Back to Kochi …

After breakfast we left the backwaters again; first by boat to Alleppey. From here we should have taken a public bus to make it back to Kochi – however with buses going unusually infrequent and always full (presumably due to some trains, that had gotten canceled earlier on), we ended up on private transport back to Kochi … where it all had started two weeks earlier.

Six of us (including myself) made it to the airport early the next morning to catch a flight up to Delhi – for the second part of trip up North …

Kathakali

This evening saw us attending a Kathakali performance.

Kathakali is a traditional form of art in Kerala; Kathakali aims to tell a story through dancing and music. Costumes and make-up are grand and colorful; preparing the make-up already takes up hours. For more details on the origins, refer to this (very good) article in wikipedia.

The story, we saw, was a shortened version of Baka Vadha or Death of Baka, telling (or dancing) the story of Bhima deciding to fight the man-eating beast Baka, his encounter and struggle with Baka and finally his victory over the beast.

Exploring Kochi

As odd as it may sound … so far, I have kind of avoided traveling to India – mainly due to the ambiguous feedback, I did hear from others (in about 60% “Oh my god … so intense, never again”, the other 40% “I loved it, BUT …”). However, I had to make it eventually – so here I was … booked on a one month trip, covering two weeks in Southern India and two in the North.

My trip started with a flight to Delhi, a loooooooooong (9 hours) lay-over at Delhi airport (thanks to Air India for canceling my original flight) and a short hop down South to the coastal town of Kochi.

With the tour only starting in the evening, I had a good part of a day to start to explore the area … which I did – covering the main bits around Fort Kochi, including the beach, the Chinese Fishing Nets and the churches.