In 2007/2008, while I was travelling through Asia, I wrote to my mom every single day of my journey. With the current CoVid and quarantine situation, I decided to look back again to those old emails and to turn it into a book.
Two years after the photo exhibition, I’m proud having edited those memories, to protect it from disappearance!
The first pages are available only here:
![[VIDEO] Best of Asian trip](https://lookbackpacker.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Capture-d’écran-2018-12-20-à-20.31.54.png)
Some images of the beautiful landscapes, the amazing people, and the crazy experiences I lived for 6 months during my trip « alone » through South East Asia. (more…)
After a first week in the north of Mysore, It took me almost two weeks to discover the green and nice beaches of the Kerala, and the collection of temples of the Tamil Nadu before finishing my indian trip on the nice Bay of Bengal
After a first week full of surprises, I arrived from Mysore in Kochi, recommended by all the guides as a very interesting city. Well I haven’t found the great interest, it’s a nice small city but without any big activity to do, you will see in a half day the chinese fisher nests, and can also enjoy a Kathakali dance show during the night.
So after just one night there I decided to take the road for Munnar. I lost more than 10 degrees in those green cloudy mountains, but I could enjoy a nice trekking offered in the hotel I found (both quite expensive but I think it worth it):
Right after the half day trekking I took an other bus to go back to the coast in Alleppey and its great backwaters.
After 3 buses and 6 hours I finally arrived in an hotel I found on Hostelworld and definitly recommend : Sea Shore hotel, in front of the beach. The owner there, Faizal, will treat you like a part of her family. She arranged me a nice ayurvedic massage for the day after, and I also booked a full day tour in the backwaters through a friend I met in Hampi. We passed the day between frenchies enjoying the peacefull canals and passing through the fishers’ villages.
After 3 nights there I took a night bus to Madurai. It was an experience ! I made the mistake not book in advanced my sleeper place, so I finished in the general indian wagon, trying to sleep with a fully booked train ! I finally arrived safe in my destination : Madurai. It wasn’t my plan to go back to a big city, but I made a small break there to check the temple and took back the train for Trichy.
Arrived at night, I just found an expensive hotel (but with wifi and breakfast) and went to discover the city with a local bus the day after. I visited the Rockfort temple, on top of the hill, and the huge Sri Rangam temple. The third one, Sri Jambukeshwara temple, was in construction so I skept it.
Photo rockfort temple and srirangam
At 3pm I was back in my hotel, and took a local bus to Thanjavur and found a cheap hotel to stay in, without wifi and with a massive cucaracha fight during the night… Anyway the day after I visited in the morning the Big Templeand the Palace and its museum (totally don’t worth the price). By noun I took a local bus to Chidambaram, passing by Kumbakonam (5h total) and enjoyed the sunset in the gorgeous Sri Natajara temple.
Second biggest city in Tamil Nadu (after Chennai), Madurai is famous for its huge Mînâkshî temple (closed between 1pm and 3pm).
Situated in Trichy, also called Tiruchirappalli, the entrance steps are hidden behind a huge bazar
Also in Tiruchirappalli (Trichy), this temple is the cloudest I’ve visited, you’ll discover an entire city inside, very impressive!
In Thanjavur (or Tanjore) this amazing stone temple is also called Râjarâjeshvaram. It hasn’t the paintings as a lot of temples in Tamil Nadu, but is really amazing and with a main limestone cow as main statue!
Expensive price for a basic castle, which the main attraction is the small museum and the colourfull Durbar Hall. The access to the other parts – including the belltower – were closed.
Dedicated to Shiva as the king of the dance, this last temple I’ve visited in Chidambaram is really amazing, full of colours, music, and nice people!
The day after I took a bus to Pondicherry where I found a very nice old colonial center. The streets are quiet and full of (expensive) shops and restaurants. You also have a nice bay walking way, and a muslim quarter with a nice Mosqueeand market! I really appreciated this city, maybe because it reminds me the colonial streets of Panama, or maybe because it was full of french restaurants… After one night there I took the direction of my last real stop: Mahabalipuram.
Mahabalipuram, or Mamallapuram is a small seaside town where you can enjoy nice restaurants or hotels on the beach (with a great sunrise if you’re courageous to wake up), with a nice temple at its end! Behind the local bus station you will also discover a huge archeological site full of temples and with the famous Descent of Ganges‘ rock relief (also called Arjuna’s Penance). The city doesn’t have much more to offer, the streets and beach are quite messies, but I must recognize I was there more here to take rest, enjoy the sun, read and write, than going more far in the visits… (I heard you have a nice Tiger cave 6km in the North, or an other temple on a hill at 15km in the west). I preferred to stay and take force for my last journey in India, and not least: Chennai to Kolkata, a 29 hours train journey!
After one week in India, it’s time for a small report of my journey from Mumbai to Mysore, passing by Hampi (1180km km, 22h in buses)!
I must recognize the beginning has been quite hard. This country has nothing to do with what I lived before. I thought 4 years in latin america would have help me to resist to the men harassement, the poverty or the chaotic organization, but here it’s an other level! You don’t eat, wash yourself, walk, dress in the same way. Once you get that, and get rid of the fear or hanger you can have, I think you can start to like India, and it’s where I am now, enjoying every smile, every color, every smell of this magic country.
So I arrived to Mumbai by night, where I saw entire families sleeping on the streets, and found a dark hotel at 2.30am where they put me in a dorm on a mat without sheets. I couldn’t sleep and thought « what the hell am I doing here ». The day after, a golden sun was lightning up this same hotel, and it was gorgeous! I discovered a busy and noisy city, where you risk your life everytime you want to cross the road, but with a so special light and so beautiful people you can forget the bad sides.
The first day I just walked around the city, visited Victoria Station, went to the Indian Gateway place to see the nice Taj Mahal palace, walked down Oval and Cross Maidan parcs, Crawford Market (I booked a bus there for Hampi), and saw a gorgeous sunset on Marine Drive with Kohulan, a south american I met in the hotel. Then we took a local train just for fun, and arrived to Grant road and enjoyed a nice street market by night.
The second day we’ve been together to Elephanta island to breath and to discover very nice temples built inside of the mountain.
I took a night bus to Hampi, a countryside city where I thought it would be more quiet. But when I arrived there was a celebration, and a loooot of people. I visited the ruins alone the first day, where I was bothered every 10minutes by people asking for a selfie. With families and women it was ok, but the guys have an insistant way to ask very annoying. Even if you say « no » they will take it, or worse : they’ll do it discretly while you’re walking (I must recognize I also love to steal portrait of people in the street, but I don’t take selfies!)
Anyway I passed the first day trying to visit the ruins around the city, and enjoyed the celebrations with the owner of the hotel and his friends. A first very local experience I really enjoyed !
The second day I shared a bicycle guided tour of the south sites with a couple of english travelers, and finished the day invited by the guide to see the sunset in a temple while a monk was singing. A magic experience I strongly recommend, even if I don’t remember the name of this temple!
The third day I crossed the river to visit the north side of the river, renting a moto.
I’ve been amazed by the visit of the ruins in Hampi. You find in the same site a pyramid as the mexican one built by the mayas, walls like the inca’sones in Cuzco, arabic architectures, and roman columns and viaducs. You also find temples which looks exactly like cambodian’s (I heard they were built by the same people, and the cambodians destroyed the indi statues to replace them by buddhist ones).
I took an other night bus to go to Mysore (it wasn’t a sleeper one and I couldn’t really sleep because of the crazy driver), where I finally found peace in a gorgeous hotel, a house built in 1907!
The city is not so big, there’s trafic but it’s ok, I walked around a lot of streets full of traditional dress shops, and a huge market where you can find oils, spicies, fruits and vegetables. I also took time to visit the fantastic palace of Mysore. I was the only foreign tourist, but there was a lot of indians doing the tour without shoes, a great experience to live!
Meeting other travelers helped me a lot to share my feelings and see they were thinking the same. I’m thinking about Kohula, from South Africa, Joe and Jack from London, Jeanne and Pascal from Perpignan (in France), Melis from Turkey, and many other great indians who helped me a lot on my way! You don’t choose India to have a fun experience or to relax like you would go to Ibiza or the south of France. People are here for a spiritual reason. They’re looking for peace, or answers about themselves or their life. It really feel good to meet so interesting people !
