Munnar versus Bangalore

The local bus ride was so much fun and it didn't even take that long considering India time and the roads up here, 6 hours is very ok on a bus! What I didn't realise was how many rich areas there are in kerala as we were driving away from the city we were passing a nicer villa after the other, massive houses with big drive inns. India is defiantly full of contrasts! As we got higher up in the mountains it was amazing to feel the fresh air and the surroundings: WOW full of high mountains and lots of tea and spice plantations, very very nice (yes I say this a lot know). The main street in Munnar is very small but lots of people, it has no restaurants, but lots of good local food and amazing home made chocolate! We found a cute little pink guest house where we stayed for a few nights before moving up even higher to Koodaikanal. This bus drive started off very nice, but we got stuck for 2 hours on the way as there was a truck that had problems and was blocking the way in the middle of a turn. I also will admit that it can be very scary as the bus driver drives like a crazy banana and when u look down its pretty far down! It also took us a lot longer time then expected and we arrived late in the evening so we ended up in a very shitty room in a basement of a house so we got out of there very quickly the nexy day thinking to stay another night somewhere else but ending up taking the nightbus to Bangalore (we have to go by there to get back to goa). Koodai kanal wasn't as nice as we thought it would be and very cold too, so Arambol wasn't a hard choice to make!

We arrived Bangalore 7 in the morning facing the usual choice of rickshaw drivers that took us to hotel that had the best policy ever consisting of a 24 hour check out meaning we had to check out 7 in the morning next day and wait around until 7 in the evening for our bus to Goa. Hehe what a system, that's India for you! Bangalore was very modern, too modern even, very dirty, extremely polluted was very hard to breath, but we had a very funny westernized day! Started our day with breakfast at Coffee Day, lunch at Pizza Hut, walking around a shopping centre, eating dounuts from the bakery and had dinner at KFC hehe We survived the day and got back to Arambol safely where we were greeted by lots of smiles and hugs, always good to be back home, the best hug was obviously from Stav that came screaming towards me with open arms shouting maja, that's pure love and the best kind :)

Kerala

taking the train is always a new experience, luckily we got the top bunkers which are the best as indians wake up early and starts talking so its best to be higher up. Anyways it wasn't to bad to take the night train I slept ok considering that its a very hard bunk "bed", a lot of noise and loud local people. Woke up pretty early thou to the lovely shouts of chai, coffee, breakfast, water, lassi etc etc every 10 min there is a new guy shouting and selling from early morning to late in the evening and its only "quiet" a few hours. What was suppose to be around 12 hour train journey turned into 17 hours (but hey its India you always have to add on a few hours). We got to Kernakulam in Koochin in Kerala (that for your info means coconut)around 3 PM, straight to a rickshaw to the ferry and over to forth Koochin. On the other side there was a new line of rickshaws with loud drivers shouting come with i show you very cheap hotel, very cheap (obviously said in the lovely indi english accent), so we picked one with the best deal and found a hotel. Very strange to sleep in a bed in a room after being used to sleeping in huts, but at least we hot water for showers too :)

We spent 3 nights in forth coochin spending one day as proper tourists going around town seeing museums, shops, churches etc etc, one day with backwaters going around in a tree boat on the lakes where we got served a delicious home made veg thali on plam tree leaves of course and the next day on local buses up to Munnar. Its funny to see how commission based India is that we really got to experience up close on out rickshaw tour as every time he shows up a shop or museum the driver earns money, everybody has some connection to each other hehe


anyways after being fed up with the heat and mosquitoes we found our way to beautiful Munnar :)

Roadtrip

5 days ago we got on the bikes and left Arambol on a roadtrip to Palolem, 4 bikes 9 people including Stav. After 3-4 hours of driving with stopping, a bit of waiting and some scary moments on way we arrived to Shai's house. Shai is a good friend of some of the woodstock people we came here with, great guy with lots of curly hair, smiles and good heart and letting us use hes house whenever we want to :) We found a beautiful place to stay called Top Hill that consists of a small restaurant and little beach huts on a hill with a sea view. Our hut has a cozy balcony where you can see the sea only a few meters away, very nice (like all the Israeli people say in their funny accent). Anyways to be honest we haven't done that much since we got here, we did go for a dolphin trip one day (we only saw a few and it wasn't really all that exciting but we went for a swim a this tiny little beach with crystal clear water which was nice), the place is very nice and shanti and has a nice atmosphere, the food however hasn't been that great so we've been going into town everyday to eat, we didn't even plan to stay here for this long but the first train available was the night train tonight off to Kerala which is exciting. We're ony 4 people left now as the other 5 have gone on their bikes to Gokarana and back to Arambol, so the train it is, its says it will take about 12hours but knowing India you need to add on a few more hours! It's the first time we're taking a night train so that will be fun to see if I'll be able to sleep amongst all the noise and loud Indians hehe

Anyways I'll probably write more interesting stuff next time from Kerala :)

You dont find happiness you create it :)

No matter how many pills or whatever you take of medicine etc you will get ill at one point and this is what happened to me, I haven't been dying or anything but been sick and have had a bad tummy for days! Very annoying and I lost a lot of energy and none of the pills were working to make me better so I went to this Ayuverdic Center where they gave me full body massage and this horrible medicine that tastes a mixture of cough medicine, jeger meister and some other horrible flavours that I had to take for 3 days. Yesterday I have was nearly ok and finally today I feel good :)

Anyway enough of the boring stuff I've had some fun since the last time I wrote on the blog like yesterday for instance we went on a day trip on the bikes to Paradise Beach. Its about 30min drive, then you take a little ferry (where they amazingly fit on 3 cars, lots of bikes and people and it looks likes its going to fall apart and its the most slow ferry I have ever been on but it works) and then you drive for another 20 min and then you arrive to Paradise Beach. AMAZING! One long beach that never ends with no restaurants or any people, it was us and beach so we decided to go skinny dipping, might as well you know when you have an entire massive beach to yourself hehe We also found lots of gorgeous coloful shells and Stav even found a baby octopus which I have never seen before!

I also had an aha moment yesterday that I found at of all places in a small traveling agency whilst sat there waiting reading a poster that said "You don't find happiness, you create it". I haven't thought about it like that before but its so true so I'm going to stop searching for it and create it on my own, I chose myself to be happy, I chose myself to let go of deep negative thoughts I chose to live by the moment cause I'm India, exciting beautiful India, how can you not create a happiness when you have so many gorgeous and amazing people around you, now the challenge is to take this happiness with me back home again, it's all inside me now its just a matter of fact to hold on to it :)

All together now

Sorry that it has been a few days since there was a new blog post but we decided to come back to Arambol and the internet was down in Goa the day we got here and then we just haven't had the time well we sat down to do it yesterday but it closed earlier, anyway we're back and even got a beach hut at Woodstock :) The train ride back to Goa was very long nearly 10 hours but it was defo one of the best memories so far from this trip! Indian people are so friendly and always want to help you even thou they don't have a lot. We sat next down to an India couple who was probably around 35 maybe and you could tell they were poor but yet they offered us to share their food with us, the woman didn't say much but her eyes and smile was enough. The man who spoke a little bit English was so friendly and was telling us about India and asking us about Norway, very sweet people that will always be on my mind :)

"ALL TOGETHER NOW!" is Staf's (one of the cutest girls on earth who lives at Woodstock) favourite sentence and this is what were met by arriving at Woodstock. Well not exactly the weirdest thing was we just got out of the taxi and started to walk towards Woostock and then Indie comes towards us, it was like he knew we were coming. The sun was going down and it was one of those great moments and it hit me straight away that yes it feels good to be back! Then we went to Woodstock and were met by more smiles and hugs and little Stafi saying all together now hugging us. She is from Israel but she speaks very good English to be so young! She defo brings a lot of smiles and laughter upon everyone! Most of the people that we left were still there and we have some new friends as well which is great! Yesterday we went to a juggling convention where we attended a massage workshop which was a laugh and we learned some new techniques as well, all though both me and Johanna got more massages by the guys and the other way around hehe Have to take advantage when you can :) In the evening there was a Gala show where the professionals where showing of their skills consisting of poi, juggling, tricks, dancing, fire witches and so on! There are so many amazing and talented people out there, it was beautiful to watch!!

Anyways loving life in Arambol and it feels great to be back, but don't worry we are going to move on end of this week I think going to an ashram in Kerala which I am so excited about!

Pics from Hampi

in my indian gear gotta love the alibaba pants

breakfast

Mango Tree

People starting to gather around for morning bath





Johanna and I on the moped

Indian Hampi lady

Cute little Indian girl

Shanti Guest House

Hampi day nb 2

We got up really early this morning to go down to the lake the watch the people take their morning bath and washing their clothes. The sight was very colourful watching the beautiful Indian women wearing their colourful sharis, little children running around naked, children wearing their school uniforms, elderly people and a few tourists here and there, pretty much everyone from the village. After taking a few snaps here and there we walked to Mango Tree again for breakfast were we got served fruit salad with museli and curd on a palm tree leaf (very yummy).

Hampi is divided into 2 parts with a lake in between, one side (the one where we live) is more India whilst on the other side is more western, but also more lakes where you also can go swimming. So after have seeing the India side yesterday we decided to take the boat over on the other side and rent a moped again to find the lakes. Again we had such a laugh on the moped and found a nice spot to take a dip in the fresh and surprisingly very clean lake. Hampi is a very small, but nice place, however both Johanna and I don't find the people here very friendly from what we have experienced other places. People don't smile a lot and seem a bit fed up with tourists, but I still reckon its worth the visit! Tonight we're just gonna chill and try and go to bed earlier as we have to get up very early tomo and hopefully catch a train back to Goa :)