Excursions south of Chennai

I had the opportunity to visit two cities / towns / purams south of Chennai, India. Puram is city in Tamil (or one of the many languages in regular use in India). By the way, did you see the statistic that some 2,000 languages become extinct ever day! Unbelievable. But I digress...back to my adventure. I visited Mahablipuram now called Mamallapuram but referred to as Mahabs. It is a neat town located on the Bay of Bengal and it has a lot of history. There are many ancient temples built in the 7th century at Mahabs. One of which is the Shore Temple -- one of seven temples built by the Pallava kings. The other temples are under water just off the coast.

Upon arriving at the Shore Temple, we were immediately accosted by people selling trinkets and stuff. I assumed I was immediately categorized as a tourist (i.e., weakest of the group) given the number of people that shoved merchandise in my path. No one bothered the other members (CK and SR -- I'll talk about SR in a minute) of the group as they were "locals". I'm not sure how the merchants decided to target me given that my jeans and t-shirt were no different then their jeans and t-shirts. Things became easier once SR stepped in and shoo'ed the merchants away. BTW, "shoo'ing" is an art form that I did not master in my short stay. It takes a certain look, tone, and body language that only real Indians can perform. Maybe I shouldn't be hard on myself given that SR is an ex-policeman. SR was even more impressive later in the day and the next day. SR works in our India office and runs things with military efficiency and speed. He is an ex-guard for the previous chief minister and has a lot of knowledge about the area.

Even with SR at our side, we decided to procure the services of a tour guide, John Pasha. No really that is his name. John was unlike most other tour guides you may encounter in that he was hard to understand, seemed like he was making up facts, and didn't really want to talk too much. But he did have a name tag (that is how I knew his name -- I'm smart like that). John was interesting however and did do a good job demonstrating how Portugese sailors may have tied their ships to the docks -- he put one arm through a hole in a rock and held his hand with the other hand that was wrapped around the outside of the rock -- you had to be there.

SR also demonstrated his knowledge of protection tactics when he had to pull over and let the current chief minister's motorcade pass on the highway. He pointed out the role of each car and particularly the leading car with large antenna's. It was a signal jamming car and mine "finder". At which point I had to look on the ground around my feet to make sure my feet were not on a trigger. Hey, I've seen 24. It got a bit exciting at one point as I wanted to take pictures with my camera phone. One of the guards shouted at CK and SR (again he knew I was an ignorant tourist somehow). The quick translation was to put the cell phone away. Apparently a previous chief minister was assassinated by a bomb triggered by a cell phone. Needless to say I put my cell phone away quickly and took another glance at my feet. I wasn't feeling like Jack Bauer at this point.

During the adventure we had tea (chai) at a road side shop. I am a huge chai fan and had to take in the local color. CK guiltily ordered as the chai guy didn't understand "grande double shot soy extra hot with no water". I say guiltiliy because he rightly predicted it could cause me trouble. The decision doesn't seem too smart 10 Imodiums later! But let me live in that moment...the chai was awesome. It was made with a few drops of strong tea, hot milk, and dried ginger powered. The taste was awesome. You just had to overlook where the flies last landed.

We visited the uninteresting Pondicherry the following day and stopped at the same tea wala -- I just didn't get enough. I was still brave at that point. Pondicherry is a French influenced city and still have many French people who have emigrated to the area. It was weird seeing a white guy (I'm assuming he was French) steer a motorcycle as expertly as the Indians. We visited a museum that had archeological artifacts from the area. The museum tour guide, no it was not John Pasha, was a bit more knowledgeable but not anymore interesting.

All in all, it was a great outing and I learned a bit more...