Alleppey to Munnar (December 18-20)

Just a quick flip through the next 2 days in Alleppey...

We had heard about Amma, "The Hugging Mother", and wondered if we could see her at the ashram in Amritapuri, south of Alleppey. Ralph was supposed to go with a guy he met at the beach; but Faisal warned him to avoid that guy, so Ralph went with us instead.

It was a long trip, we had 2 bus changes.

When we arrived, two Americans pushing a cart of trash bins gave us directions. We told them we are only there for the day, and they said they thought they would only be there for a day and ended up staying for years... meanwhile, I was thinking, "shoot, I didn't bring extra clothes."

Ashram temple.

Luckily, she was there and giving hugs. It is usually very hard for foreigners to get attention until 11pm, because Indians go first and foreigners get the late night to 2 am slot. But, imagine that! Amma hugs people without pause from morning til past midnight!

The Universe seemed to help speed things along because we met a woman outside who talked about Amma so passionately and asked if we wanted to go to the stage and see her. We said yes, and she pulled my hand through all the cordon sanitaires and directly behind Amma. In less than an hour, Henri and I were face to face with the spiritual leader and we got our hugs.

Henri and Ralph.

There is really something special about her. After receiving the darshan (the way she gives her blessing, which is the hug), we sat down behind her again and we noticed that our faces were hot, as if we had been in the sun for a long time.

Henri found these little coconut islands on the way. Cute!

When we got back to Alleppey the festival of dance had started, and we followed the banging drums into a hall where a red demon with silver fangs dragged me in and made me dance around a chair. He did the same with Henri and Ralph.

The next day we mostly stayed on the beach, it rained a little in the afternoon, which was a bummer.

But the next day, it looked really depressing. It was the right time to pack up and go to our next destination.

While waiting for "Faisal is the making the idly, making the chapati, making the sambar, eating good, NOOOOOOO problem," I went around our street and discovered this temple a few steps away from the guest house.

Then it was time for breakfast. For the first time, it came in less than 30 minutes! That's a record! Because sometimes people wait for 2 hours while he goes to the market for ingredients.

Aleena, my Malayalam tutor, was ready to go to mid-morning school (early morning is for the mosque school).

And here's Abu, who's a little camera-shy :)

Faisal made a mistake about ferry schedules, so we took a quick bus to Kottayam instead of the laid-back ferry ride we were hoping for... but at least we were an hour early :)

 From Kottayam we took a bus to Munnar. On one of the stops, a fight broke out and our bus was at the center of it all. I'm still confused about what happened, but moustaches were blazing that afternoon.

Hours later, we were in Munnar! And everyone on the bus was excited to see the tea plantations.

But we'd better save the best shots for the next blog.

Here we are, we found a cheap place to stay that had a nice view of the river and the town. There were not as much mosquitoes as in Alleppey, but Henri really wanted to show off his mosquito-zapping racket.

 After a long day of travelling, it was time to unpack once again and feel at home.

We bought our own pitcher in Bodhgaya because we're kooky like that.