Show me the growler

Kumily, Kerala.
We wanted to be in unchartered territory. Getting up at 6AM certainly provided that.

Kumily is home to the 780 sq km Periyar Tiger reserve. Entering the jungle before dawn, we gave ourselves every chance to glimpse a tiger. Sadly, our guide was rather less enthused. He may as well've said: "See that path? Follow it for an hour and a half, then come back", for the value he added. Worse, we merged with the other group setting off at the same time. This isn't the David Attenborough meets Ben Fogle meets Tarzan experience I had set my alarm for.

And so it continued. We stopped to watch some wild boar. Big deal. Vagrant pigs. We stopped for some bison. Apart from a joke about sinks, what have they ever done? I took a photo without looking and walked right passed, in silent protest. This proved a master stroke. I stopped down the track at a clearing with the other guide. The next thing I knew, he started shouting: "Tiger! Tiger!"

Well, I couldn't see it. I got crazy eyes looking all over the damn place. "Look in the pond! Look in the pond!". I was panicking: what fucking pond?!

The reason I couldn't see Terry (the tiger) was because he was so close. I was actually looking over him.

Fame won't change me.
To put this sighting in context, as we returned another trekker responded to our triumph by declaring: well, I saw a pig. The woman at the Tourist Centre told us no-one she knew of had seen a tiger in 4 years. Amazingly, we became a little bit famous around town. 'T-list' celebrities, you might say (sorry). Rickshaw drivers knew us, shop owners knew us, hoteliers even asked us to write about it in their guest books, as a selling point.

This left us with no option. For the rest of our stay, we really really lorded it up. Really badly. We talked loudly in restaurants. We bought tiger postcards and just had to drop in why. We cleared spaces to allow for actions in the retelling. If there had been a disco in town, we'd have been in there dancing to Tiger Feet - that's neat, that's neat, that's neat, that's neat I really love your tiger feet, all right! - waving boxes of Frosties in our hands.

I think the right thing to do now is to go in Rehab and then release my own perfume range.

India's nether regions

Kanniyakumari, Tamil Nadu.

is the very southern most tip of India: if India had genitals, I'd be standing on them! And keeping with being at the arse end of India: it's full of crap. Like Blackpool but without the class.

This is where the waters of the Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal and Indian Ocean meet. Unfortunately, all they have done is thrown up wave upon wave of plastic tat. Where exactly do they think I am going to put a 6 foot long macrame conche shell bedcover? (the more they pestered me, the more the answer to this question became obvious).

We were harangued by a lot of tat peddlers. The conjoining of the three seas makes this a major sight of Hindu pilgrimage. They come here to pray. Most of the people we encountered came to prey...on tourists. On a rock just off the coast there is a memorial to Sri Vivekananda, a swami who swam there and spent three day's quiet contemplation. I can see why he went now.

I came wanting to have a spiritual moment. I left only having managed a moment with several spirits (vodka, rum, Jack Daniels). Call it a draw.



Pepsi. Exactly who I would call in an emergency.

Philospher. Film Maker. Tosser

Kovalam, Kerala.

Today we met Tampan: a local poet, philosopher, documentary maker and purveyor of fine tourist bungalows at half price to you just don't tell anyone else. We talked for an hour or two over cinnamon chai about Keralan poets (which we had never heard of), English poets (which we had never heard of), until finally settling on a subject myself and the missus are more familiar with: ourselves.

Carrie - should she accept - is to appear in Tampan's next documentary, as a ethnic Syrian Jewish girl, born in Cochin as one of the last of the fading Jewish community. This will be a Malayalam language production. It's an obvious casting. I it seems do not have the look for this particular blockbuster and was offered a background role. Second goat to the left, or similar.

Apparently, like all his Indian peers Tampan does not like western women. They show too much flesh. He prefers women completely covered up and to spend his time lusting over their bare ankles; the only flesh on show. 'Less is more' I suggested, referring to his sharing his opinions.

Then he declared his love for us. This is not in itself unusual for me and the missus, but it usually takes people longer than half an hour of knowing us to admit to it. He said he would meet us at our bus the next morning for a tearful farewell.

He never came. Carrie's dream of stardom within the small Keralan Malayalam speaking community as an Indo-Syrain Jew was shattered.

Two pancakes later and she was back to her normal self.

Carrie's Fenney

Give a man a fish and he can feed himself for a day. Give a man the means to fish, and he can feed himself and his family for a lifetime. Give him a basket on his head full of sarongs and sun-glasses, and he can harass you for hours.

Fruit, fags, weed, drums, coconut carvings, jewellery, sunglasses, sandals, sarongs. One decent Claire's Accessories would get rid of the lot of them. Load of old tat. I thought my name was postcard, so many people shouted it at me.

One thing we did buy was a bottle of Fenney, the local fermented coconut moonshine. It's great, for two reasons.

1) There's quite a ring to it when Carrie says, "do you fancy a bit of fenney tonight?"

2) It gets you wasted. It says 42.8% on the bottle, but I think that's the number of people who go blind after drinking it.

It left us stumbling down the street, arms tight round each other, trying to protect ourselves from these shapes we couldn't bring into focus (shopkeepers, cars, tourists).

Finally: Keralan Baywatch....or is that Gaywatch?

Madgoan - a town, not an Indian police cover up - to Kerala

The journey was an epic. Overnight for 18 hours and 550 miles to the sweaty hub town of Thiruvananthapuram (order a ticket there I dare you). Travel across town. Take a bus to the small coastal village of Kovalam. Walk to the far side of the village and follow a path through the palm tree grove-swamp into the darkness. Keep walking in direction the path was heading before it ended for 10 minutes more. Arrive at lodgings. 10PM.

10 minutes later we're in a local eatery, overlooking a large pond and under the stars, listening to the waves on the beach, 50 metres away. Coconut curry and Kingfisher beer on the menu. This is the life I thought.

Then it hit me.

Didgeridoo music. Didgeri-fucking-doo music.

The goddamn hippies had got here before us. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and repeated the mantra: I hate hippies/I hate hippies/Goddamn hippies. The waiter waited to take my order.

But this was no ordinary Indo-hippy fusion mix tape, available behind the bar cheap price, oh no. Then came....the pan pipes. I mean pan pipes? Fuck off. What was I supposed to do now? Throw the tomato and green chilly sauce bottles up the wall and leave? I was half way through a Kingfisher (big bottle) by now and everything.

I had to think fast. The answer would be here somewhere. I was desperate. I scanned the menu. Then I got it. The answer had been staring at me all along. Quickly, I ordered so much coconut based curry and booze that there was enough for it to actually come out of my ears. 10 minutes of gorging later and I was in a coconut based vegetative state. Safe.

We were to stay here for 5 days. It was going to be tough, keeping that much curry overload maintained, but I knew I could make it. I had to.

A right Goa, she's a Goa, Time to Goa

Colva, Goa, March 2008.

We're in Goa and I have to say it's really really impressive. Mile upon mile of sandy beaches, fringed by palm trees, with my pink curry-bloated carcass lying right in the middle.

Yesterday was our first day on the beach, which with sad inevitability I celebrated by getting burnt. When she found out, Carrie's expression started alternating brilliantly: you poor thing/you fucking idiot/you poor think/you fucking idiot. It was a matter of skill to stop her on the right one, like a fruit machine.

Colva seems to be mainly Indian day trippers. This is good for two reasons. Firstly, Indian tourists are hilarious. Groups of men from Andrah Pradesh who on sight of the sea, strip down to their Y-fronts and jump in whooping like they've never seen it before, then spend the afternoon chasing each other around on the beach, in the same wet Y-fronts. Stopping occasionally to molest slapper here.

Secondly, the sight of Sari wearing Indian women flying though the air, as they paraglide off the beach is superb. Two foot of brightly coloured Sari flapping behind, flying low across the beach, diminutive Indian superheros saving the day, for my entertainment.

The age of the train? Or the train that took an age.

Mumbai - Madgoan, March 2008.

India by train. The only way to see the real India. The best way to meet real Indian people. Well, I think I saw all 1 billion of them during our 18 hour train epic today. Any day that starts at 5.45AM is already in the bad books. Any that then ends at 1AM the next day - and has only consisted of 'train' - is taking the piss.

That said, it was actually quite pleasant, mainly due to the hours being punctuated by chicken biryani, samosas, chicken biryani again and bombay mix. All served just the way I like it - by attentive young boys.

This journey has also neatly encapusulated this trip so far: sleeping and curry. Or 'slurry', if you will.

Indian bureaucracy update:

Number of signatures required to use safely deposit box at hotel? Four.

Just how I like my train windows - shit splattered!

They're here.

Mumbai, March 2008.

Observation 1: Arriving in India is like being hit by a tidal wave of colours, smells and sounds. Everything is one hazy blur and none of it makes sense. At least, that's what it feels like with a bitch of a hangover and 6 hours' jet lag. I could barely tie my own shoelaces. Now I am sober, India is all right really. Loads of Indians. Dunno what all the fuss is about.
Observation 2: Indian girls are well fit.
Observation 3: I already hate all westerners. Wandering around with their cameras and their day packs, taking pictures of cliched authentic scenes*.

*I don't really hate them. The ones in bikinis I quite like. I'm just practising hating them for when my transformation into pretentious backpacker is complete.

Odds on when the first bout of Delhi belly (or Mumbai shitty-squits?) occurs:

• Train to Goa (12 hours) 8/11
• Goa 4/7
• Kerala 6/5
• Cochin 2/1
• Mysore 5/1
• Madras 8/1
• Never 100/1

These odds are compiled on the basis that my stomach is already cramping. Eachway bets (diarrhea and vomiting) are available. Tip: the 'Goa' train is favourite but something about the name Mysore that makes it a good outsider.


Carrie's question of the day: apart from waking up all night, how did you sleep?