Day 2 -Chennai to Kochi
Panic!! Fear!!Where the hell was I! This wasn't my room. These aren't my clothes. Holy crap I ain't wearing any clothes. I feel violated and disheveled. I appear not to have shaven in a couple of days which is unlike me. Then Ceri and Sari came into the room talking gibberish. Oh yes now I remember. Big rat. It's all coming back to me now.
A quick shower in freezing water and brushed my teeth with the last of our bottled water and we were off to find some breakfast. We had organised a large taxi to pick us up and take us to the airport at 12:00 so we could make our flight to Kochi with the owner who still looked as pissed off as he did the previous night. I think that is his constant demeanor. Poor bastard,
he will never know the truth.The hell hole of a road looks completely different in the morning. One of the lakes of water and the decaying buildings, was replaced with small puddles and slightly less decaying building, but still the kind that look used and repaired by people on a daily basis. About 20m from the backpackers we found a place that served breakfast. Hooray! Some bread omlette and a coffee for me and what looked like pancakes with curry for the rest of our unit.
It was the best coffee I had had in ages. And the best bread egg omelette I had ever had (being my first and all) although Sari was convinced that the tomato sauce was off.
Back at the backpackers, the large taxi had still not arrived. 'It's because of the rain, it will only be another 15 - 20 minutes' said the angry owners assistant. He himself was the opposite and constantly seemed to be smiling. Was it because of my beard? Who knew.
After ~20 minutes something the size of a Mitsubishi Mirage pulled up in front of us. The large taxi was anything but. 'This isn't going to fit us and our baggage all in!'
'Please try. Please try'
'Oh bugger, OK'
So we did and sure as shit we all squeezed in. Ben in the front because of his size and long legs, Ceri, Sari and Janelle sitting on my lap in the back with 2 backpacks. Zoom! off we shot. The driver using his horn to full effect dodging around auto rickshaws and small women carrying bungles of strange origins.
The main road was clear of cars moving in the opposite direction and those sacred cows I had heard so much about. We were all more amused when we passed a similar car with about ten or more people in it. We were then grateful for the large amount of space we had! CAR PHOTO ALL SQUISHED IN.
Jump out at the Airport and give the driver a tip. It is customary to tip everyone here I have found. You can tell someone wants a tip if they do something small for you and then hang around with a sulky look on their face.
We landed late and took another 3 hour taxi drive to the nicest place we have stayed in so far. Clean with a fan and no rats. Good for me. They even fed us some chicken and rice with pineapple for desert. 5 stars.Day
