Pleasant surprises in India's capital

I must confess that I did not do lot of research before embarking on this trip of a lifetime. Cintra and I had always known that one day we would like to visit the country of our forefathers. We knew a little about the places we planned to visit from school geography, news reports, conversations with people from India or who visited South Asia.

Although I would now strongly recommend doing some intentional research before travelling, we enjoyed some of the surprises and “Wows” that come with seeing things with a fresh perspective.

That was true about our visit to the city of Chennai and even more so about the capital city of Delhi. Chennai introduced us to the insane traffic, population density, extreme heat, and a city struggling to cope with the demands of growth. Yet it is rich in history and in many ways a realistic picture of India.

Then two days ago we arrived in Delhi. My, what a contrast! Our host, Wilfred Balraj, brother-on-law of our friend Rev. Mathias Ross, met us at the airport and greeted us like long lost relatives. Wilfred and his daughter, Abigail, have been the most generous and gracious hosts. Wilfred’s wife, Sunitha, is away in Iraq on Unicef business, and is returning home for a short while.

Wilfred took us on a long route to his apartment, so that we could be introduced to the city. All we could express during the drive was one surprise after another. First the streets where all the embassies are located, then palaces and temples and one architectural wonder after another.

The beauty of the landscaping was another shock. We had never seen anything like it. My myths of India were shattered.

For two days, we had the chance to drive along the streets of Delhi on our way to places like restaurants, malls, church, market and so on. On each of these trips we witnessed scenes that amazed and surprised.

One cannot drive through any part of any Indian city without seeing disturbing signs of poverty, homelessness, disrepair and pollution.

The positive signs for us were generally more orderly traffic, environmental awareness and modern lifestyles.

We have not done any touristy things, given the short time until we leave for Agra. However, we found some time for mall and open market browsing as well as enjoying some exceptional dining places.

We have been in India for four weeks and this is the first Hindi speaking place we have been. We were no longer surrounded by Tamil, Singhalese or Mallayam.

The commonly used languages here are Hindi and English.

As we plan to leave for Rajasthan, we look forward to returning to Delhi on two more weekends and hope to enjoy more of what this bustling, beautiful and thriving city has to offer.

Leaving the magic of the Vagamon hills, Kerala

Our visit to Kerala is over and we are preparing for a weekend in Delhi before taking the famed Golden Triangle tour connecting Delhi, Agra and Jaipur.

In spite of being in the southern State of Kerala for just one week, we accomplished far more than we imagined. Two of the days in Kerala were marked by steady monsoon rains and fog than rolled in an out in a blink.

We had a couple of days of clear weather that allowed us to see some of the countryside. On our last night in Cochin, we realized that we had only scratched the surface of this magical State.

Still we want to recap some of the special experiences we enjoyed in addition to the time of relaxation and overwhelming hospitality in the Econest eco-tourism and wellness centre.

We were privileged to be invited to a small Hindu wedding in a nearby town. We witnessed the ceremony, enjoyed a tasty lunch and took pictures with the bride bridegroom.

In Sri Lanka, we had visited a tea factory but did not see the actual process because no one worked on Sunday. In the Vagamon hills, we finally got the full experience of how tea is made.

After our visit to Econest was over, we went to Cochin for the final night before our flight to Delhi. We had just a few hours to take in some sightseeing in Cochin, including a tour of the Archeological Museum, housed in the former palace of the Cochin Kings Rama Varma.

This was also our only time to meet relatives of my niece, Natasha. We stopped briefly to join her husband, Ashraf's, sister Farzana and her family and join them in breaking fast as part of their observance of the Holy Month of Ramadan.

Here are a few scenes from the museum and boat tour.

Now our sights are set on the capital city of Delhi as well as attractions of the Taj Mahal and Golden Temple of Amritsar in the adjoining states of Rajasthan and Punjab respectively.

Please keep us in your prayers and continue to join us on this journey to South Asia.

A rocky experience on our last day in Vagamon hills

Now this is a blog I did not expect to write. But I must confess that today the tranquility of our stay in the Vagamon hills of Kerala was shattered. Cintra and I found ourselves on the rockiest, bumpiest ride on a four-wheel drive than we have ever before experienced.

It all started when our friend at Econest: Ashasadan offered to help us enjoy another calm, rainless day by going for a half-hour drive to a farm. Sounds simple and painless.

So we joined him and Jibu (the other physician on site at the centre) on Jay’s four-wheel drive to this special place. We enjoyed a couple of kilometres of paved roads and then some gravel, followed by rocks that seem to get larger each time.

Earlier in the day, Jay and Thomas, the new manager, took us on a visit to a tea factory. On that ride, I pointed out to Jay that his fuel guage was on E. “Not to worry,” he assured us. “I know how much I have. It is quite enough.”

Now on this rocky road to who-knows-where, the ride was getting bumpier and the roads were getting higher. As we traveled another couple of kilometres in these conditions with no civilization in sight, I asked, “What if we run out of diesel? How will we get back?” Jay repeated his confidence in his tank.

I drew upon my reserve supply of faith and accepted his assurance.

We started to go downhill over some very uneven tracks, and as we got to the bottom, the engine sputtered and fell silent. A few turns of the key yielded nothing. I suggested he dip a twig into the tank to check the level. He did and found there was a trace, but not enough.

So we continued on foot. I was not prepared for outdoors, so I had casual slippers. Cintra used an umbrella for support and I found a short pipe to use as a walking stick. We continued, trying hard to find safe spots on which to step.

After what seemed like about three kilometres, we saw a building and a truck. Jay rushed on foot, had a conversation in Malayalam and waved to us to stay where we were.

Then the truck engine started with a ‘roll start’ and headed our way. It had an open back, so Jay, Dr. Jibu and another chap hopped on the back and Cintra and I squeezed into the cab with the slightly large driver. There was barely enough room for my leg to leave space for the floor shift.

If the drive coming down in Jay’s truck was rough, this was out of this world. I have never been bumped up and down so much in my life. By the way, seat belts are not generally used here.

The bumps shook up every part of my body, including my bladder. And we were dangerously close to the edge of a cliff and the driver was quite non-challant as he held the steering with one hand.

We made it to Jay’s disabled truck, left the three guys and we accepted the offer to have the elder four-wheeler drive us back to Econest.

Cintra had previously declined an offer to have a Reiki treatment by either Dr. Mercy or Dr. Jibu . After the ride, she visited Mercy for a treatment. We will continue to more peaceful existence for the remaining few hours of our visit.

A Needed Respite Between Hectic Touring in South Asia

We are at about the half-way mark of our trip to South Asia, and we seemed to have arrived in the Indian State of Kerala at the right time. The visits to Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka were exciting, but hot and exhausting.

We are preparing for an equally demanding period when we leave this weekend for Delhi, with side trips to Rajasthan (Taj Mahal) and Punjab (Golden Temple of Amritsar).

So being in a part of India that is well-known for its exquisite beauty as well as refreshingly cool mountain air seems just what we needed.

What we have seen and experienced so far here is almost beyond description. Our stay at Econest: Ashasadan has been nothing short of blissful. We have enjoyed extraordinary hospitality in a simple, almost rustic style. Their emphasis here is to create an atmosphere of family.

To be afforded such gracious hospitality in this Walden Pond environment will leave lasting memories for Cintra and me.

We have beautiful memories that are embedded in our minds of majestic mountains, panoramic valleys, towering pines, lush tea plantations, and raging, frothy waterfalls.

So here are some of those scenes we captured on an unusually glorious, sunny day, after several days obscured by constant rain and dense fog.

From lofty mountain grandeur

Several years ago, I met an Indian man on an airport shuttle in Minneapolis and told him I planned to visit India. He told me that I must visit Kerala; it is the most beautiful place in India.

My niece Tasha's husband, Ashraf, is from Kerala, so we knew this was a must for us. And here we are, relaxing a cabin on top of a mountain in an Eco-tourism and healing centre, operated by our friends Ajit and Mercy.

In our exchanges before we came here, Ajit had never described this place in any detail. He did tell us there were tea plantations on the mountain and that Mercy, a medical doctor, did a lot of work in natural remedies for patients.

Seeing and experiencing this centre has opened up a whole new world for us. Naturally, the first thing that overwhelms you is the natural beauty -- the breathtaking beauty of the mountains, valleys and rivers. If ever I felt like singing "How Great Thou Art," this is it. The words "When I look down from lofty mountain grandeur, then I proclaim, 'My God, How Great Thou Art,'" were never so true.

It was a wonderful reunion with Ajit, whom we had met when he was a guest as global partner at a Saskatchewan Conference meeting seven years ago. He was our guest at our home and insisted we should come to India and we said we would but didn't know when.

It was a special joy to meet Mercy, his wife, because Cintra has a particular interest in her work with alternative treatments, especially with diabetes.

This seems to be a perfect location for this community service. Established in 1987, Econest: Ashasadan offers an ideal opportunity to nature lovers for relaxation, mixing with nature, researching, meditating and simply just being alone or with others.

Ajit explained that this mountain top property was originally built by Laurie Baker, a master architect. Baker, a Quaker, was a companion of Mahatma Gandhi and chose this place as his home to have easy access to a nearby Ashram. He literally built his house, in which Ajit and Mercy now live, on a rock.

The cottages, which were later added as residences for women visitors to the Ashram, were built Laurie Bakerian-style, using traditional material, with large windows, to fully engage the senses in absorbing the natural surroundings of streams, lakes, lush mountains and waterfalls.

After Baker died, the buildings fell into disrepair and was vandalized and looted by villagers.

Ajit and Mercy took it over about 30 years ago and fully restored it. With his background in social sciences and interest in agriculture, and hers in natural remedies, this was a great combination.

Mercy had been working in a nearby hospital that was providing health services to the poor, similar to services she provided when she worked with Mother Teresa and the Medical Mission Sisters and Bombay.

Ajit and Dr. Mercy, as she is called, were committed to a common vision of protecting Mother Nature as well as to offer holistic health support to the poor using nature to its best advantage.

Econest: Ashasadan is ideally located in the midst of three hills - Thangal, Murgan and Kurushumala and is part of an Eden-like wonder that offers so many opportunities. It is an inter-religious centre, operated by a Trust. Their funding comes mainly from outside charitable organizations and not from patients or guests.

Econest attempts to be as self-reliant as possible, with using all material waste to create heat, using solar to fill some of its energy needs, using its own water systems, and even in the kitchen using natural and local foods and grinding their own grains. All water is returned to the waterways and become part of the waterways that serve a local hydroelectric plant.

One of the special services of the centre is Ayurvedic Massage, something that immediately caught Cintra's attention and of which she took advantage. Also, she was interested to learn that some of the natural remedies have cured patients with a variety of conditions such as diabetes and fibromyaglia, according to Mercy.

Visitors to Econest not only benefit from its programs and services, but have easy access to all the opportunities surrounding it. Nature lovers can explore at leisure. It is a hub for inter-faith reflection and exploration, especially for Hinduism, Christianity and Islam.

Close to the centre are the Ashram, shrines and holy places, including the 14 stations of the cross going about 1.5 km up a mountain.

For the short time we are here, the monsoon rain, fog and cool weather are hampering our effort to fully absorb what Econest and its surroundings have to offer. However, we feel we have already had a life-changing experience, just being here.

Here are some photos taken through a heavy fog of our cabin, the centre's farm, view of the lake from our window and and the dining room.

We have also had other memorable experiences that are such a departure for the past three weeks in South Asia. Our arrival turned out to be a little more adventurous than we expected. We arrived at the Kochi International Airport, not sure what to expect next. Ajit offered to send a car for us, so we sent photos of us to help the driver. He gave us the mobility number of the driver in case of a problem.

Waiting outside the terminal, we did not see anyone who looked like our driver. So with some help, I called the number. An anxious, panting voice answered and said the car would be there soon and that he was walking.

I am not sure I heard right, so I waited. Soon enough, a young man rushed up to us, no car, with an email with our photo, and introduced himself. Yes, he walked. The car was in a monstrous traffic jam. About an hour away from the airport, he jumped out of the car, and asked his driver to continue while he walked to the airport.

Within minutes, a car actually showed up. Our interim host, Jay (Jain) and the driver, Ramesh, couldn't be a more welcome and somewhat surprising sight. This is a welcome like we've never experienced.

Then we entered the traffic mayhem. It was about two hours before we got out of it. Then we slowly entered the country side, where we gained more speed, and the climb up the mountain began.

It was getting dark and we could barely see some peaks and valleys and some tea plantations. Then rain started, followed by dense fog. So our view of the panoramic landscape was obscured.

We soon learned that this is monsoon time. So we are to expect lots of rain in addition to the cool weather. (Ashraf had reminded us to bring outerwear).

However, it is important to emphasize that as much of our family, friends, and other readers of this blog, may want to remember the physical beauty of this place, or to focus on the commitment to service, it is more important to remember the many poor and disadvantaged persons who need the support of the centre.

Econest is in the middle of building an Ayurvedic hospital to include holistic health services as well as radiology and pharmacy.They rely and public and community support and local labor to continue their work.

They will appreciate your support through your prayers or any other contributions you wish to make. For ministers thinking of a place for sabbatical, this is worth considering. For persons interested in natural remedies, there is much to do and learn. This centre and surrounding areas offer much to people who are interested in inter-religious exploration. It is a model of recycling, energy conservation and environmental stewardship.

We hope to have more to share about the centre and the rest of Kerala. Please continue to join us and keep us in your prayers.

A visit to one of Cintra's favorite things

When we decided to visit Sri Lanka, it was with the primary purpose of visiting Upali Jayasekara, whom Cintra knew even before she started at University of Saskatchewan.We did not anticipate the richness of the island in so many ways, including conservation of the significant elephant population.

We also did not know that Sri Lanka is the world's largest exporter of cinnamon and that Upali has one of the major cinnamon plantations on the island. What we have known for years is that cinnamon is Cintra's favorite spice. She loves it so much she once considered naming her first daughter "cinnamon."

That should give an idea how important this visit to the plantation was to us.

The drive was about three hours, so we left home right after breakfast. As usual it was steamy hot, and worse because the car has to AC, among other things.

After a while we stopped for tea at a favorite spot for Upali. There we were introduced to the "happiest man alive," a parking security man with the most cheerful disposition and the loudest natural whistle.

The drive felt normal for the first half, and then we got close to the shore of southern Sri Lanka where the tsunami devastated 10 years ago. It was sad to see concrete pillars standing with no house on them, properties in shambles, empty lots where there used to be houses.

It is painful to imagine what it must have been like to have this massive and sudden tidal wave virtually erase the homes of these villagers. The solid construction generally survived, but the less sturdy homes of the poorer folk could not withstand the catastrophic force of the tsunami. You learn to put a flooded basement in Regina in perspective.

Sadly, many lives were lost and the lives of the survivors and the entire population were forever changed. This was their 9/11 and Katrina.

Our drive continued as we turned into a country road toward the plantation. We stopped at the home of the plantation foreman, parked and hopped into his three-wheeler, otherwise called an auto-rickshaw.

Cintra had ridden in a three-wheeler taxi in Chennai, but this was my first time.

We couldn't use Upali's car because of the narrow, muddy, unstable road into the plantation. The drive seemed even more adventurous when I found we were driving close to a river that is known to have the occasional crocodile. We did see two water monitors.

We drove through a field of cinnamon trees and finally made it to the plantation house. We found workers stripping cinnamon bark from the branches. It was an amazing experience to learn about the cutting of the trees, scraping the skin off the branch, rubbing the bark before cutting and removing the bark, drying and bundling the bark.

Before we left, one of the workers climbed a coconut tree using a rope, hand picked some coconuts, and another cut them for us to drink the water and then split them for us to enjoy the jelly.

We left and made a brief stop at another building where cinnamon leaves are used to make cinnamon oil. There is also a process in other plantations to use bark to make oil.

We both felt we couldn't be more fortunate to visit this plantation and even more privileged to know it is owned by a good friend who gave us a personal tour.

Knowing we had long drive back to Colombo, we took a few minutes to have an abbreviated visit to a UNESCO World Heritage Site at Galle, a few kilometres away.

This enormous fort was first built by the Portuguese in the 15th century, and further developed by the dutch in the 16th century and developed further by the British later. The result is a spectacular community, surrounded by giant stone fortress, offering diverse cultures, scenic environments near the ocean, and European architecture and roadways. The town is steeped in history and archeology and attracts thousands of visitors.

Our limited time did not allow us to explore Galle; however it was an experience of a lifetime just to have an overview. If you have a chance, please check it on the internet.

Now that pretty well wraps up our tour of Sri Lanka, the cinnamon capital of the world, among other distinctions. Next we return to India to spend a week with Ajit Murecken on his eco-tourist site of Econest in Vagamon, Kerala.

Thanks for coming along and Ayubowan from Sri Lanka.

Will that be BOP or OP?

our amazing visit to Sri Lanka is almost over. We barely scratched the surface of this wonderful island, and yet we feel overwhelmed. In a word, it was "elefantastic (soon to appear in Wikipedia)!

This island has been called by many names -- the gem of the Indian Ocean, the land of elephants, the resting place of the tooth relic. In addition to those, we will also think of it as the land of tea.

Of course, we have not been to China, and we are about to see the plantations in India, but there was nothing more breathtaking as to see the hillsides with rolling tea fields.

As tea lovers, Cintra and I took a special interest in this aspect of our vacation. To be clear, we are not connoisseurs. We mostly use tea bags and generally drink what is available in the grocery store (on sale).

Of late, we have acquired some special herbal teas and flavored tes. We enjoy flowering tea in the clear teapot andd I enjoy loose tea from a Brewt.

But we soon found out we really know nothing about tea. I had no idea there were so many types of tea and so many grades. If you haven't done so, you must visit a tea plantation if or when you travel to Asia.

On our visit to the tea factory high in the mountains of southern Sri Lanka, we were first shown the wilting, then the sifting and crushing. We missed the picking because we were tehre on a Sunday, a day off for pickers and factory workers.

Also, they do not do flavoring at that plant. So the fruit flavored and Earl Grey and others are made elsewhere.

But we learned about the highest grade called Pekoe, or you can have orange pekoe (OP) or broken orange pekoe (BOP) or broken orange pekoe flowery (BOP F), and so on.

So back in Colombo we found ourselves browsing through the tea sections of stores. There we found the shelves sorted by the grades as well as tea plantations. And plantations could make a difference because climate and elevation are factors too. This was as complicated as choosing wines!

We tried to order tea - just ordinary black tea - wherever we went. In a country where English is not a first language, ordering tea the way we like it is not easy.1"

Here is a typical scenario. We ask the server for tea. He (usually a man) is about to fill our order and we stop him. "Wait," we say, "we want it with no sugar. no milk, and very weak."

Guess what. None of those translate into Sinhalese or Tamil. He looks at us puzzled. We repeat, this time with dramatic hand gestures. And he replies, :no sugar, no milk." We confirm and add, "very weak." He confirms in return.

Moments later, he arrives with a tray containing two tea cups with milky tea, and a bowl of sugar. "We do not want milk," we tried to explain. He has a confused, pained look, and takes it back to the kitchen. After a while, he shows up with tea - no milk, no sugar. We drink it and gasp. "Oh that is way too strong!" Oh the poor waiter. So we ask for hot water and dilute our tea.

This is repeated in every place we travel. Yesterday, the guy in Orbits in Majestic Centre mall food court, after not understanding my order, said, "Oh you want black tea!" So I will try that, although that is not exactly what I want.

We look forward to one last outing when we will visit Upali's cinnamon plantation and the old Dutch fort of Galle.

Please join us.