The hotel in Kannur, on the north Kerala coast, is set on a little cliff. Two sets of breakers keep crashing, dividing between themselves the sight and sound effects. You hear only the suppressed roar of those right below you; those forming and collapsing some distance out, over what must be a submerged rise in the seabed, can be seen but not heard.
Early in the morning, before the sun is up, little strings of light are sprinkled on the dark sea. As it gets bright, these become sets of mechanised fishing vessels, a bigger one leading the way and smaller ones trailing. I suddenly disturb the peace and ask others in the group to come and see. There, a bit before the boats, I have spotted the outline of a hump, fin and tail emerge and disappear in an arch — a dolphin happily playing outrider to the boats. The others can’t see it, and mutter about my imagination. I am so thrilled I couldn’t care about the jibe.
Through the morning some boats are stationary, like matchsticks bobbing in the sea. As the day progresses, some skip the waves in what must be a homeward journey with the catch of the day. Birds circle over them, picking up the leftovers while the fishermen do the sorting. What loneliness the fishermen must know, making them natural winners among philosophers.
A good part of the journey to the sea has been distinctive. Outside Mysore, as the forest begins, the bamboo clumps are yellow with age, some fallen. The sign asks cars to be careful about elephants crossing. In vain; none emerges. Then it is coffee plantations, row upon row of hedges with coffee bushes comfortable in the shade of tall trees. Soon we are in a quintessential coffee plantation town. There are an incredible number of car accessory shops on the main street, where cars crawl and the roadsides are jammed with parked cars. It must have been a good year for coffee.
And then, when the ghat roads begin, we are plunged into as dense and rich a forest as I have seen. The little breaks in the roadside foliage reveal equally dense slopes across the valleys. At some turns, little sunlight breaks through the thick canopy. The brooding dark green spaces make one of the women in the group feel claustrophobic. As you slow down at turns, the air smells damp and green. Maybe the mind has associated the damp scent of moss with the colour green.
Talking of turns, on the return journey to go to Ooty, the road signs say there are four hairpin bends ahead. As we negotiate up and around them, a mist descends, and car headlights come on. The overhanging foliage forms an archway with veritable walls of vegetation along the sides. The light at the end is so feeble it feels you are in a tunnel. Then when the mist gets thicker, the car has to crawl. As we emerge, it is like coming out of a tunnel in a fairground — the forest so overwhelming that you think you have just come out of a world of make-believe.
In Kannur town, I go on a different kind of journey into the unreal. Malayalees are supposed to out-drink everybody else, including Bengalis. But where on earth do you find a liquor shop to pick up half a bottle of something? The first barrier is that of language. Few understand what a “liquor shop” is. I do a little better with “wine shop”. And the look on the faces of a couple of passers-by who understand is disapproving and puritanical. Eventually, I spot a bar sign and lower-middle class men disappearing down a seedy corridor. A well-dressed gent guides me to a dingy hall full of drinkers, and a counter serving as both bar and retail shop. My memory goes back to the Kolkata of the sixties and seventies, when drinking was legit — but try finding a liquor shop (they had the shabbiest of fronts) in the residential south of the city!
Road journeys through Kerala remain etched in the mind. There is little garbage by the wayside; though from the looks of houses peeking behind the foliage, it is an endless densely lived-in space that is neither country nor town. And the roads are so good, particularly a stretch going up to the Tamil Nadu border, that there is not an iota of doubt that it is so much better to travel than to arrive.
