Assunta and I are in village Nedumpura, near to the small town of Cheruturutty ----home to the famous dance/theater/music institution Kerala Kalamandalam: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerala_Kalamandalam
This is next to Shoranur (average size town) which is in Trissur district (for those of you who REALLY want to know where we are!).
We start our treatment tomorrow morning with doctor appointments, after which we will be prescribed a 21-day course of massages, diet, and other treatments (including doing nothing else : i.e. rest, during this time period. ) That's probably the hardest thing for me...i really want to DANCE --learn some Mohini Attam, move, etc. However, I will follow whatever they say , and I do know that these treatments tend to make one sleepy and a little tired, so maybe once I start, it won't be so difficult to stick to the "doing nothing" prescription. We shall see...
We are staying in a beautiful old Kerala-style home, with large wooden doors and overhanging roof to keep the house cool. We have a large well in the back, attached to the kitchen, where we directly get all our water. In fact, there is a window in the kitchen which opens to the well, and a bucket that can be pulled up (however, water can also be obtained thru the pipes). The house has electricity, but no fridge, no hot water (tho if we really feel like it, we can heat some up on the stove for a hot bucket bath). Otherwise, its really quite warm here in the afternoons, and the water from the well feels refreshing. There's an outside little room for taking a cool shower or bucket bath.
We also have no Internet or television, but there is a landline phone. Our next door neighbor has lived here forever, and is very helpful if we need anything.
We came back late last night on the train from visiting Kunhiraman's village, also our dance teacher (and his niece) Yeshoda's home there. We had a lovely two relaxing days there, and also went with her when she took her mother's ashes to be dispersed in the sea. Her mother died 41 days before, and it was the proscribed time to take the ashes, after a ritual ceremony in the nearby temple by the ocean; all the family members had to bathe in the temple tank (fully immerse themselves) and then came out, and did the same in the ocean. We were happy that we could be with her at this time. Her mother was 86 years old, and died, fully conscious and aware of her family around her. She refused to go to hospital , or have surgery which was suggested. She lived a long and dignified life, and carried on with her daily rituals, almost to the end. She was not interested in traveling far from her village home.
Yeshoda told me an interesting story: her mother had a pet chicken. Every morning the chicken would come around the front of the house, (the chicken pen was in the back), and they would have some sort of interaction every day. When she died, the chicken disappeared, and has not been seen since...they have not found any feathers (if a wild animal got the chicken) or any other evidence of her. She is just gone --like that. A little mystery. A people-animal connection...
So, back to this morning. Because we were gone for the weekend, and we have no fridge, we had no milk for our (most necessary!) morning tea. I decided to walk to the nearest store, somewhere along the main road, to search for milk. I set out early, around 7:30 AM. First I walked to the end of the dirt road that we live on, and came to one little shop, but they didn't have any tea. All the other shops were closed: Sunday morning everything shuts down. So, I kept walking. And walking. And walking...I probably walked about 2 km (but not sure, really!), until finally I hit a more main road. It was a nice morning walk, and I did indeed finally find a little shop that had cold fresh milk for sale (RS 12, about 25 cents) for a little plastic sealed bag of milk. Proud of my conquest (also bought a loaf of bread), I meandered back down the road.
I went on, and on, and on......and ON...until I looked around and completely did not recognize where I was. (how could I go wrong , tho?? It was only one straight road, and one turn to the right...). Well, somehow I just missed the turn, and kept going. Anyone I asked along the way did not speak enough English to be of help to me. It occurred to me that I could call Assunta, since I had my phone on me. I called her, but her phone didn't pick up (I had forgotten that she had run out of minutes.). I was slightly flumoxed (word?) because I knew that I couldn't be that far off, on the other hand, I really didn't know where I was, and I couldn't tell anybody where I was going, because I had neither the street name, nor the phone number of the house we are staying in (actually, I did have the phone number, but in my mini-panic, I didn't remember that I had it in my phone). SO....I kept sort of walking in circles, absolutely sure that the Communist star and sickle symbol I was staring at on a wall nearby, was NOT the same one I'd seen earlier along the way.
Finally, I sort of stumbled over to a group of men standing by the side of the road, and one of them asked me "French??" (everyone knows Brigitte around here). I said, "No, American". I'm LOST." He looked at me kind of funny, then said "I speak good English!". (YAY!). But he couldn't get the "lost" part until I repeated it several times.
Then I gave him Assunta's number, but he also couldn't get thru on his phone.
"Where do you stay?"
"I don't know!"
(Scratching his head...). "What name street? "
"I don't know!"
"Phone number?"
" I don't know!"
Finally I kept saying "Brigitte, Briggite!"...and he got it. He said "O! No problem, no problem! I take you there."
He walked me down a dirt road --a shortcut back to her house. In that 5 minute walk I got an almost complete outline of his life, and he mine: he's 55, born in 1955, no 'issue' (children), works in Trissur, is Christian Protestant, his 'pet name' is Mohan , but his given name is Charles Simon. He wants to learn yoga but goes to work early in the morning and doesn't get back until 9 pm.
From me he learned my age, my marital status (always a vital piece of information here), I have one child, I am a dancer and yoga teacher, I am coming for Ayurvedic treatment (which he pointed out that few local people could afford), and I look young to have a 29 year old daughter--YAY! : ), and I am staying at Brigitte's house with my French girlfriend. Now of course, everyone in the village will know that we have arrived...
I enjoyed my momentary "lostness", and got nice feeling for the village and its inhabitants. Guess I just sort of overshot my mark when returning. Afterall, I hadn't had my morning cup of tea, it's no wonder!
This is next to Shoranur (average size town) which is in Trissur district (for those of you who REALLY want to know where we are!).
We start our treatment tomorrow morning with doctor appointments, after which we will be prescribed a 21-day course of massages, diet, and other treatments (including doing nothing else : i.e. rest, during this time period. ) That's probably the hardest thing for me...i really want to DANCE --learn some Mohini Attam, move, etc. However, I will follow whatever they say , and I do know that these treatments tend to make one sleepy and a little tired, so maybe once I start, it won't be so difficult to stick to the "doing nothing" prescription. We shall see...
We are staying in a beautiful old Kerala-style home, with large wooden doors and overhanging roof to keep the house cool. We have a large well in the back, attached to the kitchen, where we directly get all our water. In fact, there is a window in the kitchen which opens to the well, and a bucket that can be pulled up (however, water can also be obtained thru the pipes). The house has electricity, but no fridge, no hot water (tho if we really feel like it, we can heat some up on the stove for a hot bucket bath). Otherwise, its really quite warm here in the afternoons, and the water from the well feels refreshing. There's an outside little room for taking a cool shower or bucket bath.
We also have no Internet or television, but there is a landline phone. Our next door neighbor has lived here forever, and is very helpful if we need anything.
We came back late last night on the train from visiting Kunhiraman's village, also our dance teacher (and his niece) Yeshoda's home there. We had a lovely two relaxing days there, and also went with her when she took her mother's ashes to be dispersed in the sea. Her mother died 41 days before, and it was the proscribed time to take the ashes, after a ritual ceremony in the nearby temple by the ocean; all the family members had to bathe in the temple tank (fully immerse themselves) and then came out, and did the same in the ocean. We were happy that we could be with her at this time. Her mother was 86 years old, and died, fully conscious and aware of her family around her. She refused to go to hospital , or have surgery which was suggested. She lived a long and dignified life, and carried on with her daily rituals, almost to the end. She was not interested in traveling far from her village home.
Yeshoda told me an interesting story: her mother had a pet chicken. Every morning the chicken would come around the front of the house, (the chicken pen was in the back), and they would have some sort of interaction every day. When she died, the chicken disappeared, and has not been seen since...they have not found any feathers (if a wild animal got the chicken) or any other evidence of her. She is just gone --like that. A little mystery. A people-animal connection...
So, back to this morning. Because we were gone for the weekend, and we have no fridge, we had no milk for our (most necessary!) morning tea. I decided to walk to the nearest store, somewhere along the main road, to search for milk. I set out early, around 7:30 AM. First I walked to the end of the dirt road that we live on, and came to one little shop, but they didn't have any tea. All the other shops were closed: Sunday morning everything shuts down. So, I kept walking. And walking. And walking...I probably walked about 2 km (but not sure, really!), until finally I hit a more main road. It was a nice morning walk, and I did indeed finally find a little shop that had cold fresh milk for sale (RS 12, about 25 cents) for a little plastic sealed bag of milk. Proud of my conquest (also bought a loaf of bread), I meandered back down the road.
I went on, and on, and on......and ON...until I looked around and completely did not recognize where I was. (how could I go wrong , tho?? It was only one straight road, and one turn to the right...). Well, somehow I just missed the turn, and kept going. Anyone I asked along the way did not speak enough English to be of help to me. It occurred to me that I could call Assunta, since I had my phone on me. I called her, but her phone didn't pick up (I had forgotten that she had run out of minutes.). I was slightly flumoxed (word?) because I knew that I couldn't be that far off, on the other hand, I really didn't know where I was, and I couldn't tell anybody where I was going, because I had neither the street name, nor the phone number of the house we are staying in (actually, I did have the phone number, but in my mini-panic, I didn't remember that I had it in my phone). SO....I kept sort of walking in circles, absolutely sure that the Communist star and sickle symbol I was staring at on a wall nearby, was NOT the same one I'd seen earlier along the way.
Finally, I sort of stumbled over to a group of men standing by the side of the road, and one of them asked me "French??" (everyone knows Brigitte around here). I said, "No, American". I'm LOST." He looked at me kind of funny, then said "I speak good English!". (YAY!). But he couldn't get the "lost" part until I repeated it several times.
Then I gave him Assunta's number, but he also couldn't get thru on his phone.
"Where do you stay?"
"I don't know!"
(Scratching his head...). "What name street? "
"I don't know!"
"Phone number?"
" I don't know!"
Finally I kept saying "Brigitte, Briggite!"...and he got it. He said "O! No problem, no problem! I take you there."
He walked me down a dirt road --a shortcut back to her house. In that 5 minute walk I got an almost complete outline of his life, and he mine: he's 55, born in 1955, no 'issue' (children), works in Trissur, is Christian Protestant, his 'pet name' is Mohan , but his given name is Charles Simon. He wants to learn yoga but goes to work early in the morning and doesn't get back until 9 pm.
From me he learned my age, my marital status (always a vital piece of information here), I have one child, I am a dancer and yoga teacher, I am coming for Ayurvedic treatment (which he pointed out that few local people could afford), and I look young to have a 29 year old daughter--YAY! : ), and I am staying at Brigitte's house with my French girlfriend. Now of course, everyone in the village will know that we have arrived...
I enjoyed my momentary "lostness", and got nice feeling for the village and its inhabitants. Guess I just sort of overshot my mark when returning. Afterall, I hadn't had my morning cup of tea, it's no wonder!
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