The Golden Park Madurai

... hanger-onner we checked in at the New Ruby Hotel which at only 300 rupees a night and with a great location seemed as good a place as any. An indian style bathroom, complete with squat toilet and bucket shower, a tv set, fan and a clean double bed, by my backpacking budget standards was pretty good. Mother, on the other hand looked like she may be about to give birth to kittens. Her first 'budget' accommodation was to be our ...

... not far "Anna Meenakshi" which is cheap and the food is great, so I prefer to go there.<br><br>So, it's just dinner and then packing for me. My train will leave after 11 pm and tomorrow I will be far away in Varkala, one of Kerala's main beach sites. I am looking forward to that.<br><br>-------------------------- <br><br>So, meine letzten Stunden in Madurai bzw. im Staat Tamil Nadu sind angebrochen. Es waren 12 schoene Tage und Tamil Nadu ist definitiv ...

... cycle rickshaw guy with a magnificent, enthusiastic smile named Mani who we hired for a couple of hours to take us around the city and through the backstreets and alleyways local knowledge style. A great way to get around and up cose to the locals. Mani was barefoot and it was scorching hot as he dodged bullock carts, rickshaws, dogs, cars, people and motorbikes to cycle us around to all the sites on his custom 'tour'. We visited a sandalwood ...

... most of the songs for the white album while training in an ashram in the north of India. Funny story.. Ringo left early because he didn't like the spicy food. Hiduism teaches that there is one supreme being that created the universe but it is so alien to us it is impossible to even comprehend of it. Therefore, it is divided into three sub-dieties Brahma, the creator, Vishnu, the sustainer and Shiva, the destroyer. Each of these dieties is represented ...

... himself under a bus. Emily managed to eat some dodgy chicken and get struck with the dreaded Delhi belly in time to have a calamitous train journey. So in summary don't underestimate my warning when I say do not ever think of driving yourself around India let alone on a super powered Enfield and its better not to eat anything prior to inter railing across the Indian sub continent.

... m. Det eneste som kunne vaere bekymrende er hvis Nana faar for meget traek og bliver lam i ansigtet... Under togturen er doerene aabne og folk haenger ud af dem. De kan ogsaa finde paa at hoppe af mens toget er lidt oppe i ****. Nu vil vi snart tilbage til vores hotel - det er meget smpelt, men der er hvad man skal bruge. I morgen venter os en 6 timers lang togtur. Ha det godt :) Knus fra os.

... because I was wearing what's known as a lungi, or a colored dhoti, and only white ones were acceptable. Not having a white one to my name I had expressed concern about this earlier, but our guide assured me I'd be fine. Luckily Lalu, being the resourceful gent that he is, slipped outside in all the confusion and came back 90 seconds later with a white one in a wrapper, even though none of us had seen any clothing shops for ...

... way there, i saw sleeping cows on the road, peoples laundry on a public fence and lots of interesting people. I stopped at a street stall to buy a watermelon since i was hungry and that would be my breakfast. When i finally reached that house, no-one was surprised i was there :) heheh. i finally integrated myself into India. ok ok into the families :) As i had some watermelon i didn't eat breakfast, so i just bummed around with everyone else until ...

... spending most time in transit. Here was my rough itinerary: Day One: Madurai sightseeing: 2:30 - 8:45 p.m. Night minibus to Kanyakumari: 9:30 p.m. - 4:00 a.m. (next day) Day Two: Sightseeing in Kanyakumari: 6:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. Minibus to Madurai: 1:00 p.m. - 8:15 p.m. Sleeper bus to Pondicherry: 9:00 p.m. - 5:30 a.m. (next day) As you can see, that is a lot of damn time on the bus. Sightseeing in Madurai consisted of roaming around and seeing ...

... around the walls told pictures of Hindu mythology and legend in thousands of brilliantly drawn and painted panels. This is a complex, with many rooms and sections to the temple. It was amazing just to wander, as each place was different and equally captivating. There were several extremely holy shrines in sections of the temple that were accessible only to Hindus (of which I made the mistake of wandering into the outer layer of one of these rooms, but felt that ...