We had to fly to Mumbai, then change planes and fly to Chennai.
Chennai is on the East Coast of India whereas Mumbai is on the west coast. Lots
of flying but all went smoothly. Fiona and Gary had it all under control, still
I missed Dinesh.
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| Lakuma, Our New Local Guide |
Arriving in Chennai in the middle of the afternoon we
checked into our hotel and then immediately started our city tour. Our new
guide was Lakuma who has a Doctorate Degree in Tourism with a focus on the
history of South India. She wore a pretty sari and was very proud of her Indian
heritage. We had some drive-byes of the buildings formerly run by the East India Co; it was somewhat of a blur. Many of the former large British buildings
are now Indian Government offices. Unfortunately they look dated and I am not
sure how efficient they are for today's economy or politics. Our one main stop,
before it closed at 5 pm was St. Mary’s Church, the oldest Anglican Church east
of Suez. Built in 1680, it is to my Western mind just an old church, nothing
special,
albeit the apparatus to operate the fans to create some kind of air
movement during service was ingenious. Several slaves stood outside the Church
pulling on ropes attached to pulleys which moved large paddles to “fan” the pious
crowd inside.
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| Inside St. Mary's Church |
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| Two Kids Waiting to Make Their First Communion At St. Mary's Church |
The power struggle between the Moguls and the British caused
all kinds of wars to start here. Naturally the French, Dutch, Portuguese, etc.,
were involved or wanted a slice of the total business and to a degree got it,
yet the EIC was by far the biggest, most powerful trading company, maybe ever.
And all we visited was St. Mary’ Church? Well, Lakuma was not Dinesh. Lakuma
however told us the following while riding in the bus:
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| A Well-Balanced Load |
Madras was the name
only the English used, Chennai was the name of the town for ages in the Tamil Nadu language, the Indian language spoken here. Whenever, among Indians, the
town was written down in their native script, it was always written as Chennai,
never Madras. Madras was only used when speaking or writing in English. The
name Madras was taken from the first fishing village that was there when the
English came, Madraspatnam. A cotton cloth, produced in this area, was light
weight and cool to wear in summer. Originally it was a printed over cloth, workers
would wear but the big sales came when plaid woven cotton fabric was used. This
plaid fabric was made using vegetable dyes that bled when washed; creating a
‘blurry’ plaid that was the epitome of style at one time. The faults in the
yarn, the slubs and nubs the cloth had, the bleeding of the dye colors, all the
negatives were advertised as being unique and ‘ the real thing ‘, it was only
due to advertising that an inferior product became a fashion statement.
Brooks Bros. was the leading fashion house that started this trend.
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| Flower Seller |
There are 29 States within India, 22 speaking their own
language, and some even have their own writing system. To be able to speak to
each other, Hindi, the native language of Hindustan is used and all numbers are
the internationally used numbers. Only in 2010 did the high court of Gujarat
rule on making this official. The written system must be the Devanagari script.
All official government writings are in English, too.
Chennai population changes over the course of the year. While it is
believed that the core population is around 6 million, the seasonal swell of
workers and tourists can bring it to 10 million and more.
The main road in Chennai runs from the airport to downtown, 17
km long. The house numbers run consecutively in a clockwise fashion, so the
house across the street has a totally different number, not even close to your
house number.
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| Happy Kids |
Temperatures can reach 45C in summer and water is very
precious. Monsoon rains are needed to refill reservoirs or soak the fields.
Chennai has not had monsoon rain for the last 4 ½ years. Cyclones (hurricanes)
bring some water but a steady, daily rain (monsoon) is needed desperately.
Chennai’s main industries are: automobiles, leather
production, salt, rice sugar and mango production (mango is not a native fruit
for Tamil Nadu).
Historically cotton and silk were main products but because
of international pressure those commodities have mostly been abandoned in this
region.
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| Kapaleeshwar Temple |
Our group visited the Kapaleeshwar Temple, an ancient temple
dedicated to Lord Shiva. It is said that Lord Shiva pinched off a head of Lord Brahma
to arrest his pride. The crestfallen Lord Brahma came to this spot and did
penance. Carol and I took some time off and did not enter the temple. We are
getting “templed” out.
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| Close Up of Some of the Carvings On the Temple |
We also drove along the famous Marina Beach (2nd longest public beach on earth – Miami is longest). It is a wide beach, busy with people but the ocean waters are not conducive to swimming, too dangerous with currents and pollution. At each end of this long, 50 km long, beach are salt works, salt is extracted for use and export. We did not see the salt works.
Phew! It was a long day. We called it quits for day one, the traveling,
the flights and the heat wore us out.
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| Marina Beach |
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| Asking Directions At the Beach |
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