Nagarcoil day1 pt.2

Day 1 in Naragcoil also included a trip to the beach for our little group of eleven.  Most of the students knew that their friends were on spring break back home, so they got to say they went to the beach as well.  Indians do not wear bathing suits to the beach, so we observed that as well. We only spent a short time, and ran into a bunch of school groups who all wanted to practice saying "hello".

 Then we drove on down to a little fishing town.  The kids everywhere find a little piece of land to play cricket.

The Catholic Church is an important part of the religion of many people in Kanyakumari.  Fishing is important as well.  We watched a video at our hosts home that was made from some amateur footage from the day the tsunami hit this area. The water was sucked out from under the boats like the tide had suddenly gone out.  And then huge waves struck.  In the distance, you can see at least a hundred wind turbines cranking away creating power--a modern contrast to most of what is surrounding them.  Our own hosts home has planned power outages from 10 am to noon each day because of the lack of infrastructure.  Also in the distance along the sea is a new nuclear power plant that is due to go on-line in about a year, and should solve the problems for a while.

This area also is the home to monuments to Swamy Vivekananda and Saint Thiruvalluvar.  We took a ferry ride that allowed us to visit the Swamy Vivekananda monument and view the Saint Thiruvalluvar monument from the boat.

Our group also visited the Gandhi Memorial, the last place that Gandhi's ashes were kept before they were dispersed--some into the sea. There is not much to the Memorial except photos, but we got a spirited lecture by the docent who is seen in the top left.  This was one of the most colorful characters we met, and he growled and admonished those who were not in our group and were talking.  Then he took us upstairs and let us climb over a wall onto the roof where we are seated to watch the sun set.  Also in the photo, second from left on the front is our tour guide, Ramah, who is a dentist in Chennai but came along with us. She showed us the hospital where she was born in Naragcoil and was a great resource for our many questions.

So, we watched the sun set on the southern part of India where the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea all meet.
Most of our group went on a Hindu temple visit where they were actually holding a service--not just an historic place.  I personally felt weird about going into a participatory service as an observer, so I stayed outside to watch people.  I was also totally exhausted by the day and lack of sleep on the train. The guys had to take off their shirts, and they all eventually exited with different kinds of marks on their foreheads.  Nancy said it was kind of weird, so I was just as happy that I had not gone in.  Then we climbed on the bus to return to our hosts for a late dinner and a welcome bed.  The dinner was fantastic--eaten Indian style without utensils--and it included the group singing happy birthday to me.  What better place to spend a birthday?