Saturday 22nd
September: Kumarakom Lake Resort, Kerala to Courtyard Hotel Marriott (right next door to the Cochin Airport)
Hello from your guest
correspondent, Thelma. I am taking a turn of doing the blog while Di, your
regular correspondent, takes a well-deserved break.
After the chatter of breakfast –
very interesting to listen to the range of topics from life snippets,
interests, families and of course, India and the Indian people – we set about
leaving the Kumarakom Lake Resort to venture on the next stage of our tour.
WhatsApp has already been very busy with photos of the previous evening and
messages from Zoe who has left us briefly but will join us again later in the
tour.
Last memories of the Kumarakom:
·
Paying our room bills – that massage was worth
every Rupee
·
The array of musical instruments in the foyer
·
The lovely staff who waved us farewell
·
The Resort was clearly gearing up for the next
wave of visitors (the tourist season) who were starting to arrive as we left.
After making sure nothing was
left behind (Jenny have you checked your jewellery?) and identifying our
luggage for loading onto the bus, we set off back to Cochin with promised
interesting visits on the way. As well as travelling over some of the very
bumpy flood-affected roads of the previous evening, points noticed en route
included the bright pink water lilies / hyacinths that are only open early in
the morning before the heat of the day. There were an incredible number of
bridges over rivers and backwaters with lovely names such as Cheepanya Bridge;
some with a number of houseboats moored to the river bank nearby.
 |
| Pondering on purchasing whilst Chris chats to Indu |
Our visit to the Kara weavers was
extraordinary. Kara means land / border; referring to the patterns on the woven
cloth. Jopi met us there but we saw again our friends, Indu and her daughter
Chittra and met their wonderful team of the quality control officer, admin assistant,
designer and the first employee in their team. As it was a holiday, there was a
small team, working on an order to be sent to the US; on questioning they
expressed interest in developing markets in Australia. Indu explained the framework
for the organisation:
 |
| 3900 tea towels being packed for distribution to Bloomingdale's in the US: a huge order!! |
·
Kara weavers purchase the items from the
Cooperative according to orders for woven materials that include tea towels,
towels, hotel gowns
·
The Cooperative has a Committee that is
democratically elected for a 5-year term
·
The Cooperative pays the women weavers who often
work in their own homes and within a set radius, for each contract; i.e. shared
payment
·
Website: www.karaweavers.com
Certificates on the wall included
one from the Fair Trade Forum India. The organisation provides impetus to workers
to stay in the weaving profession. Interesting that this is an example of where
shipping containers are used for office and storage. And of course, there was
an opportunity for shopping and quite vast amounts of the Kara stock was
transferred to our suitcases with special orders being filled in ‘magic’ time.
Our itinerary had changed as we
had missed the opening times of the Synagogue by the time we reached
Mattancherry / Jew Town. The delay had nothing to do with the West Coast Eagles
beating (trouncing) Melbourne in the AFL Preliminary Final and more to do with
road delays and missing the turn off to Kara Weavers – our driver managed a
very impressive 3 point turn on a very busy road.
So it was straight to lunch at
the Museum Restaurant, where we had a splendid ‘ginger themed’ lunch with a
great view across the waterways and watched a couple of larger ships leaving
their berths.At the entrance was a huge wooden long boat that required 100's of rowers to power it for ceremonial occasions The Museum was interesting with artefacts for sale and we did
manage to avoid purchasing any large statues to send home.
Following lunch there was an
opportunity for shopping in the shops in the small streets in Jew Town with
interesting arrays of clothing plus incense, perfume and elephant statues.
While we avoided the large buxom reclining elephant (not sure which god was
depicted) tiny elephant incense burner holders were the go.
Back at the bus, we
said goodbye to Gopi and wished him well on his continued enterprises.
Heading toward Seematti, there
were discussions around types of saris and materials. On the way information
included learning about Toddy, the local alcohol drink based on fermented
coconut, and we remembered seeing a sign previously for the Toddy Workers
Welfare Centre. There were also continuing signs of the post flood clean-up and
re-building. The Attara Bridge was surrounded by timber yards and brick/concrete manufacture, obviously in full production for post-flood restoration.
The many other interesting sites included signs for Fashion Paradise, Primerry
School, Hotel Loveland, Donate Eyes – Live Twice, the Lourdes Hospital and Hot
Male Menswear. Interesting that a number of vehicles, particularly trucks, have
‘please toot’ sign on the rear of the vehicle to let the driver know if someone
wants to overtake; such a sign in Australia would (often) result in a rather
rude hand gesture.
 |
| Trying on some of the sarees on offer |
After Seematti it was on to the
Marriott Courtyard Hotel via very busy traffic and interesting sights. At the Marriott,
it was time to farewell Sue H, Sue I, Elaine and Marcia before a light dinner
and off to bed ready for our very early start in the morning.
your guest correspondent
Thelma
PS Apparently when women get married their family and the family of the groom gives you the same number of sarees: on average about 12 each, but can be up to 50 for wealthier families!!! You can assist your family to choose them but that doesn't always happen for the groom's family.
PS Apparently when women get married their family and the family of the groom gives you the same number of sarees: on average about 12 each, but can be up to 50 for wealthier families!!! You can assist your family to choose them but that doesn't always happen for the groom's family.
 |
| The Hotel's specialty: Do you really think they meant 'Grab yourself'? |
No comments:
Post a Comment