber bags, filled with sand, that make up the reef. A Finnish friend who is knowledgeable about the ocean, waves and surfing conditions told me that in his opinion the reef has not improved surfing waves and has in fact made the currents more dangerous for swimmers (especially poor/non-swimmers which Kovalam has plenty of). It will be interesting to see if the artificial reef helps to prevent beach erosion during the monsoon and if it is still intact after the rough waters of the rainy season.
So, farewell for now Kovalam. I don't know if/when I will be back but for the future well-being of all that work there and whose livelihoods depend on reasonable tourist numbers I hope that this place has a renaissance and regains its previous allure.
There are things about Kovalam I will not miss. It has become too noisy of a place for one so elderly and sedate as me. The beach is not that clean and I count myself very lucky that in a 9-week stay that saw me jogging barefoot every couple of days on the sand I didn't cut myself on any of the glass or other sharps present. The list of other items seen on the sand is pretty gruesome - cat and dog corpses, intestines of some creature one day and on more than one occasion dirty diapers.
Live dogs are also a problem at Kovalam Beach. Certain dogs are known to be aggressive - biting without provocation - but no one does anything about it. As a British tourist that was bitten in the upper thigh said to me it's only a matter of time before a dog bites a child in the face and does some really serious damage. That will be very unfortunate and is bound to happen. Apparently the nearby capital city of Trivandrum has an even more serious problem - one newspaper article said there were 25,000 stray dogs in the city - and this Indian Express article suggests that relief is unlikely to come anytime soon.
All these negatives aside I would still encourage anyone looking for a bit of rest and relaxation to give Kovalam a try. You can get some very enjoyable 'body services' (reflexology, ayurvedic massage, esthetic services) at prices that are a fraction of the cost at home. You can swim, eat some tasty seafood and enjoy cold beer while gazing out at the azure ocean. Just choose your hotel room carefully if noise is a concern for you and be willing to settle for further back from the beach if you really crave quiet.
It is hard to know what Kovalam's future is. Some articles point to Kovalam's dismal performance late last year and early in 2011 in terms of foreign tourist numbers. This Reuters article suggests that the problem is nationwide and another article (which I can't find online anymore) suggested that some of the blame could be laid at the feet of the international travel press which no longer included Kovalam and Kerala on their lists of 'must visits'.
The artificial reef project remains controversial. The picture below shows a boat that was offshore for several days in early March 2011. It is my presumption only but it certainly makes one wonder if there is something wrong with the large fiber bags, filled with sand, that make up the reef. A Finnish friend who is knowledgeable about the ocean, waves and surfing conditions told me that in his opinion the reef has not improved surfing waves and has in fact made the currents more dangerous for swimmers (especially poor/non-swimmers which Kovalam has plenty of). It will be interesting to see if the artificial reef helps to prevent beach erosion during the monsoon and if it is still intact after the rough waters of the rainy season.
So, farewell for now Kovalam. I don't know if/when I will be back but for the future well-being of all that work there and whose livelihoods depend on reasonable tourist numbers I hope that this place has a renaissance and regains its previous allure.
Saturday, March 05, 2011
Bargain buffet for ladies
I know, I know, here I am posting about food again. But I think this will probably be the last time (for this trip at least). When I was here in 2009 the Taj Residency in Trivandrum (now renamed to the Vivanta by Taj) was offering a fabulous buffet at half price for ladies. And lo and behold it was still on now almost two years later. I went a couple of weeks ago and not only was the food fantastic but the people watching was fascinating.
The buffet is served in the Fifth Element restaurant which is a 90-seater and is open 24 hours a day. It does buffets for breakfast, lunch and dinner as well as a la carte. I am not sure if the other mealtimes are at half price for ladies but lunch definitely is - the bill was 368 Rs (or about $9 Canadian) and well worth every cent. My fellow diners on the day I visited (half price offer is only Mon-Fri) included an older couple from Bangalore who were being fawned over by the restaurant staff (I have no idea who they were - perhaps someone very important in business or politics although I doubt the latter), a few tables of extended families ranging from tiny tots to sneaker and track-suit wearing grandfathers, a table of about 20 professional types (IT conference-goers perhaps) and several strapping young men in coveralls who were from the Indian Air Force.
The meal began with a delicious chicken, coriander and lemon soup served with a basket of assorted breads - a couple of golf-ball sized rolls, a long narrow slice of yummy white bread and a tasty bite-sized, deep-fried UBO (unidentified bread object). Note the bottle of wine with the outrageous price tag on its neck - 3500 Rs is almost $80 Canadian. Certainly not a price most of us would think of spending on a bottle of wine I think.
At this meal I ate hardly any of the mains but instead concentrated on the salads and the desserts. The Spanish potato salad, made with new potatoes (or maybe just small, regular potatoes) and lots of grilled onions was fab as was the carrots cantonese (or something like that) which was carrots cut in to matchsticks and dressed with an Asian-tasting mixture of sesame oil, soy, vinegar and chilis. I also enjoyed the green mango salad with noodles (very tangy and 'puckerish') and the broccoli, tomato and cheese salad (though I admit that I had a couple of helpings of the latter so that I could pick out pieces of cheese and eat it with the bread).
The mains I did have were adequate but, in my opinion not fantastic. The real gem of the meal was the desserts. The galub jamuns were some of the best I've ever had - tender, sweet without being cloying, ambrosial - mmmm. The brownies were good but the chocolate gateau - which unfortunately disappeared at lightning speed once somebody plucked up the courage to make that initial cut into it - was superb. The peach mousse was also very good, the baked yogurt was creamy and sinful and the strawberry panacotta was rich and satisfying.
The only disappointment in the whole meal for me was the coffee that I was served at its conclusion. But, if you are familiar with the West Coast of Canada you know that we take our coffee very seriously indeed and - again just my opinion - we tend to like it much stronger than most people can tolerate and are very discerning (also known as snobby :-) ) regarding its quality. A British friend told me she had a very good cup of coffee at Caramel (the in-lobby cafe that has awesome looking pastries and gelato - the cafe manager told me the Taj imported a machine from Italy to manufacture gelato - $4 Canadian for two scoops) but as the price for coffee was almost half as much as lunch I didn't see the sense.
I may treat myself again for international women's day but perhaps the special 50% deal will no longer be in effect.
The buffet is served in the Fifth Element restaurant which is a 90-seater and is open 24 hours a day. It does buffets for breakfast, lunch and dinner as well as a la carte. I am not sure if the other mealtimes are at half price for ladies but lunch definitely is - the bill was 368 Rs (or about $9 Canadian) and well worth every cent. My fellow diners on the day I visited (half price offer is only Mon-Fri) included an older couple from Bangalore who were being fawned over by the restaurant staff (I have no idea who they were - perhaps someone very important in business or politics although I doubt the latter), a few tables of extended families ranging from tiny tots to sneaker and track-suit wearing grandfathers, a table of about 20 professional types (IT conference-goers perhaps) and several strapping young men in coveralls who were from the Indian Air Force.
The meal began with a delicious chicken, coriander and lemon soup served with a basket of assorted breads - a couple of golf-ball sized rolls, a long narrow slice of yummy white bread and a tasty bite-sized, deep-fried UBO (unidentified bread object). Note the bottle of wine with the outrageous price tag on its neck - 3500 Rs is almost $80 Canadian. Certainly not a price most of us would think of spending on a bottle of wine I think.
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| Soup, bread basket and very expensive bottle of wine |
At this meal I ate hardly any of the mains but instead concentrated on the salads and the desserts. The Spanish potato salad, made with new potatoes (or maybe just small, regular potatoes) and lots of grilled onions was fab as was the carrots cantonese (or something like that) which was carrots cut in to matchsticks and dressed with an Asian-tasting mixture of sesame oil, soy, vinegar and chilis. I also enjoyed the green mango salad with noodles (very tangy and 'puckerish') and the broccoli, tomato and cheese salad (though I admit that I had a couple of helpings of the latter so that I could pick out pieces of cheese and eat it with the bread).
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| Didn't try any of these salads which either contained meat or fish as I recall |
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| From left to right - Spanish potato salad, carrots cantonese, green mango salad, raw veggies (including red and yellow bell peppers) and broccoli, cheese and tomato salad |
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| channa dal masala (spicy chickpeas) and palak paneer |
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| chicken with onion and vegetable stew |
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| fish curry and lamb curry |
The mains I did have were adequate but, in my opinion not fantastic. The real gem of the meal was the desserts. The galub jamuns were some of the best I've ever had - tender, sweet without being cloying, ambrosial - mmmm. The brownies were good but the chocolate gateau - which unfortunately disappeared at lightning speed once somebody plucked up the courage to make that initial cut into it - was superb. The peach mousse was also very good, the baked yogurt was creamy and sinful and the strawberry panacotta was rich and satisfying.
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| from left - in silver tureen are gulab jamun, then creme caramel, Indian sweets, brownies, peach apricot mousse |
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| from left - the still uncut chocolate gateau, strawberry jelly, baked yogurt, panacotta, some cake (which I didn't try - chocolate quotient not present), and on the far right is a chocolate fountain |
The only disappointment in the whole meal for me was the coffee that I was served at its conclusion. But, if you are familiar with the West Coast of Canada you know that we take our coffee very seriously indeed and - again just my opinion - we tend to like it much stronger than most people can tolerate and are very discerning (also known as snobby :-) ) regarding its quality. A British friend told me she had a very good cup of coffee at Caramel (the in-lobby cafe that has awesome looking pastries and gelato - the cafe manager told me the Taj imported a machine from Italy to manufacture gelato - $4 Canadian for two scoops) but as the price for coffee was almost half as much as lunch I didn't see the sense.
I may treat myself again for international women's day but perhaps the special 50% deal will no longer be in effect.
The wondrously weird jackfruit
The odd-looking jackfruit is not one of my favourites its flesh being - in my opinion - rubbery and with a subtle but not particularly pleasant flavour. It is eaten raw, its pieces are sliced up and deep fried to make chips, it is used as a vegetable in various savoury recipes (thoran, curry) and even the seeds are boiled and eaten.
When I say it is odd-looking I am not so much referring to it as it looks when you cut into it and take out its segments but rather how it looks on the tree. It is, when fully grown and ready for harvesting, about the size of a watermelon. But it is suspended by what looks, to my mind, as a completely inadequate stem.
Below are some shots of jackfruit in situ - am I the only one who thinks they look a bit odd? As if they have been placed there by someone who has no concept of physics and are being held up by some kind of alternative gravity field.
When I say it is odd-looking I am not so much referring to it as it looks when you cut into it and take out its segments but rather how it looks on the tree. It is, when fully grown and ready for harvesting, about the size of a watermelon. But it is suspended by what looks, to my mind, as a completely inadequate stem.
Below are some shots of jackfruit in situ - am I the only one who thinks they look a bit odd? As if they have been placed there by someone who has no concept of physics and are being held up by some kind of alternative gravity field.
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| single jackfruit hanging from its slender stem |
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| multiple jackfruit nestled against the trunk of the tree |
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Pongala
Last Saturday (February 19, 2011) myself and three other foreign tourists (all from Britain) attended what is called the world's biggest female gathering - Pongala. This once a year event really should be experienced. This was the second time I've gone and it is truly worth all the heat and smoke. Everyone is in a good mood and although there are thousands of women in the city without the noise, fumes and press of vehicular traffic Trivandrum seems like a totally different place.
Pongala, like so much of Indian life, is bursting with colour and energy. We started off at about 8:45 am by bus which got us within about 1 km of Trivandrum proper. We walked the rest of the way into the city and up MG Road to the Ayurvedic College (about 2.5 km from where the bus dropped us) and then turned around and walked back. The signal to light the fires underneath the pongala pots was given at about 10:45 am (relayed from the Attukal temple by walkie-talkie and loudspeaker) and within minutes great clouds of smoke began rising from the roadsides.
We were lucky to encounter a rickshaw driver with a big rickshaw (as he kept telling us) that was able to carry all four of us back to Kovalam Beach for a very reasonable 200 Rs (about $5 Canadian). We were back in the comfort of our cool, smoke-free hotel rooms by 1:30 pm. It was a great morning with lots of smiles and unforgettable images. Here are a few that I took.
Pongala, like so much of Indian life, is bursting with colour and energy. We started off at about 8:45 am by bus which got us within about 1 km of Trivandrum proper. We walked the rest of the way into the city and up MG Road to the Ayurvedic College (about 2.5 km from where the bus dropped us) and then turned around and walked back. The signal to light the fires underneath the pongala pots was given at about 10:45 am (relayed from the Attukal temple by walkie-talkie and loudspeaker) and within minutes great clouds of smoke began rising from the roadsides.
We were lucky to encounter a rickshaw driver with a big rickshaw (as he kept telling us) that was able to carry all four of us back to Kovalam Beach for a very reasonable 200 Rs (about $5 Canadian). We were back in the comfort of our cool, smoke-free hotel rooms by 1:30 pm. It was a great morning with lots of smiles and unforgettable images. Here are a few that I took.
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| Pongala Festival also overflows with vendors of all kinds of colourful items |
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| Every colour of the rainbow can be found at Pongala |
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| Hanuman (one of the Indian gods) |
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| A particularly pretty offering in front of one woman's pongala hearth |
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| The petrol station near the Kovalam bus platform |
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| This scene is repeated all over the city - attendance is somewhere between 1-2 million (yes million!) women |
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| So many smiles at Pongala |
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| Lighting the hearth on the signal from the temple |
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| Smoke begins to rise as the fires are lit |
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| Before the fires were lit |
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| The same narrow alley after the fires are lit - the heat was intense - I can't imagine cooking over these pots for a few minutes let alone for the 30-60 that it would take to finish preparing the pongala |
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| I don't know what this man was doing cooking pongala but it was a photo op I couldn't pass up |
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| Smoke rising over the city |
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| Various organizations offer free food for all those attending pongala |
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
The weekly splurge!
Since I save so much money on food by eating local and not drinking alcohol I like to splurge at least once a week. This takes the form of either a special dining experience or some kind of pummeling (or often both!). This blog post is about dining while I'll cover pummeling (by which I mean massage/reflexology - not kallaripayatu, Kerala martial arts) in a later post.
One of my favourite dining spots in Trivandrum is the Palm Top Restaurant at the Maurya Rajadhani Hotel. The restaurant has a mostly local food buffet (they do try and approximate some continental and Chinese dishes with varying degrees of success). I think it is good value at 260 Rs (just under $6 Canadian) for lunch. The setting is especially nice on the 5th floor of the hotel and open to the breezes and with spectacular vistas out over Kerala's capital city.
As well as the buffet there is a 'live station' that will cook up Indian breads for you to accompany your meal. At lunch there are just four varieties of bread available (roti, naan, uppam and bull's eye uppam - no idea what the latter is) while at dinner there is a long list including puttu (see earlier posting), masala dosas and omelettes. Not sure how much dinner and breakfast buffets cost.
Here are some photos that give you a taste of buffet lunch at the Palm Top.
One of my favourite dining spots in Trivandrum is the Palm Top Restaurant at the Maurya Rajadhani Hotel. The restaurant has a mostly local food buffet (they do try and approximate some continental and Chinese dishes with varying degrees of success). I think it is good value at 260 Rs (just under $6 Canadian) for lunch. The setting is especially nice on the 5th floor of the hotel and open to the breezes and with spectacular vistas out over Kerala's capital city.
As well as the buffet there is a 'live station' that will cook up Indian breads for you to accompany your meal. At lunch there are just four varieties of bread available (roti, naan, uppam and bull's eye uppam - no idea what the latter is) while at dinner there is a long list including puttu (see earlier posting), masala dosas and omelettes. Not sure how much dinner and breakfast buffets cost.
Here are some photos that give you a taste of buffet lunch at the Palm Top.
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| Some not very exciting salads - definitely the weak point of this buffet |
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| Two soups - cream of mushroom and hot and sour chicken |
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| A variety of curries (both veg and non-veg) |
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| looking from the other end of the buffet row |
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| On the left dal (curried lentils) on the right 'sesame vegetables' (which I presume is an attempt at Chinese - quite tasty if not particularly authentic) |
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| Left vegetable biriyani, right plain rice |
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| Dessert - payasam (Kerala rice pudding), caramel custard, orange souffle and ice cream (vanilla) |
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| View looking west toward the ocean |
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| View east toward the Secretariat |
Daily menu
I usually lose weight when I am in India - not because of gastrointestinal upset (knock on wood I have never been afflicted with Delhi Belly or in fact anything worse than a cold in all my travels to India) - but because a) the heat lessens my appetite, b) my 'fattening faves' (chocolate, cheese, desserts to name a few) are either completely unavailable here and/or rendered unpalatable by aforementioned heat and c) I am so cheap I squeak (though I prefer the term 'frugal' - much less derogatory) and thus tend to eat much the same as the local people which frankly has very little variety and thus I eat less and less at meals as time goes by.
My breakfast is the delectable puttu which has featured before in this blog.
It is made from ground rice mixed with water, salt and grated coconut then put into a tube and steamed. Surely the puttu cooker is to our mind an odd looking contraption! I usually eat this with banana (smush the peeled banana between your fingers, break off a lump of puttu and take all to your mouth with your fingers) but you can also eat it with kadala which is a curry made of garbanzo beans (I think - this recipe from the tourism department refers to 'black bengal gram' but I think they are simply darkened, perhaps by roasting, chickpeas). In fact this combination (puttu kadala) is part of the dialogue of this cute ZooZoo ad from 2009 (at about 17 seconds).
Lunch is usually 'meals' or what would everywhere else in India be called thali. I eat thali at the Kerala Cafe which is a little outdoor kitchen stall with two 'dining' rooms - each about 10 feet square - that caters to mostly local men and women that work at Kovalam (in the hotels/guesthouses, selling fruit, waiters, masseurs, lifeguards). Very few people (in fact I can think of only one that I've seen - a shop owner whose wife probably packs his midday meal for him) bring a lunch and since most live too far away to go home for a meal they patronize places like Kerala Cafe where they can eat simple food inexpensively. Most of them run a tab and what they consume is written down in a book and totalled periodically.
The meal is served on a flat rectangular stainless steel plate with depressions - a cheaper version of the classic 'thali' (which just means plate) which is usually a circular rimmed plate in which individual dishes (katoris) are used (as in the picture below which shows the thali served at the Ariya Nivaas in Trivandrum). In the Kerala Cafe meal the largest rectangular depression is filled with rice (the fat, short-grained Kerala rice which I am not particularly fond of as I find it bland and usually mushy/soggy) and the 4 small round depressions across the top (each about the diameter of a tennis ball) are filled with 3 different kind of vegetable curries and a pickle. You also usually get a papad (very distinctively Keralan as cooked in coconut oil). If you want for an extra 10 Rs per item you can get fish fry or fish curry. The former is placed in a deck-of-cards-sized depression to the side of the 'rice depression' while the latter is served in a separate dish. Finally, you will be offered dal (lentils cooked with spices & onions to a soupy consistency), sambar or more (pronounced, as near as I can tell, more-ay, this is a yogurt-based liquidy stuff) to go on top of your rice. All of the depressions will be replenished as you empty them.
So that's lunch dealt with. Dinner is usually one of two things - either chicken fry (which is delicious but audaciously greasy and unhealthy seeming - see picture below from 2008) or an omelette - with parottas (a particular kind of flaky, Indian flatbread). I accompany either of these with a big plate of 'salad' (see earlier shopping post).
My breakfast is the delectable puttu which has featured before in this blog.
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| Pen just included for scale - you don't eat it! |
Lunch is usually 'meals' or what would everywhere else in India be called thali. I eat thali at the Kerala Cafe which is a little outdoor kitchen stall with two 'dining' rooms - each about 10 feet square - that caters to mostly local men and women that work at Kovalam (in the hotels/guesthouses, selling fruit, waiters, masseurs, lifeguards). Very few people (in fact I can think of only one that I've seen - a shop owner whose wife probably packs his midday meal for him) bring a lunch and since most live too far away to go home for a meal they patronize places like Kerala Cafe where they can eat simple food inexpensively. Most of them run a tab and what they consume is written down in a book and totalled periodically.
The meal is served on a flat rectangular stainless steel plate with depressions - a cheaper version of the classic 'thali' (which just means plate) which is usually a circular rimmed plate in which individual dishes (katoris) are used (as in the picture below which shows the thali served at the Ariya Nivaas in Trivandrum). In the Kerala Cafe meal the largest rectangular depression is filled with rice (the fat, short-grained Kerala rice which I am not particularly fond of as I find it bland and usually mushy/soggy) and the 4 small round depressions across the top (each about the diameter of a tennis ball) are filled with 3 different kind of vegetable curries and a pickle. You also usually get a papad (very distinctively Keralan as cooked in coconut oil). If you want for an extra 10 Rs per item you can get fish fry or fish curry. The former is placed in a deck-of-cards-sized depression to the side of the 'rice depression' while the latter is served in a separate dish. Finally, you will be offered dal (lentils cooked with spices & onions to a soupy consistency), sambar or more (pronounced, as near as I can tell, more-ay, this is a yogurt-based liquidy stuff) to go on top of your rice. All of the depressions will be replenished as you empty them.
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| Thali refers to the larger rimmed tray/plate as well as the meal itself |
So that's lunch dealt with. Dinner is usually one of two things - either chicken fry (which is delicious but audaciously greasy and unhealthy seeming - see picture below from 2008) or an omelette - with parottas (a particular kind of flaky, Indian flatbread). I accompany either of these with a big plate of 'salad' (see earlier shopping post).
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| Parottas on the left, next a bag of curry to go with the egg and on the right the chicken fry |
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Signs of the times
There is no denying that change needs to come in the way Indians behave on the roads - it seems as if everyone drives recklessly, speeding is rampant, safety measures are largely ignored even when legislated (see earlier post on traffic - in addition I constantly glance in vehicles and see few people wearing seatbelts) and roads are often in poor repair with hazards unmarked.
The urgency with which this issue needs to be addressed was brought to the whole city's attention on Thursday in a horrible way when a school bus being driven rashly by a young (19), inexperienced driver went off the road into a polluted waterway. Four children on board and their female carer drowned on the spot, one child died later and two more tots remain in hospital on ventilators and in critical condition. Even more tragically it is a story that has been heard many times in the state and the country - children of all ages travel to school in busses/rickshaws which are more often than not dangerously overloaded and driven by people with little experience or sense of responsibility.
I question whether signs like those shown below actually have any effect (especially with text in English!) and whether anything can be done to lower the carnage on India's roads that will likely only increase as the number of vehicles rises without a commensurate upward pressure on the citizenry to obey the rules of the road and be properly trained to operate motor vehicles (this includes both those who drive for a living and those owning private vehicles). Drunk driving is also a huge problem.
The urgency with which this issue needs to be addressed was brought to the whole city's attention on Thursday in a horrible way when a school bus being driven rashly by a young (19), inexperienced driver went off the road into a polluted waterway. Four children on board and their female carer drowned on the spot, one child died later and two more tots remain in hospital on ventilators and in critical condition. Even more tragically it is a story that has been heard many times in the state and the country - children of all ages travel to school in busses/rickshaws which are more often than not dangerously overloaded and driven by people with little experience or sense of responsibility.
I question whether signs like those shown below actually have any effect (especially with text in English!) and whether anything can be done to lower the carnage on India's roads that will likely only increase as the number of vehicles rises without a commensurate upward pressure on the citizenry to obey the rules of the road and be properly trained to operate motor vehicles (this includes both those who drive for a living and those owning private vehicles). Drunk driving is also a huge problem.
Shopping
For many people travel and shopping are inextricably linked but I must admit I don't care much for buying things. I rarely take gifts home for people (sorry folks - your bad luck to have such a mean and miserly friend!) and if I do they are usually of the practical or interesting type rather than souvenirs or the like. So my shopping while here is mostly limited to food (fruit and vegetables), utilitarian items (nailbrush, stainless steel plates) and - my one splurge so far - a presentable outfit in case I get invited to a wedding or fancy event.
Although you can certainly buy vegetables at Kovalam Beach in a number of small shops I prefer to shop in Chalai Bazaar - Trivandrum's main shopping area. I bought strawberries the other day - I had never seen them before in an Indian market. They were very expensive at 80 Rs (or just under $2 Can) for a 250 gm container. I thought they were from Kashmir but in fact they were from Mahabaleshwar in Maharashtra. They were not very good but I had to try them to find out. In terms of fruit I most often buy grapes, bananas and guavas. I am especially fond of red bananas which are quite costly at about $1 Canadian per kilo (or about 20 cents per banana).
In terms of vegetables I buy things that I like to eat raw since I have no access to cooking facilities here. So carrots, radish (both red and white which are both long and carrot-like rather than globular - I've only seen the white - called mooli in Hindi and frequently served in restaurants in the North as part of a salad plate - in the market once), tomatoes, green peppers (not seen red, yellow or orange), peas (sold in 150 gm bags shelled and ready to eat - not as tender or sweet as those of my childhood memories but still yummy) and cucumber. I haven't bought cauliflower though I enjoy it raw since the stuff I see in the market always looks rather limp and unappetizing. Broccoli, celery, cherry tomatoes and snow/snap peas are not available in the market though I suspect that if you're running a restaurant in a 5-star hotel you'll know where to get them.
Here are some veggie photos from Chalai market.
Of course there is much more than just vegetables and fruit available for sale in the market. I don't usually venture into the meat and fish section and in fact most of the time when I've shown up the fish is all gone and I've not really figured out where the meat section is (and not really that interested in finding out either). The chicken section is full of live birds in cages who seem not to be disturbed by the execution and cutting up of a fellow clucker taking place very close by both temporally and spatially.
There are lots of other intriguing looking things for sale including various pasta products, spices, brass and steel implements and pretty much anything else your heart might desire. Clothes are also available in the market but I started my search for an outfit at Fab India - which is located in one of Trivandrum's tonier neighbourhoods - but didn't find anything that I fancied. A second stop at Parthas which is a huge, air-conditioned, snobby (in my opinion) outlet with overpriced but very nice items also proved fruitless. Finally, I found an outfit I liked for 1070 Rs ($24) at another shop down the street. This outfit is a salwar kameez and I'll include a photo of it at some later point.
In closing here are some additional shopping photos.
Although you can certainly buy vegetables at Kovalam Beach in a number of small shops I prefer to shop in Chalai Bazaar - Trivandrum's main shopping area. I bought strawberries the other day - I had never seen them before in an Indian market. They were very expensive at 80 Rs (or just under $2 Can) for a 250 gm container. I thought they were from Kashmir but in fact they were from Mahabaleshwar in Maharashtra. They were not very good but I had to try them to find out. In terms of fruit I most often buy grapes, bananas and guavas. I am especially fond of red bananas which are quite costly at about $1 Canadian per kilo (or about 20 cents per banana).
In terms of vegetables I buy things that I like to eat raw since I have no access to cooking facilities here. So carrots, radish (both red and white which are both long and carrot-like rather than globular - I've only seen the white - called mooli in Hindi and frequently served in restaurants in the North as part of a salad plate - in the market once), tomatoes, green peppers (not seen red, yellow or orange), peas (sold in 150 gm bags shelled and ready to eat - not as tender or sweet as those of my childhood memories but still yummy) and cucumber. I haven't bought cauliflower though I enjoy it raw since the stuff I see in the market always looks rather limp and unappetizing. Broccoli, celery, cherry tomatoes and snow/snap peas are not available in the market though I suspect that if you're running a restaurant in a 5-star hotel you'll know where to get them.
Here are some veggie photos from Chalai market.
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| The green veg is chayote squash (which I've seen but never bought in Canada), then radishes & finally potatoes |
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| Rather than selling by weight these fixed price portions seem to be gaining in popularity |
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| shallots |
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| Tomatoes, bitter gourd/karela and onions |
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| I never see yellow onions in the market - only these red/purple ones |
There are lots of other intriguing looking things for sale including various pasta products, spices, brass and steel implements and pretty much anything else your heart might desire. Clothes are also available in the market but I started my search for an outfit at Fab India - which is located in one of Trivandrum's tonier neighbourhoods - but didn't find anything that I fancied. A second stop at Parthas which is a huge, air-conditioned, snobby (in my opinion) outlet with overpriced but very nice items also proved fruitless. Finally, I found an outfit I liked for 1070 Rs ($24) at another shop down the street. This outfit is a salwar kameez and I'll include a photo of it at some later point.
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| The charming lions in the FabIndia compound |
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| The staff at FabIndia told me on an earlier visit that the building was the childhood home of a Malayali film star but I can't remember which one (Mamooty or Mohanlal) - maybe this is an urban legend anyway :-) |
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| Clockwise from back left - dried peppers?, no idea, dried chilis, dried chickpeas, pasta |
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| This lot was locked up and empty - no idea why - sure would be nice if people would park here instead of on main thoroughfare through the market (especially when they abandon their cars almost in the middle of the road!) |
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| Colourful pasta |
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| Getting the last of the fish! |
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