pretty lil' pondicherry

so im recovered from my brush with death (ok...there was no brush with death. just having 3rd world runs makes you want to die, that's all) and weve been having the best time these past few days. mamallapurum...or whatever it's called was a cute little backpacker's town which was very refreshing because in these past 5 weeks we've seen close to zero other foreign backpackers in india. as in ive only met one. but anyway this place actually had other foreigners and one street completely catered to the crowd so we got good western food and that was fantastic. there wasnt an awful lot to do there, just see some ruins but really im done with ruins. if you showed me one of my own photos of ruins and temples, i probably wouldnt be able to tell you where that picture was taken. there was one giant fucking round boulder that somehow just rested on the slope of a hill which was interesting. how does it not roll down? one shall never know.

a couple of freaky things happened there. one was that somehow everyone in town seemed to know my name. i guess one person i tell then tells oh i dont know..the universe? me and krista were on our little motorbike on the highway when all of a sudden two motorbikes with local dudes on them come up on either side of us and yell "hi diana!!! i know your name! where are you going!?" i was thinking, "how do they know my name!?" whilst krista was probably thinking, "get the fuck away from me before we crash and die!" im guessing thats what she was thinking. so that was freaky cause really, id hate to die in a firey motorcycle accident in india. and that very same trip, the guy on his bike in front of us hit a dog and crashed! it was very traumatizing and all i could do was give him an advil. but it was advil liqui-gel migraine strength! so hopefully my contribution helped.

and now were in a super lovely french colonial town right on the coast called pondicherry aka pondy. its just the cutest! british colonialism just downright sucks when compared to the french. the town itself is very pretty with lots of old french colonial buildings and somehow everything just seems calmer (by india standards that is) and the people dont hassle you.

yesterday we went to one of the wierdest places we've been to so far, a place called auroville. not everyone would describe it as so, but i think its a bit of a cult. by the way, here's the official website for your parousing: http://www.auroville.org/
its a place that apparently belongs to no nation, where money and personal possessions are of no worth and humanity can live in unity. or something like that. i was paying attention to the informational video screening, i swear! basically its a bunch of white new age hippies living without working real jobs and being all good for the earth and humanity and the future and such. they are all about some yoga dude and this dead french woman they creepily (and adoringly) refer to as "the mother". ok seriously, she had good ideas, but how fucking creepy is that!? "THE MOTHER".

so the place is set up in 4 sections...something like residential, international...and then....other ones. and its composed of communes called stuff like 'transformation' and 'serenity'. see, cult-like, right!? and right in the middle of the town is a giant golden globe that looks like science-world called the matrimandir aka "the soul of the city" and inside is a crystal where electronically-beamed sunlight is filtered in and people go there and meditate or something. we werent allowed to go into the matrimandir unfortch. anyway that's auroville! trippy.

and so for the past 5 weeks, minus like one nite out in goa, weve been STONE COLD SOBER. arent you impressed mom? there's just nowhere to party down here in the south! its been a bit shit in that respect actually (but a lot of money saved!) that is until...last nite! me, krista and eug decided to toss back a few drinks on our own and go on a pub crawl! it was great fun minus the fact there wasnt actually a real pub crawl cause all the bars closed at like 11. this doesnt mean we didnt try!

and today we went to the local museum and a paper factory. the workers at the factory were so cute and showed us the whole process and then of course we had to buy stuff. so even though i said i wouldnt buy anything else...well i did. and then we went to the main ashram which, even though ive been reading about ashrams still cant really comprehend what its all about. something about meditating and yoga and way of life. anyway the ashram we went to is where "the mother" is buried and really i found it a bit creepy. but pretty much in the same way i find christianity creepy so no biggie. there they sold lots of pictures of 'the mother' including photos of JUST HER EYES. so she can look down upon you when eating dinner i guess. ick.

oh and of course, the biggest thing: weve eaten BEEF! beef beef beef beef beef. i will never take beef for granted again! for the first time since i set foot in india, ive found beef and ive eaten it. and its been DELICIOUS. so there you have it! and tomorrow we take a bus to chennai and from there we fly up to kolkatta. so its farewell to the south of india...