Rvee'S Regency Hotel Guruvayur

... a boy throwing stones at it. It makes an attempt to jump the curb, fails, and falls. I watch amused, as the rat tries to jump again, struggling to climb the curb. It succeeds and disappears into a drainage pipe. I laugh at this absurd sight and continue on my way.

S. Bathery is not worth mentioning more in detail. Half the town is drunk, as it turns out to be a Muslim holiday (which I get woken up to in ...

... Hotel beach? hotel greenview? Other hotel names are thrown at me, in hopes for a hook line and sinker to get commission while rickshaw drivers follow me. Here they all do a thing with their heads, like a dashboard doll wobbly head movement when they talk, which I have labeled as 'chittering'. It is actually quite difficult to replicate, but regardless, in front of me was a sea of chittering heads, each vying for my attention. Trying to break away from the pack, I ...

... the day I signed on the ship. The romance, the affair, the human side of me should be hidden under a heavy blanket and away from sun rays. La passion, the fountain of joy and trouble all together. What a dilemma! Stop thinking romantically can be such a easy tool to alienate one from another. What a handy tool to be left out the drama, the commotion, the madding crowd. Locked up. Emptied ...

... happy! A vigourous game or two of cards followed (yes, MF, I actually voluntarily played cards!!!!!!) after the brief power cut (it went out at 8pm each night and came back on at 8.30) before we retired for an early night - apart from being disturbed by what we concluded were monkeys, banging and pulling on the doors. The boys were not worried at all; the girls were convinced we were about to be murdered in our beds. As I sit here now, you can tell who was correct :-)

... left to sit alone in the Headmistress' office for half an hour while the whole staff appeared to be next door in the staff room is yet another of these impenetrable Indian mysteries. We were then escorted from classroom to classroom to admire the new murals executed by local art students. They have a Jungle Book type theme in the Disney tradition and are quite the most engaging thing about the classrooms. A couple of other mysteries were also explained during our visit to ...

... in the first place. Wilson is very puzzled as to why some of the volunteers are not happy. They weren't expecting to be involved in digging but he insisted they weren't digging just ground clearing which apparently doesn't count as physical labour. They also keep asking when they can be involved in his women's groups, which is what they expected to be doing and he had taken them to the meeting on Friday, which was a women's group. Apparently ...

... meeting was to decide the names of each of the volunteers to do kitchen and bathroom duty for each of the fifteen days. It seemed to throw the meeting plan completely when one of the girls announced they had already discussed that and decided who would do what. She even had the temerity to suggest that the volunteers could organize the domestic arrangements among themselves. This is when we worked out that Jean Françoise wouldn't be in the way in the ...

... called Marnie; she's already been bathing. Yes, that's right, not swimming, bathing, in the lake. I bet that doesn't last when she discovers what's in there and I don't just mean crocodiles. They were all a bit tired after their little outing on the train but methinks there is not complete satisfaction with the sleeping arrangements. We've lent our sleeping bags to two of the girls and it seems they all expected just a little more than a mat to sleep on. We ...

... after a sleep I went for a walk, found it a very strange place, there didn't seem to be any people about and definitely not any tourists. Next day I hired a bicyle to see the sights, I'd been round them all within about 2 and a half hours. Not much to see at all. That night went to see a performance of Kathakali which is the Keralan ritual theatre. Very strange, photos will show the strange outfits, and peformance ...

... frantic hurry to get from A to B that sleeping is not an option, screaming, hanging to your seat, praying, those are options and we explored each of them a few times throughout the night. The Seven hours to Mysore went by in a blur. Arriving at 4:30am, we get off the buss and are in a new town, its dark and every taxi driver wants to haul you off to their hotels so they can get a kickback. We tried to stumble off in our sleep deprived daze to find our own way. We ...