The train ride there was an experience in itself. We took sleeper cars because it was a ten hour journey and left in the evening to arrive on Friday morning. The trains are very very crowed, and are set up as bunk beds, three bunks high and each ticket is a bed. However "bed" is a very loose interpretation. It is really just a vinyl bench that you are expected to sleep on, however with all the bumping and clamoring and babies crying and people coming by to sell you fruit and coffee, no one really sleeps. I especially, did not sleep because my assigned bed was across from a stranger. So I was lying about three feet away from some old Indian man who kind of smelled and I had this feeling he was eying my bookbag the whole time. Since I couldn't sit up and read or write (bunk beds remember?) I clutched my things and looked out the window nearly the entire ten hours.
[This is what train cabins look like. Not fancy and VERY close together]Somehow the train ride was worth is because the town of Ooty is the very opposite of Chennai. It is high up in the mountains on the west side of India. The town is not much bigger than that of little Hazlehurst Mississippi but it is perched on the side of a big slippery mountain. It reminded me very much of some places in Latin America because it was surrounded by jungle and cloud forest. The people there were so friendly and adorable. If anyone ever wants to film a movie in India, I highly recommend you go there, because everyone loves to be photographed and they will force feed you tea and cookies. Some people even gave Deepa and I flowers, called it the "Ooty rose".
[view from the hillside]
[view from the hillside]Before I go on about all the sights and adventures, its important to know that this trip was made possible by Neely and his family who arranged for all 15 of us to come and visit them. The whole weekend we joked that Neely was the "Prince of Ooty". I say this because his three uncles who live there own what seems like all of the important and thriving businesses in town (hospital, tea factory, hotel, real estate, spa etc.). They arranged for a private bus to pick us up from the train station and drive us all around town for the entire weekend. They also organized our hotel stay which was just a 30 second walk from their property. They were amazing tour guides and continually made sure we were fed (and god knows we were FED). Basically, they made sure we had an amazing time and we were so thankful for their hospitality.
We ate most of our meals at First or Second Uncles house. (I call them this because they all had really long names that we couldn't pronounce very well but to our relief they insisted we call them Uncle. Plus they introduced themselves to us in order of their birth and so that is how we remember them).
We did so much hiking, it was amazing to be outside in cool fresh calm air. The mountains are gorgeous, complete with waterfalls, lakes, cliffs, and monkeys (OOHH the monkeys...). The center of town is full of shops and tea stalls and churches of many denominations. We saw flocks of kids going to and from schools and they were usually followed by flocks of dogs and sometime mules (we never did figure out why there are so many donkeys there. They are not pets. They are not used as work animals. No one eats them. They just hang out everywhere and poop in inconvenient places). However we spent most of our time in the outskirts of town where our hotel and our hosts lived.
On Saturday, we went to Neelys family's tea factory. The Anand family owns the plantations, the factory and the distribution business. We saw the process of planting, picking and making the precious green tea the makes the little town thrive. When I talk about tea, I don't mean the thin watery stuff that comes from tea bags. Their tea is creamy and sweet. It is mixed with milk, served piping hot and is loaded with antioxidants (all workers at the factory told me "tea good for health!"). It is more like what we know as Chai tea and I purchased a lot to bring back. They even gave us a discount because we were with the owner. I took that as a justification to buy more :)
Saturday night we tried to go out to a club (if you haven't picked up on this: we have a very lively group, love to dance and be rowdy Americans on occasion). We should have know that would fail. Neely took us to the only dance floor in town - it was in the basement of the only Holiday Inn in town and you guessed it...we were the only people there. But we still had fun and had a few Kingfishers (the only beer widely accepted in India).
The monkeys there are a constant source of amusement (although some people were just plain petrified of them.) I don't know what breed they are, but there are little and wrinkly and remind me of the flying ones from the Wizard of Oz (minus the wings). Anyway, we had an odd encounter with some of the family who lived on the roof of the hotel. One morning the ringleader monkey ran in to our room and took bananas and potato chips that were sitting on the sofa. It ran out with them and ate them on the porch right in front of us. I am not making this up. I took many pictures and am still a little bitter that they stole the only junk food I could get my hand on in that entire town.
[one of the monkeys that stole my food]More later.
-S
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