Loving it in Kochi so far

2.2.19

First impressions – love it.

It was 5.30am when we got into bed. Just in time for morning prayers at the mosque with an accompaniment of noisy crows.
And monkey birds, they’re not really monkey birds but we’ve heard them all over Asia and always call them monkey birds.

Morning prayers seemed to go on forever but the next we knew it was 10am when we woke up.
Coffee on the balcony and at 11am we were ready to go and explore Fort Cochin which is an area not an actual fort.

We’ve often had issues with cashpoints on our travels but managed to get money with no problems at the first one we found.

Next we got sim cards from a very helpful Airtel guy on the side of the road.
John had photographs, visa and passport photocopies at the ready and we were very pleased to find they can do 2 sim cards from one set of paperwork. Even more pleased that is 500 rupees, less than £6 for the card, 1.4gb of internet each day and calls!
We will be even more pleased if after 9pm it activates when we restart our phones as instructed.

We continued walking in a straight line enjoying the sights and sounds on the way. So far today we have seen and stroked numerous goats, water buffalos, cats and dogs, the goats are remarkably tame and just hang out in the town.

There are various art exhibitions across the city. The toilet one had to be a highlight though.

After all that excitement we went to the Spice Trading area. It’s very, very run down, the road is rough and dusty, a bit grubby and very manic with people loading up handcarts and lorries. A few feet away it’s clean with lots of tourist buses and souvenirs.

It’s a very diverse area, traditional eateries where they eat with their hands, upmarket restaurants and trendy places with smoothies, chia seeds, hummous etc. Something for everyone.

We ventured into a traditional place but I changed my mind. I can’t get my head around curry for lunch, so we are now sitting up on a balcony at Cafe Crafters in Jew Street waiting for paneer fingers and a chicken and cheese sandwich for John.

I decided to go sugar free last July with just an occasional treat.
I’m currently drinking fresh lime juice soda, sugar free, but planning on a pineapple lassi for afters.
This is going to prove difficult here with pineapple lassi freely available. Pineapple will be my holiday downfall. Coffee with ice cream could be an issue too.

In fact the pineapple lassi didn’t need sugar, my tastebuds have definitely changed and even John didn’t add the syrup they provided in case we needed it.
Lunch was great, good people watching too.

We went into an antique museum, a few old cameras, scales, typewriters etc but mostly it should be renamed as a chamber of horrors.

Next the Dutch Palace, equivalent of 5p admission, pictures, murals and a bit of history. The clue was in the admission price.
Great building though and good to see it hasn’t been made into an expensive crab restaurant, like the Dutch hospital in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

The little souvenir and clothes shops are great, we loved browsing. It’s certainly got a lovely feel about it in Kochi and the locals are great.

We braved it back through the spice area, I bought some coriander seeds and have had lessons on how to grow them.

Time for a drink and seeing the first sign all day for beer we have ventured in to the swanky looking Seagull seafood restaurant by the sea, although sadly most of the sea side seats were reserved and the rest taken and not that swanky at all really.

John felt slightly squiffy after just one Kingfisher beer. I stuck to the very refreshing lime juice and soda, with no sugar.

As it turned out my lime soda caused a bit of an autication.
I had the exact money ready to give to the guy at the till who had spent a while in conflab with an older guy at the back. I had a feeling something was going on and when the bill was 11 rupees more than it added up to I asked why.

They had added GST. It clearly said on the front of the menu would be added to hot food prices.
We asked to speak to his boss who said there’s no GST on beer but there is on lime as it’s a fruit..! Anyway.. we refused to pay it and left. It’s only peanuts but not the point.

We walked to the infamous Chinese fishing nets. Fabulous atmosphere as everyone was waiting expectantly and looking at the catch of the day.

We carried on walking and I heard a young man talking to some tourists in perfect English. He was telling them that he just loves to chat with foreigners to use his language skills and learn about their cultures.

They were just leaving and I asked him if he wanted to hear a tourist story and relayed our lime soda tale. He apologised on behalf of his country and said we should complain to the tourist police. It’s such a small amount of money but he said the Police need to know whats going on.

Anyway, we walked along to the end of the walkway and sat looking at the sea with our new friend Sijo discussing anything and everything, even Brexit, which he knew a lot about. ( 2025 update Sijo is studying at a Unı in the UK)

He said it’s the very first time a tourist started a conversation with him. As John said, I talk to everybody.
After watching the sunset and swapping facebook details and giving Sijo a 5 Turkish Lira note for his collection of world notes and coins we headed off towards our base.

On the way some musicians were warming up for a Folklore Festival.
We waited to hear them but decided against staying as it was horrendously loud and more than a tad squeaky.

Not far from our room we stopped at Shawarma Express, they have an extensive Arabian menu. It did look good.

We’ve already decided we are going to learn all the Indian food types first, so we chose Butter Chicken and Beef Masala, rice and butterscotch ice cream. It didn’t taste of butterscotch at all.
The curries were superb though.
The chef came to our table, a little, older man, and asked how our food was, ‘mmmm.. Lovely’ I said, he looked thrilled to bits, bless him.

We are now back in our room, supposedly getting some sleep but yep..
the sim cards are activated but mobile data isn’t working. Looks like the included data is out of date. A trip back there in the morning…

Having a shower when we got back with a bucket of hot water and a jug was entertaining.
There is a shower head but it doesn’t do hot water. Could only happen to us. Typical Brett Class.

Night night all x