We made it!

We have now been in India almost two days, staying in Fort Cochin - a sleepy beach town by India's standards.  It is beautiful here with lots of green foliage and walks along the beach.  The town is known for the Chinese fishing nets that dot the coast.  It takes 4 men to operate one of these nets.

So far we have just been walking around and trying to get used to the sounds, smells, and tastes of this place.  The smell of burning trash is by far the worst and I can only imagine what the bigger cities will be like.  My mom says we will get used to the smells eventually.

Fort Cochin is in the state of Kerala, with the largest Christian population in the country.  Christmastime brings lots of tourists to the area and the town is covered in Christmas lights and paper star lanterns that light up at night. We were told that last night during the carnival they burned an effigy of Santa Claus.  We unfortunately were too jet lagged to make it though! The following is a picture of some of the lights in the town park, which was packed with people last night.

Above is Jeff's first meal - masala dosa.  Absolutely delicious and cost about $0.50!

Tomorrow we are taking a boat ride through the Kerala backwaters and the day after we plan on heading to Munnar, a hill station about a 5 hr bus ride away.


We are still figuring out the best way to upload pictures, so stay patient with us!

We're almost off!

The apartment is cleaned out, the storage unit is packed 15 feet high (let's hope for no earthquake), the cat is with her grandma, we've said most of our goodbyes, and we are almost packed for the trip.  Another 36 hours and we fly out! (And then another 30 hours of travel time before we actually reach India.)