Sightseeng Cochin
As we left our accommodation we noticed the building opppsite was being set up for a wedding. We will have a look later to see if we can see more.
First we wandered down to the seafront and had tea. We then wandered along the prom, passing the Chinese fishing nets and little stalls selling all sorts of gifts.
One stall in particular caught our attention. It was a little plastic device which the man was demonstrating by putting rice flour dough in and producing all different shapes of pasta, cake icing etc by changing the little discs. As Christine is a bit of a kitchen gadget collector the 100 rupee.(less than £1) price tag was too good to pass up. We will await the master pieces when we get home!
Onwards with our walk and nestled under a tree we saw 8 tiny little puppies.. We asked a man if he knew where the mother was and he showed us a picture of her and said she wasn't far away. We were pleased to see there was food and water for her.
A little further and something else caught our eye which was a little disturbing. One of the fish sellers had a baby thresher shark for sale to eat. Being divers and lovers of all things under the water this made us sad, As we looked the man thought we were interested in buying the shark. Darryl told him there would none left in the ocean if they kept catching the babies and no we did not want to buy it.
Next was a stop at a very small chocolate factory where a lovely man showed us the machine and gave us some great chocolate to try.
Then it was time for lunch. We found an upstairs restaurant right on the seafront with views over to Hillingdon Island which did an extremely tasty Veg Meal for 80 rupees including 3 different veg curries, 2 chutney, rice, papad and a milk pudding, all refillable!
Onwards with our walk and we came across a statue of an elephant made entirely of stainless steel bolts. We passed catholic churches, Portuguese houses.amd in the Jewish quarter, a synagogue and a fancy shopping street.
We wound our way slowly back to base through quiet back streets and had a refreshing sweet lassi along the way..
In the evening we headed back out. By now the wedding over the road was in full.swing with really loud music and strobe lights.
We headed down to the street sellers at the sea front and had dahi puri and samosa chat, followed by masala chai. Later we spotted a street seller with a huge crowd around him. We went to see what he had and a man told us it was a hot drink, like a medicine. It has lemon, mint, ginger and some local leaf we did. not know. He told us it was good so we ordered one and he was right! The ginger made it quite spicy but really tasty.
On the way back we peaked in at the wedding and a man told us to go in and have a look. The garden was beautifully decorated with fairy lights, the 'top table' were still eating and there was the most enormous buffet of food with every curry and salad you could imagine. Luckily most of the guests were leaving and the music had finished, otherwise sleeping may have been a problem!
