The Return! (India, post pandemic...)

First of all, Chennai's best feature is the location: situated on the Bay of Bengal, the constant sea breezes keep the air fresh and clean...though NOT at all cool! This is what I read on Google:  " Chennai lies on the thermal equator and is also coastal, which prevents extreme variation in seasonal temperature . For most of the year, the weather is hot and humid."   In fact, one of my new friends at the Ananda Center made this joke about it:  There are three seasons in Chennai: "Hot, hotter, hottest!!"  In other words, even though this is "winter", it is still hot during the day.  Right now, as I do this blog at 3 pm in the afternoon, I see that it is 30 degrees C, or 86 degrees F. Of course it feels hotter because of the persistently high degree of humidity. I am constantly sweating, constantly sticky. I don't like AC-- I get chilled too easily-- so I get relief by sitting under the ceiling fans in my Airbnbs or when I go out to restaurants. (Of

  The point of leaving the lovely Kerala beach and beautiful surroundings for a big, crazy, less beautiful city was to spend Christmas and New Year's with the lovely Ananda community here. There are a handful of Ananda centers scattered around India, all in the major cities, unfortunately... and Chennai was the closest one to fly to near a beach. (Hence, sea breezes and reasonably clean air!) So... I headed to the Trivandrum Airport early in the morning of the 20th. There in the airport, some kind folks took this photo of me next to this impressive Xmas tree and display! It seems so very strange, having Christmas in India, when it is so bright, sunny and warm! But...there you have it, Christmas must be celebrated!  Since, on my previous domestic flights, I did not have any window seats, I decided to splurge this time, and paid the 400 rupees required to procure one. Here is the view, coming down into Chennai.  Of course, the joke was on me: the guy in the middle seat next to me--ha

 Since Kanyakumari was only a two hour trip by train, and all three of us were keen on experiencing sunrise and sunset from the same point, we set off in the morning with great anticipation. Besides being at a location where three oceans converge (Indian Ocean, Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal), AND it was possible to see both sunrise AND sunset, it would also be SO cool to say we had been at the southernmost tip of India! Well...as we all know, having high expectations is a dangerous pitfall! You will soon see how--though there were certainly great moments to this adventure-- it was, by and large, not truly worth the effort involved. (I know Johanna and Patricia would beg to differ! When I was their age, I had more of their exuberance as well... and was able to put up with a lot more than I am willing to now!)  Windblown and full of enthusiasm, these two young women thoroughly enjoyed their very first ride on an Indian train!  I confess that I too have always enjoyed trains... the Indian