Hi All,

  So many of you have written saying you are quite relieved at our change of plans.  We do appreciate that.   What is a bit reassuring is that almost all of the cruisers who made the passage from Malaysia or Thailand to Galle, Sri Lanka and then to Cochin are saying that it was just about their worst passage ever.  I find that reassuring because we made it under our own power and with almost all systems in tact by the end.  Of course, we did manage to avoid some of the worst of the storm while friends were stuck pretty much in it.  But whatever happened DoraMac and Randal got us here safe and sound. 

  We don’t have many plans in place for the time starting now. We will plan to leave India for the Maldives at the end of the month.   We plan to stop first at Uligan an island in the northern most part of the Maldives because it has great diving and we do have four diving tanks we’d filled to use in the Red Sea.  Then we will head on to Marmaris to pack up DoraMac and ship her off.  Other than that our plans are so new we have no details.   Here are some follow-up photos and odds and ends.

Ru

DoraMac

Cochin Miscellaneous

My treatment ladies.

This morning was my last treatment so I asked the ladies if I could take their photo. The one on the left is engaged and will marry in 7 months. The one on the right is married with two young children in primary school. They live about 200 kilometers from Cochin so stay in rooms upstairs in the treatment building. During a month they get 4 days off but both worked on me the entire 7 days I was there. When I asked about that, they smiled and shrugged and said there were no other women workers. They earn 4,000 rupees per month. I don’t know if they pay for their room and food or if that’s part of their pay. I speak no Malayalam and their English was a bit limited. They were very sweet and concerned and made it all bearable And the pain mostly seems gone.

When they work, their saris are pulled up around their knees and they wear the purple aprons tied around their waists to try to keep most of the oil off their uniforms.

Sarah Cohen – corrections.

This is the real photo of Sarah Cohen’s wedding…I found that out during my second visit. In the other photo, Sarah was standing to the brides left.

Abdul, Sarah, Thaha

I had met Thaha the first visit but assumed he was Abdul who was mentioned in the Washington Post article. They are brothers and both help Sarah.

I also read in Kerala and Her Jews that Prime Minister Indira Gandhi came to Cochin for the 400^th anniversary of the Cochin Synagogue to take part in the celebration.

Hungry for information; they really do eat paper and about anything else so are the trash collectors of Mattancherry.

This jazzy tuk tuk either said Elvis or reminded me of Elvis, but somehow Elvis sticks in my mind.

The driver was very nice and took me to the veggie and fruit street and then drove around looking for a bakery that sold whole wheat bread.

One evening 12 of us took the ferry across to Ernakulam for dinner at the Grand Hotel. It took 4 tuk tuks carrying 3 cruisers each to get us there.

Americans Bill and Amy on Estrelitta, homeport, Florida.

Bill and Judy on BeBe, from Texas and Michael and Linda on B’Sheret, from Wisconsin.

Michael and Linda are the friends we’ll travel with to New Delhi. They, and Bill and Judy on BeBe are also shipping their boats.

Brits Terry and Fiona on Roam II

They came from the Mediterranean this past year and are heading towards South East Asia.

Brits Chris and Trish on Sapristy registered in South Africa

After dinner we loaded back into the tuk tuk parade back to the ferry pier. Fiona had called the Bolgatty Hotel and it had sent a small boat to bring us all back to the marina since the public ferry had stopped running at 8pm. We paid 10 rupee per person.

Three young working women came to visit.

I met these ladies on the ferry from Ernakulam back to Bolgatty. They were going to spend an hour or so walking around the resort. They took out their camera phones and made a short video about me. They bought some bags of popcorn from a vendor and gave one to me. I invited them to our boat. They asked how India compared to China. I wish they could talk with our Chinese friends BoBo, Zoey and Singkey. They all look so lovely in their saris. Two of the women are 24 and one 23. They work here in Cochin and live in a “hostel” because home, where their parents live, is too far and I guess they don’t want to live at home any more.

Bolgatty guards at the gate.

When the marina was first built lots of people came to see the boats and climb all over them so guards were added and RULES. Now tour boats go by the marina and we wave and say hello.

Hi All

This morning I set off with friends on a "last visit to Jew Town" because when I left the boat this morning we were about to do a passage to the Red Sea and on to the Mediterranean. 

Ru

DoraMac

Return to Jew Town with Linda and Michael from B’Sheret

Our friends Linda and Michael hadn’t yet been to Jew Town or the Synagogue so I acted as tour guide. We had a lovely time. Randal came and met us for lunch and then he and Michael went off to do boat parts shopping and Linda and I to do our shopping. I bought a long skirt to wear in Oman and Yemen and Eritrea where we won’t be going. I also bought some pants with elastic around the ankles and I can pull them up higher on my leg to make really blowzy short pants to keep out of the wet in squat toilets. Linda excellently negotiated the price of the pants for me. Randal and Michael didn’t find boat parts so settled for a beer at the Seagull.

Bazar Road scene

Coffee break after our visit to the Synagogue

Michael and Linda

Bright colorful cloth sunbrellas for sale at the book shop just down from the Synagogue.

They really look like fun but most people just use regular cheap lightweight umbrellas.

A lesson in how to tell a genuine pashima which could be summed up to “the one that costs the most.”

We actually did learn quite a bit and you could feel the difference in the real pashima yarn. But they were way too expensive so we were all just looking.

Teeny, tiny copper elephants that I just had to have…… so tiny you can’t see them in the photo but they are around the edge of the table. Linda negotiated for me here too. He never had a chance; she’s good.

I’m wearing my ‘Not Red Sox hat.” I’m thinking I’ll color the words Red Sox on the brim.

The locked gate to the Jewish Cemetery

Linda and I walked to the cemetery at the edge of Jew Town but the gate was locked and no caretakers within like the one in George Town, Penang.

Space for what once was a thriving community but now is less than ten.

The cemetery in George Town was the same, space for people who had moved to other countries.

We were intrigued by this building but no signs explained its origins.

They stopped to say hello and introduced themselves and asked our names and were quite curious about our interest in the building. Their English was pretty limited to hello, what’s your name….Both were in the 7^th grade.

The taller boy wanted me to take his photo and sort of coerced his friend too.

Inside the building was dust and dark and some odd statues.

Shopkeeper’s niece.

In a small shop across from the Fort Kochi ferry, Linda and I were looking at postcards and puppets when this young girl came in. She had just had her hand decorated with henna.

Tour boat goes by the marina

Early in the morning before we left for Jew Town, this tour boat went by with a loud, jovial group of young men.

Frisbee toss

Randal keeps a supply of Frisbees on the bow and this was the first time he was able to toss them to a passing boat. He was one for three.