Weekend in Madurai (Ma-Dry)

The Children of the World ( a brief interlude) The setting is the top of our 7 story hotel in Madurai. It's a cool damp night and their is a high cloud cover. William and I are sitting at a 25ft long table, all around are the voices of the 30 other projects abroad volunteers, who've come from every part of the world. Their is a Frenchman named Roman, a loud Italian of Indian birth, a Persian who was born and raised in french Canada, several from the UK, and stragglers from the rest of Europe including, France, Germany, Netherlands, and Italy. Everyone is asking the same questions: where are you from, what is your placement, how long have you been her,e how long until you leave. Their is a unifying bond being formed through the thirty students eating diner on the roof regardless of their country of origin or language spoke (although everyone spoke English.) It was a truly amazing experience to meet these people and hear their stories and be able to tell my own. Never before have I felt like a citizen of Earth and merely US by passport.




Now to the weekend.


Friday:

William and I left Karaikudi at around 4pm Friday afternoon we got into a bus where both of our knees where smashed in the sheet metal back of the seats in front of us. The inside of the bus had so much un-rounded sheet metal inside that I felt like i was traveling in a Cuisinart. We arrived at the Hotel Supreme 2.5 hours later and got checked in to our room (AC finally!) which was about $60 for two nights. We immediately headed up to the roof top veg restaurant and met up with Christine the American studying medicine and Mohammad (38P MCAT) the Persian from Montreal. Will and I drank clean water and talked with them and slowly everyone trickled in. We ate western style food (first in a week and a half) and told stories. After diner we all headed down to the Apollo 96 which the spaceship themed bar in the basement of the hotel. I ordered a $2.00 double whiskey and coke and sat back and met everyone. Too quickly the bar was kicking us out (Indian bars close at 11) Max (Englishman) Will a few other and I wandered down the road until we found a bar willing to serve us to midnight. At midnight they asked us to leave after selling us a couple bottles of whiskey and vodka and we went back to the hotel where all thirty volunteers and the three desk officers met up with us and we partied till about 2 or 3 in the morning.

Saturday:

We started Saturday off by traveling to the ruins of an old large palace which I photographed extensively. Their is not much more to say about the palace just view the pictures. After that we ate another western meal and nine of us headed to a theme/water park. The water park was amazing and almost completely out of place in India. It was located on the outskirts of Madurai. It was almost completely empty and it was a sunny and hot Saturday. The park was divided in to two sides the first being a large pool with a canal running its perimeter. Their was about 12 or so slides ranging from tubes to speed slides. A few of which would never be allowed in the west. It was a blast! They also had a wave pool and artificial water fall you could stand under. The second half of the park had about a half dozen more extreme slides which we rode. Overall the park was great and very clean. Saturday night we all ate diner on the roof again and a most of went to the Apollo 96 for a beer (nothing like Friday night)


Sunday:

We started the day by going to the Meenakshi temple (a very large Hindu temple) we spent sometime there I was blessed by an elephant the put their snout on your head and then spent the rest of the day shopping in Madurai.We went to the tailor shops where you can get Indian Cotton shirts and trousers made. I got two shirts made for me which cost about $10. I also picked up some presents for people back home (sorry can't say what, surprise!) Will and I then took another very painful and long bus ride home and here I am back at the cafe. I feel like this ran short at the end but I don't really feel like typing more. I will try to upload some more pictures for everyone but it is slow. I just started the upload and also realized that I shot most of the weekends pictures as .RAW so most of them you wont be able to see until I get home. Which reminds me I will post the link to my Flickr photostream once I'm home so that my loyal followers can view my photos.


William and I at the shops In Madurai. Where the tailors and such are.

Another views of the shops. some volunteers (dont know who) looking at scarves and trying to avoid the pushy salesman.

Temple with will in the foreground taking a photo

pond at the temple. that small gold statue in the middle is a lotus that is solid gold and weighs 130kg.