This week has been crazy busy! After my last post we had just celebrated the Indian holiday of Holi. We had Thursday and Friday off work so my coworker Erika and I flew to Kerala which is a state the southern part of India. Before this trip I had never traveled to southern India. It is very different from the north. Especially Kerala.
We traveled around to three cities in five days while we were in Kerala. We flew into Kochi, then went to Munnar, and then to Alleppey.
Kerala is the most educated state in India. They don’t speak Hindi like in the north. They have their own language but mostly communicate with foreigners in English. We landed in Kerala at night and woke up to palm trees which was an awesome surprise! The first day in Kerala we rented a rickshaw and driver for three hours. He had grown up in Kochi and had stories for each spot. In the evening we went to see a cultural dance which was super cool. We got to see them doing all the makeup beforehand and it takes a minimum of 2 hours for each person to do their makeup for a 45 minute show.
We spent the night in Kochi again and then got up at 5am to catch a rickshaw to the bus station to take a bus eight hour bus to Munnar. We were only able to spend one night in Munnar but it was worth it. Munnar is where a lot of the tea gardens are in southern India (there are many in the north as well) and they are breathtaking! It is impossible to get a photo that does them any justice. We slept at a resort built into the side of a mountain for only $11 USD a night. That would never happen in the States! 🙂
The next morning we woke up at 5am to catch another rickshaw and bus to Alleppey. We arrived at Alleppey in time for a beach sunset on Easter Sunday. Kerala is the most (basically only) Christian/Catholic state in India and they are very festive for Easter so it was a fun time to visit.
The next morning we woke up at 5:30am (got to sleep in!) and took a houseboat ride on the backwaters which is really what Alleppey is known for. It was beautiful and I’m so glad we did it.
The next day we slept in and then took a train back to Kochi and then flew back to Delhi. This week continued to be busy becuase our corporate team was in town from New York so we did a lot of things with them and had a ton of fun. We’re moving into the 2nd quarter after surpassing all of our 1st quarter goals so things are going well!
I am beginning work on our new POS system which will connect our retail stores to our headquarters in Delhi. I am super excited about this! I love implementing systems and streamlining processes. 🙂
Best,
Rae