We flew to Trivandrum this morning and as we landed, all you
could see were coconut palms. They use
every part of the coconut in their daily lives for wood, thatch, cooking, hair
products, milk, etc plus it is the biggest export of the region. We were met by
Barbara and J-Raj our tour directors. Unfortunately, the state of Kerala called
a general strike for the day to protest three significant cost increases on oil
in the past six months; it is now over $7.00 a gallon!
J-Raj gave us lots of information on the bus ride so we
would have some perspective about the area.
The state of Kerala has the only Socialist Government in India and trade unions are
very strong. Therefore the wages and living
standard is higher. The city has 1.5
million people and is considered a small city by India standards. It is spread
out with lots of green spaces and we passed by four colleges or universities.
The good news is there was no traffic on the way to the
hotel (Taj Vivanta) but the bad news was we could not do anything in the city
that day. The hotel is beautiful with a British
influence. Several of us took advantage
of the free time to enjoy treatments in the Ayurveda spa. I had a 60 minute Relaxing Message for about
$30 including tip and it was just what I needed after the move, long flights
and jet lag.
At dinner, we met the 12 Whole Foods Team members who just returned
from the Sunrise Children’s home about four hours north of here (by train). They spent last week building a playground as
their volunteer project. We played two
truths and a lie so we could bond and ended the evening with a slide show of
their time with the children.
 |
| View outside my hotel window |
No comments:
Post a Comment