Hello again everyone,
First, apologies for the lack of post-Tokyo pictures. Time and technology have so far defeated us, but Koji hopes to make another serious attempt today while I nap during this 'rest day' in a surrealistic mock-Italianate villa in the middle of nowhere in Western Tamil Nadu. Such is the kaleidoscopic and unpredictable nature of travel in India.
Since we last comunicated we spent an afternoon and evening in Pondicherry - where the French co-governed to my great surprise with the British until 1954, when the French conceded their defeat East of Suez by withdrawing in humiliation from l'Indochine. Amid the usual chaos of India there is a a relatively quiet quartier francais, gradually being restored - complete with all the manifestations of a French provincial town. Mairie, residence du gouverneur, maisons elegantes, eglises, une cathedrale etc. A hit with the hordes of French tourists whom one encounters in Tamil Nadu. We stayed in a very French hotel named "Le Dupleix" afer the first French governor.
We then set out on a very long journey to a real "Hill Station" in a town called Yercaud. The hotel is old, and one can almost visualize the memsahibs gathering for tiffin. It turned out to be very cold at night, and they laughed when we asked, upon check-in, about air-conditioning. In fact, the hotel was the house of the owner of a very large coffee plantation - still operating.
By the way, before I get further caught up in the magic of Southern India, ''Egypt is off, dear", somewhat to our relief in the circumstances. So now we have nine days unaccounted for. People we met on our first day in India have recommended Muscat as the new decadent resort, and we are in the middle of trying to contrive four full days there, before trying for Berlin for three full days to see the progress on the new museums. We would then return to Lisbon as planned and on to England. We'll keep you posted. All of Europe beckons, of course, but we are disinclined to face chilly temperatures unnecessarily. When we ''looked up '' even Cyprus the web recommended ''winter woollies'', and we've "gone off" North Africa a bit - at least for the present.
But back to Tamil Nadu. After Yercaud and the incompetence of a new driver, we wasted a day (if any day in India is ever wasted) but yesterday spent a very rewarding moning in Tanjore, seeing a magnificent Hindu temple, a Royal Palace containing a very old library of writing in Sanskrit on palm leaf paper, together with a collection of Hindu bronzes discovered buried around Tanjore over the last two hundred years.
Today we are having a ''rest day'' as I mentioned, but tomorow we press on to the State of Kerala, said to be the quietest and most beautiful State in India. And I'm bound to say that by now I could do with a bit of quiet!
More in due course.
K & K
First, apologies for the lack of post-Tokyo pictures. Time and technology have so far defeated us, but Koji hopes to make another serious attempt today while I nap during this 'rest day' in a surrealistic mock-Italianate villa in the middle of nowhere in Western Tamil Nadu. Such is the kaleidoscopic and unpredictable nature of travel in India.
Since we last comunicated we spent an afternoon and evening in Pondicherry - where the French co-governed to my great surprise with the British until 1954, when the French conceded their defeat East of Suez by withdrawing in humiliation from l'Indochine. Amid the usual chaos of India there is a a relatively quiet quartier francais, gradually being restored - complete with all the manifestations of a French provincial town. Mairie, residence du gouverneur, maisons elegantes, eglises, une cathedrale etc. A hit with the hordes of French tourists whom one encounters in Tamil Nadu. We stayed in a very French hotel named "Le Dupleix" afer the first French governor.
We then set out on a very long journey to a real "Hill Station" in a town called Yercaud. The hotel is old, and one can almost visualize the memsahibs gathering for tiffin. It turned out to be very cold at night, and they laughed when we asked, upon check-in, about air-conditioning. In fact, the hotel was the house of the owner of a very large coffee plantation - still operating.
By the way, before I get further caught up in the magic of Southern India, ''Egypt is off, dear", somewhat to our relief in the circumstances. So now we have nine days unaccounted for. People we met on our first day in India have recommended Muscat as the new decadent resort, and we are in the middle of trying to contrive four full days there, before trying for Berlin for three full days to see the progress on the new museums. We would then return to Lisbon as planned and on to England. We'll keep you posted. All of Europe beckons, of course, but we are disinclined to face chilly temperatures unnecessarily. When we ''looked up '' even Cyprus the web recommended ''winter woollies'', and we've "gone off" North Africa a bit - at least for the present.
But back to Tamil Nadu. After Yercaud and the incompetence of a new driver, we wasted a day (if any day in India is ever wasted) but yesterday spent a very rewarding moning in Tanjore, seeing a magnificent Hindu temple, a Royal Palace containing a very old library of writing in Sanskrit on palm leaf paper, together with a collection of Hindu bronzes discovered buried around Tanjore over the last two hundred years.
Today we are having a ''rest day'' as I mentioned, but tomorow we press on to the State of Kerala, said to be the quietest and most beautiful State in India. And I'm bound to say that by now I could do with a bit of quiet!
More in due course.
K & K
No comments:
Post a Comment