Cochin Weekend

Overall, awesome weekend!

Cochin, now known as Kochi, is located in the south western state of Kerala, right on the coast. It is an incredibly beautiful place, lush and green, and extremely colorful. We had a great time relaxing, a little shopping and some sightseeing. To see all the pictures, click on this link

Cochin is famous for 3 things:

• Seafood
• The backwaters
• Furniture

Obviously, I didn't buy much furniture (trying to squeeze an armoire into my two bags wouldn't be easy), but I definitely enjoyed the first two! The seafood was so great, I more than ate my fill of crab, prawns and lobster! Based right on the water, Cochin is recognizable for the giant Chinese fishing nets that you can see in the harbors. They're Chinese nets because the Chinese are the ones who introduced them to the Keralans (see the picture at the left). They're really crazy looking and when you go to the shores and check out the fishing nets, you also see the fishing stalls. The fisherman catch it, lay it out on the ground and will slice it up and cook it for you. While it was SUPER tempting (or not), I stuck with the food at the restaurant.

The backwaters are the Indian version of a chain of small rivers that weave in and out of the city. You can rent these boats and basically go for overnight rides all along the coast. Unfortunately we weren't able to do that, but we did go for an hour long ride around the main bay at sunset which was pretty cool.

And lastly, oh the shopping. While Cochin is famous for the furniture shopping, really they just have shopping in general. Jewelry, pashmina, furniture, art, antiques, cheap toy rickshaws...no matter what you're in the market for they have it. And they also like to yell at you as you walk by and try to convince you to come into their shop, which interestingly enough...didn't work on me. I didn't do as much shopping as some, but I did walk away with two really cool paintings (one on the right, one on the left) from a local artist. Where these will go in my flat back in Mpls, who knows, but they're awesome!! And where was all this wonderful shopping? Jewtown. Seriously. That's the name of the area of Cochin. The original settlement of the Jewish Indians built around a beautiful old synagogue, it just goes to tell you how India feels about P.C.

The best part of our trip though had to be the hotel. The Taj Malabar is truly amazing. Incredibly beautiful and peaceful, it was the perfect get away from noisy and crowded Bangalore (especially as there was some crazy statue unveiling in the city this weekend so they closed everything in order to prevent rioting...seriously over a statue). I also got my first (and last) massage while I was there. I know, everyone talks about how wonderful the massages are there and how cheap they are (which is true), but I just haven't gotten around to getting one. However, the amazing massage I had in Cochin more than made up for it. Feeling relaxed.

Which is perfect timing as I head into my last week at work...

Lots to do, little time.