[Onto the East Coast- India]

Slowly but painfully left the beautiful beach of Varkala on the west coast of India. Its a kind of place where nothing happens and yet that is still just too busy; saying 'hello' to so & so, having a swim, lunch with someone else and dinner with a group of wanna be film artists....busy days in all....

I ate ice cream one night...and only afterwards, as an after thought, was concerned about the hygiene of the water used. (A case of closing the gate after the horse has bolted). Well my fears that night were answered as my stomach contents were brought up and I laid in bed the following days cursing India and the shitty hygiene standards here.....

I stopped in Madurai to visit a temple, which is a huge complex with 4 large towers marking the entrances on all points of the compass. These towers are painted in gaudy colours and tiered shape, each tier has a multitude of statues and god like creatures, protecting the temple form evils I guess. Inside the main building god like creatures, including cows! are adorned and worshipped, and a real living elephant standing nearby adds to the bizarre scene.

Visited Pondicherry on the east coast of India, an old French town, where streets are still called rue. The police wear cute red styled French caps too. A European feel to an Indian city with many expats still living here and of course speaking French.

I am now in Mamallapuram (just south of Chennai) which is another temple town on the beach and I have promptly caught one hell of a flu....I have spent the last 8 days coughing, sneezing and bed ridden. I have almost seen nothing of the beautiful temples here, my body needs sleep, and lots of it. Luckily I am in a relatively nice hotel room so its not so depressing. But after just suffering food poisoning and now this...I am not having fun!

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