Quick Update

Just some quick things from the last couple of days:

- After our visit to the national park that Nisha is writing up, we headed up to a hill town in Tamil Nadu called Ooty. After a harrowing drive with a madman jeep driver up a road with 34 marked hairpin turns we arrived in this Indian tourist town. We had a fun day in Ooty seeing the great British botanical gardens and checking out the cheesy Indian carnival atmosphere around the boathouse. We hit the bumper cars, the mechanical bull and the world's largest handmade tread flower garden. Needless to say a fun time was had by all.

- We are now in Kochi, a city in Kerala. We are staying out in the historic fort area, which has quite a few tourists, but is one of the quietest and most charming little neighborhoods we have seen in India. We are staying at a great little B&B kind of place. We are going to be here for a few days, it should be very nice and relaxing.

- I still am getting used to the stunning popularity of the Lungi in south India. It is basically a man-skirt that is worn by a lot of guys down here. I never saw one until south of Goa, but probably about 30% of the guys down here wear them. In north and central India 99% of men wear pants. Only a few old and holy men wear the Dothi.

- Kochi has the best Internet connections and computers in all of India.

- South India so far has been really nice. People here seem to smile more, are generally more friendly and are a lot less annoying when tyring to sell you something. Even the autorikshaw guys have a little humor when they are pestering you. There is a guy around here who always tries to get us in his Ferrari, which is actually just a rikshaw with Ferrari stickers on it. There are also just a lot less hawkers and beggars in general, almost none in fact. The climate is nice as well, a lot less dusty and more tropical. Very much what we had expected from the South.

- The longer we are here, the cheaper we get. Since we were only going to be in Ooty for one night, we settled on the well run old camp atmosphere of the YWCA. A decent room for 450 rupees (11 dollars). "Its fun to stay at the..."

- One the flip side, we spent over 30 dollars on dinner the last two nights. Is it any surprise what our priorities are? That trend will end soon however.

- This one is for my Mom (who grows bananas in Key Largo)... Ever since we got to Kerala every convenience stall has at least 2 or 3, and sometimes up to 10, fresh banana stalks hanging out front. You just ask and they rip off as many fresh bananas as you want. The best convenience store food ever, except for maybe the steamed buns they sell at the Lawson Stations in Japan.