Seasons on the Move

Mumbai – December 28

With the news of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination on everybody’s lips, Fab and I returned downtown to swap some books. It was strange to think that only a few weeks back we had been at the Pakistani border. We picked up a guide book for East Africa and one for the Middle East. By January 6th, we would be in Cairo. By the middle of February, we hoped to be in Kenya. However, the news coming out of Nairobi concerning the results of the December 27th national election was troubling.

We spent the remainder of the day walking up and down MG Road and around the Churchgate area. I quite liked walking in Mumbai, with all of its Art Deco architecture and wide boulevards. We picked up a few last gifts in anticipation of our flight out of the country the following day and then returned to the house for a planned dinner engagement.

Devika and Sandeep took us for dinner at a friend’s house just past 8pm. The family was from Gujarat and served us some local cuisine. I found it too spicy and Fab found it too sweet. We spent close to two hours making awkward conversation with people who clearly didn’t have any real interest in what we had to say. Despite that, they were courteous and treated us as welcomed guests.  After returning to the Shah household, Fab and I went to bed disbelieving that our time in the country had finally come to an end.

Mumbai – December 27

Fab and I spent the day running around town trying to swap novels for new guide books. Sandeep drove us down to Chow Bazaar in the morning so I could try and suss out some Bollywood memorabilia. Sandeep joked about the bazaar (literally thieves bazaar) and how the story goes that if you go down to buy an extra hub cap, they will steal the hub cap of the opposite side of your car and sell it back to you. I didn’t find the bazaar all that bad and spent a good fifteen minutes haggling with a guy over the price of Bollywood LPs. I ended up getting a decent price, but knew that if I wasn’t leaving in two days, I could have very easily walked away and came back a day later to a bigger bargain.

We grabbed the local bus down to Colaba where we figured we’d find some used guidebooks. No luck. We didn’t spend too much time looking because we didn’t feel like being accosted by store owners and hotel touts. Instead, we walked up to the used book sellers near the Fountain. We found the books we wanted, but knew that we had time to haggle, leave and then come back the next day for another round. We just wanted to feel things out first.

At night, Sandeep and Devika took us back to Swati Snacks which was full with non-resident Indians back for the fortnight around New Year’s eve. Afterwards, Sandeep bought us some betel nut wrapped in some type of leaf. The taste was completely jarring, an explosion of unknown flavours. It tasted like a combination of saffron, licorice, perfume, soap and Sen-Sen. Apparently its quite good for digestion. I had my doubts.

Kannur to Mangalore to Mumbai – December 26

We hit the road just past 7am. We needed to catch a train in Kannur to get us up the coast to Mangalore. From there, we had a flight booked to Mumbai in the early afternoon. Mohanan gave us ride to the station and bid us farewell by stuffing a handful of business cards and promotional flyers for his guesthouse into my hand.

Not wanting to punish ourselves with another unreserved train ticket, Fab and I bought a couple of chairs in first class. Money well spent. The compartment was vitually empty. We stretched out our legs and looked out the windows at the green fields of Kerala we were leaving behind. I thought about how, on the cusp of my thirties, I found myself cut adrift from the friends of my youth, the only tether to my past self being my family. Mike too, I guess. I remembered how I used to have the feeling that my friends would be my friends forever, like in the Disney film “The Fox and the Hound”, but that feeling of certainty was long gone. Things fall apart over time, people change, move on and fade from view. Although I still think about my past friends from time to time, I would hate to be the same person I was when I was twenty, eighteen, fifteen It never ceases to amaze how unfailingly stupid I have proved to be over time, all of which doesn’t bode well for me in the future.

W e landed in Mumbai near dusk. Sandeep had arranged for us to be picked up from the airport. It was great having somebody like Sandeep on our side, he always made things easy. Sure enough, after coming out of the terminal, there was a man waiting with a sign that had our names on it.

We crawled though the traffic down to Breach Candy where the Shahs lived, the driver trying his best to give us a tour of the city. Once we got inside the house, we dropped our bags and got comfortable. Sandeep and Devika were still at work, Anuj was out for the day. The only person in the house was Anuj’s grandmother, a short woman blind in one eye, missing some of her teeth and cute as a button. Although she didn’t speak any English, she did her best to make us feel at home.

Unfortunately, the driver, whom Sandeep did not know personally, tried to take advantage of granny and get her to pay him for our ride. I picked up on this a gave him a fistful of small denomination rupees. Thankfully, he left.

Sandeep and Devika got back later in the evening. Anuj’s grandmother obviously told Sandeep about the incident with the driver because he was visibly irritated. Despite the whole affair, Fab and I had a good talk with them about our travels in India, Sandeep giggling along with his high-pitched, hiccupping laugh.

Beach outside of Kannur – December 25

We still had the place to ourselves which was a pleasant way to spend Christmas Day, albeit a little lonely. Both Fab and I wrote emails to our friends and spent a large amount of time speaking with our families via Skype. It was good to hear from all of my brothers and sisters. I’m not sure either Fab or I realized how alone we really were until we spoke to them. Although I was never a huge fan of my dad’s Christmas morning burnt, bitter pancakes, I somehow felt nostaligic about not getting the chance to not like them this year.

It was nice to spend our first Christmas alone, but the fact that we were in an empty hotel on an isolated beach made our solitude a little too apparent. Towards the end of the day, a group of Germans invaded the place and ruined the peace and quiet. Not only did they take over the hotel, they refused to acknowledge us, going so far as to shun us when we tried to stay hello.

Beach outside of Kannur – December 24

Got up early for breakfast and then headed down to the beach. The day was hot and the sun was high. There was a strong undercurrent that made swimming next to impossible. A nice relaxing day, if your idea of relaxing is having two pot-bellied middle-aged men standing over you and staring at your wife whilst pretending to be representatives from a newly opened guest house.

Beach outside of Kannur – December 23

We went into town with Mohanan to gather some supplies. I bought box of beer and he bought toilet paper and water. Fab bought soap and shampoo. On the way into town, we passed a Hindu grave site where a number of bodies wrapped in white cloth were being readied for the funeral pyre. Strange scene, but not as graphic as it might sound.

In the evening, after a swim in the ocean, we sat on the rooftop of the hotel and watched the sun set.  It was nice having the place to ourselves, but the solitude was a tad lonely. I looked out at the ocean, wishing Mike and Jen were with us, so that Mike could pretend that he could surf the waves.

Malabar Coast – December 22

I spent the morning on the veranda reading “The Lovely Bones” and chatting with Henry, a journalist from London. We talked about the difficulties of quitting smoking while sucking back tobacco and strong coffee. According to him, he had been a writer for a number of shite magazines before starting a business with a friend of his writing literature for a number of NGOs. I talked about filmmaking and my aspirations as a director.

In the afternoon, Fab and I went with John, Lynn and Imogen to a secluded cove that they had discovered a few days back. We tanned our flesh on the soft sand, half protected by the swaying palms overhead. Fab went to look for sea shells with John and came back with an assortment in wild hues of red, blue and green. She separated her favorites into a small burlap sack which she intended to send home.

Back at the hotel, we downed a couple of Kingfisher beers while waiting for our ride to pick us up. We had to check out of the Costa Malabari and had booked a room at a newly opened hotel close to Kannur. John entertained us with stories of dining in dodgy Colombian restaurants and being trailed by Mossad agents during a business trip to Georgia (the country, not the state).

Our ride was over an hour late on account of getting lost on the way over. The driver, Mohanan, recently moved back to India after spending the last thirty years in Oman. He had decided to quit his job as an electrical engineer and open a guest house on the beach. We were to be his inaugural guests. We parted ways with our new friends at the Costa Malabari and left feeling good about having a place to stay in London.

We got lost on our way back to Mohanan’s guest house, but arrived to find that we had the entire place to ourselves. Since we were the first guests, Mohanan was nervous and eager to please. He sweated profusely as he ran around making sure we were happy with everything. I hate to use to the word cute, but cute he was. We had a quick bite to eat and then fell asleep, our room twenty paces from the beach, to the sound of the heavy waves crashing against the shore.

Malabar Coast- December 21

Up early and at the breakfast table. Due to all the conversations at the communal dining table, I was beginning to find that being Canadian had certain advantages. I could relate to the British through sarcasm and the monarchy, the Americans because we shared a large amount of leisure culture and consumerism and could get along with everybody else because we were neither British or American.

I was also surprised to find myself defending the Americans against European snobbery, mostly against the Germans – as if their history is anything to brag about. Kimo and Kyra faced an onslaught of questions like: can’t you see that Bush is ruining the world or how can your country be so racist? I guess the Europeans had no idea what type of people live in Berkeley, California. It felt kind of like defending a family member that you don’t particularly like, yet feel obliged to stick up for because they are, after all, family.

In the afternoon, we hit the beach with John and the family. We sat around in the sun talking about art, film and the fashion industry. Both John and Lynn worked in the fashion industry and throughout their time in India they had been collecting quality textiles and dirt cheap prices. Actually, from what I gathered John only worked part time in fashion and spent the rest of his time coordinating big international shows for the British government. Imogen was a student a Cambridge.

By the end of the day, after a rabble rousing conversation about politics at the dinner table, Lynn offered us a place to stay when we arrived in London. After leaving India on the 29th, we were going to spend New Year’s Eve in Dubai before jetting off to England. We eagerly accepted since we had not yet booked a place in the city and were worried about damaging our bank accounts. The courtesy of strangers on our trip has been consistently humbling.