Timing is Everything

Dear Reader

As i sit here at Cafe Del Mar dunking my danish pastry into my italian esspresso while overlooking the red cliffs of Varkala, my thoughts start to wonder, dear reader...not so much about the commercialisation of culture or even the role that pleasure-seeking yogis play when they cross these shores and demands crocs in the local stores (sadly not fiction).

No, my dear reader, that yellow brick road is already laid and well trodden. That hegemony is already in phase II of implementation. we must deal with it. what i am concerned with today, as i watch these two backpackers (who look more like travelling tinkers) try to catch a rickshaw to the station is that of timing.... today is diwali which means everyone make "big festival" big party" "which makes "big accomodation problem" for anyone leaving today. but perhaps they do not leave the timing to the universe and book ahead. somehow, the tibetan flags sticking out of the bald one's day pack convinces me otherwise.

My timing, for instance, brought me to the tropical southern province of Kerala at the time of the "second Monsoon" ...which is why i sit eurpoean style at a cafe instead of horizontal style on the beautiful beach below. no matter. the rain is of the "constant intermittent" variety, so i still get to pull out the occasional sand wedgie (and do my Bo Derek in "10"/ Halle Berry in 007 sea exit). The rain offers a good excuse to "not go see temple","not go see town". in the last few days i have been walking the streets like forrest gump in the second half of the movie...the part where "shit happens". (It has by the way, but just briefly so i wont slosh arouhnd in those details.) For the weary, the sick and the sunburnt, the rain gives you permission to sit on the cafe strip, commatose style (in that way the rain works a lot like fires), breaking only to read, write and "run forrest run" for the loo. It's all about timing (and having wet wipes on hand).
For instance, Bad Timing.

• gets you on the train with just enough time to wonder why the locals are still waiting on the platofrm. In good time you realise that when the train starts moving, so too dos the rest of the province...which is why you end up standing in the rancid latrine alcove. here you remain until another station platform or God do you part.
• puts you at a restaurant with only a Rod Stewart loop for entertianment and the clientelle to match. Luckily, while the waiters hang on your every eye and hand gesture (no, no more. i was just reaching for my water.). you spot the traveller balancing out the other diagonal. timimg is crucial. get the bill first or you will become the entertainment.

Good Timing

• gets you to the woman washing your clothes with a translator in time to help her fish out the 2000 ruppees (R500) out of your dripping pants.

And thene there are those times when you should just wait a while...

like when you get so excited to see the sun that you make a sprint for the sea only to watch your books soaking up the flash flood from your distant focal lens.

I must be off dear reader as time waits for no man and tides for no woman. yes, i am off on an 8-hour boat trip from Allepey to Kollam on the backwaters.

I will meet you dockside later....