Finding Homes For Ned and Kelly

In an attempt to redeem our bodies from the diet of rice, chili and oil, we would sometimes buy a load of fresh fruit and veges and cut them up for a great salad of cabbage, carrot, and pineapple . We would eat this vitamin mountain like a pair of wild, rabid vegans from a plastic bag off the ground at the roadside. We had eaten one of these fresh feasts on our final day and left the plastic bag of organic remains outside the doorway of our room to rot in the sun. Our room was at the local dementia home where we could stay for a few days while searching for two local recipients suitable for our two well traveled but still perfectly functional cycles. We woke in the morning to find a cloud of flies had formed over the fermenting remains of our salad and a pungent aroma was wafting across the grounds towards the innocent and senile elderly. In search of somewhere to dispose of it, my father (bless his soul), approached one of the crazy old men living in the home. The man took one look in the bag, reached in, pulled out an old rotten piece of pineapple, popped it in his mouth and walked off licking his fingers. Perhaps not the best way to dispose of it.

We advertised our cycles on the local TV station and soon had two polio stricken middle aged men phoning in. They were both reasonably poor with small stalls at the coast selling soft drinks and tobacco. They would benefit well from a cycle to help them travel independently too and from work and out to get supplies.

So it happened that on World Handicapped Day we formally handed over Ned and Kelly to Prakashan and Shaji. I was surprisingly moved, perhaps not too far from the point of tears as they climbed into their new machines, big smiles appearing on each of their faces.

Prakashan was naturally skilled at driving the cycle, so he was able to accompany me on the 15 km ride to deliver the cycles to the men's shops at the coast. Riding alongside this man was a special experience. At 45 years old, with baby sized legs but body builder arms, Prakashan was a positive minded go getter. Despite his condition, he had acquired a wife, two daughters and a simple thatch hut stall. "Going fast, going fast" he chanted all along our ride, and called out to each of his friends as we passed. To his dismay, they were more interested in me the white guy cycling behind him. He liked to ride smack bang in the middle of the road so that all of the buses had to swerve around him. Clearly he liked attention. At the beach he was in his element, crawling across the sand on all his hands and thick callused knees. He could move at surprising speed and bound over walls like an agile goat. I tried to crawl along beside him but was no match. He introduced us to his fishermen friends and was able to find a fresh fish to give us as the token of his thanks.

Shaji, the second recipient, was beaming when he first sat in his seat, but soon appeared to become a little depressed. This may have been after seeing that Prashakan's cycle had come with my old tyre pump still attached, while his had not. Thomas explained to me that these disabled people can develop mental problems and selfish natures due to their condition. Despite sharing the same disability and having their shops side by side, Prakashan and Shaji were not friends. Disabled people get used to having peoples attention. Perhaps jealousy was the issue as Prakashan was such an outgoing likable guy, he was likely to steal all of the local attention with his new machine. Never the less, Shaji shook my hand appreciatively once I delivered his cycle to him at his small shop.

I left feeling confident that Ned and Kelly, India's most well travelled hand powered tricycles were in good hands and would serve their new masters well until the end of their days. I hope that not only will the two men's lives be improved by the cycles but also that this day they gained some insight into selflessness and giving. I hope too that perhaps one day, Ned and Kelly will ride side by side once again along the carefree back roads of Kerala. Just as they did on those days together for me and my Father.

Life in a Coconut House

Day 50,51,52

We cycled a shameful 2 km around the corner to spend the night in an orthodox church and dine with the young student priests. They had a jovial dinner table with lots laughing, mostly we suspected at us. The service we witnessed in the morning was not so jovial. It was smile free, ritualistic, involved a dangerous volume of incense smoke and more curtain pulling than a pantomime. We cycled on to Calicut to receive a free meal and hotel with the help of Rotary, then on to Vellore stopping briefly to catch some video footage of the tricycle with a roadside elephant and it's driver.

Day 53

This could have been the final day of the 2000km journey. We decided the trip must end with the ocean as it was important we had a sense of destination. So we diverted our route to wash off 53 days of skin caked pollution. After stringing our tent fly between some palm trees, we were invited to spend the night instead with a family living on the beach in a house made nearly entirely from the coconut palm. The floor is sand, the frame bamboo and the walls and roof are cladded with neatly woven palm leaves. This is then tied together with rope spun from coconut shell fiber. The man of the house was a motor cycle mechanic living in this 2 room hut with his wife and two young sons. They had no furniture. Just a few mats, and cooking pots. This was a poor yet simple and uncluttered life. "I give you my house and you give me yours" my father proposed. He then asked the man if he would go out to buy 3 beers, one each for himself, my father and I. The man took my fathers 500 rupee note with delight, gave us each awkward hugs and took off on his motor bike to arrive back with 2 beers and no change. After the beer, I scaled my first coconut tree to drop 2 tender coconuts which we shared with the locals on the beach. The mans wife served us a very cheap meal of rice with a couple of drips of fish curry. The first family that appeared not to try and feed us into a state of obligatory giving. Perhaps they felt that an expression of their poverty was a better approach. The  night was spent on woven mats on the sand floor of the hut.

Day 54

I enjoyed a short game of cricket with the two boys before setting off inland towards our final destination, Kunnumkulam, where I had left off 53 days earlier.

For 53 days, Thomas had become a familiar voice on the other side of the phone, calling me more frequently than a paranoid mother. Having him call 3 times per day to ask, "How are things with you", came to feel a little smothering. Especially as I had to yell back "Things are fine with me" over roaring traffic. Each morning I would pull over to answer Thomas's call to pray. This was no brief roadside prayer, but a lengthy recital of my family tree. "We pray for Shasa's Mother, Father, Sister, Brother, Step Mother, Step Father, Friends, Family, all of his near and dear ones.....". Although at times this communication felt a hindrance and frustrating, I knew, while I was alone on the road, it was really an umbilical chord for my sanity. What could have been a lonely haul of unrecognised endurance, was a journey with support and purpose, largely because of Thomas consistent interest in my well being and the many connections he planned for me along the way.

Then suddenly, 15km from our destination, Thomas unexpectedly appeared at the roadside. I immediately recognised his old Hero Honda motor cycle which he would painstakingly not allow above 60km per hour in hope for prolonging her lifespan, and his bright red helmet. It was a happy yet surreal reuniting, where 2000km strangely melted into the soil beneath a sturdy Kerala coconut palm. Into its roots and into its memory.

Thomas had orgonised an obscure yet hearty reception for us in Kunnumkulam, complete with media cameras and notable townsmen, plus a band of mentally handicapped children blowing horns and banging drums. "A band of Idiots" my father whispered not uncompassionately. Perhaps the local brass band was busy, but we much more appreciated this mob with their vacant stares and passionate cacophony. Speeches were made and gold and white sheets were placed over our shoulders as symbols of honor; a Keralite custom. Our distance was over. Now only one job was left before we could depart. To find two local recipients  to which we could personally donate our faithful tricycles.

Servant vultures and ceramic knickers

Day 47 (something went funny and my life extended by a few days, this day should now be correct)

We spent 2 nights in an old hillside concrete cottage in Gudalore with Jose and Asha, looking out towards the giant tea covered hills of Ooty. Jose was a 57 year old limping diabetic. He was the same age as my father yet spent all day sitting idle in his tiny battery shop waiting for what he expressed to be one customer per day. Meal times consisted of my father and I sitting alone at the the large wooden table while the man and wife did not join us for the meal but stood behind us, watching fervently like servant vultures until our plates were barren. Being their first foreign guests, perhaps they watched us with unashamed curiosity in how we found pleasure in their food, or diligence in assuring assuring we did not become unhappy should it happen that our plate became void of chapatis. "Try some of this", "One more of these". We were almost spoon fed. My father found this particularly unnerving. A steady stream of friends and neighbours kept arriving at the door to meet these western visitors. We took a day trip by bus up to the hill station town of Ooty to feel the cool air, wander through the botanical garden and hunt out a box of masala tea before bussing back to  Gudalore for another night of observed feeding with our hospitable hosts.

Day 48

We cycled on with many ups and downs through tea plantation hills. My mind saw them as a beautiful field of densely packed green warts. My fathers tortoise shell description is perhaps more pleasant. Our intended host, Thomas's sister, had to rush off to the hospital so we found a bus shelter for a cold rock hard attempt at sleep. Although rather inhospitable, it was reassuringly disinfected with urine and abundant in night time well wishers arriving on motor bikes, police rickshaws and buses to peer in at us.

Day 49

We sped dangerous and free over 12 km of steep down hill hair pin bends to reach the forested home/tropical fish farm of Babu, a relative of Thomas's but completely unrelated in terms of his alternative ideas. At his table we learnt about the ancient Indian philosophy of Vastu Shastra, a set of geometric rules for designing the home in order to ensure good fortune to its inhabitant; much like and Indian slant on feng shuey. These rules may have derived from logic though now appear rather superstitious.

The house must be a gridded quadrilateral
No corners can be cut
Each corner is assigned to a particular god.
The floor must slope down towards the north east where a clean water source should be located
By no means should the sewage tank be placed in the south west corner which is assigned as the entrance for the god of death. (This brings very bad luck. I guess the grim reaper is not deterred by a few feces.)

Babu seems to have spent a substantial amount of money modifying his home in order to amend some of the features conflicting with the laws of vastu shastra and swears that his luck improved thereafter.

He also introduced us to the technology of bioceramic socks. Not designed for a modern day Cinderella but intended to help people with arthritus, healing wounds and sickness. Each sock is covered in tiny ceramic tiles deriving from NASA space shuttle technology. They claim that these tiles can reflect body heat back into the body in the form of far infra red rays. These rays have just the right frequency to vibrate human body cells to promote heating, circulation, healing, weight loss and improvement of bodily functions. My small research leads me to beleive that maybe there is some science behind these spotty sockes and underwear. My father being a fan of obscure remedies, accepted a very old pair of Mrs Babu's spotty ceramic knickers to put to experimental test.