Parade Floats

"Save the Environment" Procession, Kumily

Making Fruitcake With the Cochin Rotary Club

Meanwhile, back in India ... Even though it was mid-October and the last day of Ramadan, Christmas was in the air, at least at the Cochin Rotary Club's annual fruitcake-making event, held in a very air conditioned meeting room on the roof of a hotel near the airport. It was a very westernized establishment--marble floors, shiny light fixtures, entire staff decked out in uniforms. (Thanks to Peter for some of the great pictures!)

Here we are with Paul Wilkes, a former Pitt writing teacher of mine who I've kept up with over the past 20(!) years. Paul is essentially the orphanage's benefactor, and he encouraged us to visit. Here's a bit about Paul from Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Wilkes


Here's a description of the event from a Christmas op-ed that I wrote and that the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published:

Can you catch the Christmas spirit in sun-baked Australia? (A sidetrip to India helps.)

"So where does a visitor to a sun-baked former British colony go for an English yuletide fix? To another former British colony, of course -- the hotter the better.

During a two-week school break in October, my family and I ventured to the tropical city of Kochi, on the southern tip of India. In a country swirling with sometimes absurd contrasts, we found ourselves one night on the guest list for the Kochi Rotary Club's annual fund-raiser preparations.

That night, the last night of Ramadan, with calls to prayer echoing from mosque-mounted loudspeakers, I gained some holiday equilibrium in an unlikely setting -- via an unlikely agent of memories of Christmas' past.

Whisked from the dusty streets to the roof of a Western-style airport hotel, my family and I stepped through the doors of a well-cooled conference room and into the looming presence of ... raw fruitcake! A mound of it, perhaps 20 feet long. Brown dough flecked with red and orange bits of dried fruit, piled on a table .

Each year the Rotary Club meets to prepare fruitcakes for sale to support its good works. On this night, dozens of members gathered around the table of fruitcake fixings, decked out in tall, white, stiffly pleated chef hats, long black-and-white-striped aprons and skin-toned surgical gloves.

Many of them grasped clear-glass bottles of brandy. On the emcee's cue, they raised the liquid high above their heads, toasted the season and flipped the bottles upside down, splashing gallons of liquor over the dough. A stinging rush of alcohol fumes enveloped the room like a hospital ER. In the next instant, dozens of pairs of rubber-gloved hands gleefully clawed at the heady mixture as empty flasks clanked to the floor and novice bakers shrieked in delight.

In this steamy Hindu nation, my mind flashed back to fruitcake in Pittsburgh: Moldy and sticky in a lidded tin pan, discovered on a cupboard shelf in an Oakland apartment on a June afternoon; Johnny Carson and the Post-Gazette's Peter Leo, poking fun at the perennial holiday delicacy that also serves as a doorstop; and my father-in-law meticulously slicing his homemade fruitcake for the annual Christmas party, arranging thin dark slabs on a dessert plate in the warm red and dark wood dining room of his Murray Avenue home.

The Power of Fruitcake. Who knew?"

Norah Head, Central Coast

Pelican Feeding

More fun at Guantanamo?

Snapped high on a hill in Lambton North, a Newcastle suburb, while Nicholas was taking his weekly weekend Spanish lesson at the home of an Argentine couple. The husband is getting a degree at the University of Newcastle, the wife, Nick's tutor, is staying at home with a fairly new baby.

While some consider it torture, I personally enjoy lawn bowling, especially watching the exciting championship matches on TV on Saturday afternoons.

Santa Cruz Basilica and St. Francis Church, Cochin

"Built by the first Portuguese viceroy, Francesco de Almeida, in 1505.

When the Dutch conquered Cochin in 1663, they ruined all Catholic establishments except this cathedral and the church of St. Francis. In those days, the Santa Cruz Cathedral was used as an armory. It was destroyed in 1795, after the British took over the city. Only an elaborate granite pillar remained. The pillar is displayed on the southeastern corner of the present Basilica.

The new, present cathedral was sanctified in 1905. Recognizing its historic significance, Pope John Paul II raised the status of Santa Cruz Cathedral to a Basilica in 1984.

Santa Cruz is one of the eight Basilicas in India. In 2004, this cathedral completed its five centuries of existence. The architecture is a blend of the Indo-European and the gothic style. Italian paintings dating from the time of the original foundation of the church adorn the interiors."

- excerpted from http://www.cochin.org.uk/religious-places/santa-cruz-cathedral.html

And here's St. Francis Church, which, according to Wikipedia, is "the oldest European church in India. It was constructed in 1503 by Portuguese Franciscan friars. Sometimes, this church is also referred as St. Francis Xavier's Church.

Vasco da Gama (commander of the first ships to sail directly from Europe to India) was buried here, but his mortal remains were returned to Portugal. The original headstone is still kept there."

• Hot sunshine


• Cockatoos and lorikeets on my street


• Palm trees in the yard


• People running errands in bare feet


• "No worries" and "You're all right!"


• morning tea at work


• pavlova


• Kangaroos


• lawn bowling competitions on TV


• children who say please and thank you

Vanilla County

Here are some of Sarah's emailed impressions of Vanilla County, our home stay near Wagamon, in the Western Ghats:

"We are now in the mountains staying at a homestay called 'Vanilla County'. There is a website you can google to see a picture and description. It's in the Western Ghat mountains. Needless to say, it's incredible as everything here is. It's a nice contrast to the austere convent in the middle of a poor, crowded city - here it is quiet, cool, lots of flowers, palms, jungle - the home is very luxurious in a nice old-fashioned way. We swam at a beautiful pool in a mountain stream today (see earlier post, "Swimming in the River"), and our guide picked vanilla, cardamom, cocoa, and black pepper berries and showed us the rubber tapping which is the big industry here (see earlier post, "Rubber").

Our kind and friendly hosts are cooking us more delicious Keralan food including exotic vegetables which we have never had before. Tomorrow we take a tour and then we will go to an ashram which is a famous Christian retreat 10k from here. "

[This small balcony and a large one beyond were both outside Sarah and my room. Nicholas and Peter had a separate room and bath. The bit of railing in the foreground is part of a large deck accessible from the second floor hall.]

Trucks

There's got to be a coffee table book somewhere about these brightly painted trucks. I was reminded of the photographic studies that I've seen of Pennsylvania barns and Amish hex symbols. Like the autorickshaws and buses, many of the trucks celebrate religious themes. Others look like they just advertise the driver/owners name.

Emerald Isle and the Alleppey backwaters