Indian Republic Day
On Sunday, we left for Kasarogod, the city in which Narayanan lives (please refer to the map below). On our way from the Kochi area (Odakkali village) to Trichur, we stopped to see the Kaladi which is a tall building filled with colorful murals. It is a building dedicated to a great philosopher whose name I forgot. We then went to the Richmond Falls in Athirappalli, a forest with two beautiful but very different waterfalls. There, we were surrounded by Tamil Nadu (neighboring region) tourists who were excited to see me and my disposible camera. When I offered them to get our picture taken, they all cheered and gleefully posed for the picture. What an amazing celebrity moment! This contagious enthusiasm for foreigners is literally contagious. Upon our return to the expressway, I saw a white man walking toward the falls, I had to tell Sassy (our driver and friend) to halt. I opened the car and approached the man. I asked him where he was from and we conversed for a while. I did the same thing to a French woman at the Kathakali dance performance although she thought I was some Indian peddling for money.
We finally made it to Trichur where we ate and visited a Temple that is famous for its elephant festival. In the evening, we drove and drove and drove laughing, singing and making animal sounds. Sassy is a well known actor in Kerala for his personality and animal immitations. He was a lot of fun. Narayanan was also fun. He claimed that a person who crossed the street without looking was doing it because they wanted to be crashed to collect insurance money. He would always look at the person, look at me and say "insurance." When he saw a chicken do the same thing, he said "insurance" with the same look on his face. He also liked the words "pee pee," "poo poo" and the Merengue song "La Vaca." I taught them many other easy Latin songs and they taught me theirs.
Around nine we drove through a village that was celebrating the Indian Republic Day and what a celebration it was. Our car couldn't move due to the large number of dancers, musicians and spectators. They had these dancers with fire, with pots on their heads, colorful umbrellas, sometimes dressed in drag. I also enjoyed watching the fire works. All of this activity was going on and the people still couldn't stop staring at me. I am not that non Indian looking! We were there until one in the morning. What a night!
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