Lakshadweep for New Year's 2009

Islands visited: Minicoy and Kavaratti
Time: 26th Dec, 2008 to 2nd Jan, 2009
Mode of Travel: Ship
Cochin - Minicoy by MV Tipu Sultan (20 hrs journey)
Minicoy - Kavaratti by MV Kavaratti (12 hrs)
Kavaratti - Cochin by MV Kavaratti (18 hours)

With the lil bit of travelling that I've been doing these days, I felt I should start a separate blog to put down my experiences (thanks to the constant reminders by Sid). So here goes my first blog.. and what better way to start off than Lakshadweep!! I intend these blogs to be more of my experiences put down, but I'm sure there'll be enough details to make an itinerary out of it if need be :)

A few of us started planning on a trip for the New Year's of 2009 around 2 months before the December of 2008. The locations we thought of were Sri Lanka, Andamans and Lakshadweep. Of course, there were other plans that were made as we commenced the journey, but we'll come to that later on.. As usual, the actual planning began only around November. This being a budget trip, Sri Lanka was out of question with flight tickets at around 17k return. Andamans too turned out to be expensive. Ship journey to the Andamans was 60 hours long, which effectively left us with Lakshadweep.
Another factor which tipped the balance in favour of Lakshadweep was that we knew a local through a common friend (Sid). And mind you, going to the Dweeps as the guest of a local will bring down your costs by close to 40%. Lakshadweep being a restricted area, visitors can either travel as guests of locals, or need to take a package from the Lakshadweep Tourism Dept (SPORTS). Travelling as guests will need you to have permits (similar to visas) made in advance through the local.
So having fixed the location, we now got in touch with the local (Ajmal) and started getting our documents processed through him. Passport copies, photographs and other documents shuttled back and forth various email addresses. FAQs answered promptly by Ajmal, we packed off and caught a bus to Cochin on the evening of 26th of December. Even though our ship to Lakshadweep was only on the 30th, we felt that we could spend the weekend in Cochin. We were on our way!!
Day 1 – Cochin and the fight
Reaching Cochin the next morning, we thought we'd spend the day around the city. We planned to hire a taxi and go to either Munnar or Thekkady the next day. But this being New Year's vacation season, it might've been easier to catch a killer whale in the middle of Cochin's MG Road (which, by the way, is about 7-8km long), rather than find a taxi for the next day. We called up travel agents, spoke to people in shops, searched on the net... all to no avail. While paying the cyber cafe guy, we casually asked him if he would be able to arrange for a taxi, and after a small background verification about where we were staying, he said YES!!! Oh heavens had opened! We were going to Munnar the next day after all!
One small problem: We were staying at the Central Fisheries Dept (CIFT) guest house, and the cyber cafe owner thought that we were trainees there (well, I told him so :D). Since he apparently supplies cabs to them all the time, he thought of doing us a "favour" by giving us his private vehicle! It wasn't even a registered taxi, for god's sake! The cabs there have this funda of 80km or Rs.1500 per day, and he agreed to give us the cab that evening itself. After confirming with the driver if we could carry over the remaining kilometers in case we didn't finish it up that day, we decided to take the taxi that evening itself and use it to travel around the city. A trip to Fort Kochi and the fish market almost completed our activities for the day. The beachside is also a popular spot for theatre, drama, Kathakali, wrestling, and other activities, so we enjoyed watching some of this at Fort Kochi.

The sunset was brilliant, and photographers in the gumbal happily clicked a few shots.
Sid had been a regular at this place called the F1 Bar in Cochin, and he wanted us to visit that place for the evening. After all, Sid was the main reason we were doing this trip, even though he was conspicuous by his absence. So we obeyed his orders and decided to check the place out. Oh yea, he couldn’t join us for this as he was on a business trip to Kuala Lumpur during this time! Beat that ;)
The address to F1 – the bar run by a group of firangs? M.G. Road. Hell, yea!! That was all we knew! The six of us changed and got into the cab. The driver had no clue about this place, but we figured we’d find someone along the way who’d guide us.
This being tourist season, the owner of the car told us that we’d need to return back by 10pm, as there was a ban on vehicles plying on the city roads after 10pm. Apparently, the police commissioner’s permission was required in case we needed to travel later than 10pm! Well, this is what the cab’s owner told us. The sleepy city that Cochin is, I don’t think there’s any reason for anyone to stay up later than 7pm, most of the shops are closed by then anyway. Infact, some shops weren’t even open most of the time. However, we haggled with him and told him we’d be back to our rooms by 10:30pm or thereabouts. (Anybody feeling the fight building up yet?)
Before we left for Cochin, Ajmal had told us that we’d have to go to some police station in Cochin and pick up the ship tickets as well as the permits and pay the cop for it. However, he'd not given the police guy’s contact number, but promised to message me the number later. All through the day, I’d been trying to contact Ajmal (the Dweeps local) to get the policeman’s phone number, but he never seemed to pick up the phone, which was strange. Cellphone signals are a rarity in most of the places in Lakshadweep, so if a cellphone rings, you can be almost sure that it will be answered. This seemed strange. Someone who’d done so much for us seemed to have suddenly stopped responding.
…. And we set off in search of F1 Bar. Like I already said, MG Road is long, and it took us a good 30-45 mins of searching. Every few meters, the driver would show us a board, and we’d say “Nooo.. Go on”. This happened a few times by when we’d reached the end of MG Road! Still no sign of F1. We decided to head home. Oh, by now we realized that we were staying on MG Road too! Dinner back on the way at a South Indian restaurant Dwarka was awesome. Infact this became our regular hangout in Cochin from that point on.
It was past 10:30 by the time we reached the guest house. We got out of the cab and were about to get into the guest house, when the driver said, “Sir, Tomorrow 5am?”
Not wanting to get up so early the next day, we decided to ditch the Munnar plan, but go to some place nearby. Having decided on some closeby waterfall, we were about to say goodbye to him when he said, “Sir, Rs. 1500”. And we were like “Whatt??!!”.
Driver (D): “Sir, you’ll need to pay Rs. 1500. It’s daily settlement”
Us (U): “But we already spoke to you and you said that we can carry over the remaining kilometers”
D: “No sir, doesn’t matter whether you travel 80 kms or not, you have to pay 1500 every day”
U: “So does that mean that if I go on a long drive to some far off place, I need to keep paying you Rs1500 every day????!!!!”
D: “Yes”
A nice beautiful war of words ensued. The driver called up his boss and spoke to him. I spoke to the boss. The boss spoke to the driver. Driver spoke to me again. We said we won’t pay- boss told me he gave us his private car only because we were trainees at CIFT- I said we don’t care, he was charging us for it anyway – Boss said its 1500 or nothing – We said we can’t pay 1500 for the 35 kms we’d travelled that day. I reminded the owner that they’d agreed to carry over the remaining kilometres. This was not the right way to handle customers – he was cheating us. And I made the cheating point quite clear to him.
By now the boss was pissed, and he’d hung up. The driver was instructed to collect 1500 from us, or nothing at all. In which case, our trip for the next day stood cancelled, obviously. Both parties being adamant, the driver started the ignition, pressed the clutch, shifted to 1st gear, and zoom!!!!!
Well, it was past 11pm now, we were at the gates of the guest house, the security guard staring at us. So off we went into the room, my blood still boiling from the fight. Discussing the things over, we managed to sleep later.. Maybe 4am? I’m not sure.

Day 2 : Hash and Wellington Island
We got up pretty late the next day. It was Sunday already, and we were to board the ship tomorrow. We’d still not picked up the tickets. Ajmal’s phone was ringing, but no answer.. Strange is the way fate can sometimes play with you. I’d asked Sid the previous day to check what was brewing in Lakshadweep. By today, Sid had done his homework and found out that, well, our contact Ajmal had been caught with weed by the Lakshadweep police. He would need to depose at a court in Cochin. Travelling to the mainland by itself takes a day, so even though he was out on bail in the Dweeps, it would take a few days by the time he’d get out of this mess. On the other hand, more importantly, all permits to his guests would stand cancelled!! Oh boy, the six of us sat in a room – 3 on each cot, palms on chin, elbows resting on knees for support. What had seemed to be the best New Year’s party we could’ve ever thought of had just turned out to be the worst. Of course, there wasn’t much to be done.
Sometimes, we just gotta deal with whatever’s happening, and see what’s the best way to get out of the mess first. And then, see if we can go back to the plan. The third option is always there – Plan B. It should actually be known as Plan C. A couple of folks jumped the gun here – they already switched to Plan C. Caveman was in a “Get over it guys, we’re not going to Lakshadweep” mode. NDTV and Caveman started planning on a Kerala roadtrip inspired by the Motorcycle Diaries. The tall fellow and Loverboy were quite silent by now. I was my quiet self– lost in my own thoughts as usual. The fight had spawned a separate thread at the back of my head and was still running now. Fighting once in a while is good, I feel. It helps pump blood to all those parts of the body which we don’t use so often these days – like the brain.
Still dejected, we headed to Dwarka for a brunch. The clock must’ve hit noon by now. Today, we took a bus to the restaurant. Caveman’s Malayalam skills definitely helped us ask people for directions once in a while. Who else can come up with sentences like “Cheta.. Dwarka hotel…. How to go?” Well, you get the picture. Caveman justifies this by saying that he's got a starting problem with his Mallu skills. Well, whatever :)
Hogging on good dosas and curd vadas, a strange thought just popped into my head.. While we were planning this whole trip, even before I’d got in touch with Ajmal, Loverboy had spoken to some colleague of his and got another contact of a Dweep local. He’d passed on the number to me. When I'd contacted this guy while in Bangalore, he had not been really helpful and forthcoming regarding information on the islands. However, he'd messaged me the SPORTS office phone number in Cochin. It’s on an island called Wellington Island. Of course, the number is available on the SPORTS website, but then, I’d not bothered to note it down. Thanks to my amazing phone, which has a huge memory compared to other phones such as the Sony Ericsson orange and white, I still had this message with me. Pushing my luck real far, I just called up the number. It was a Sunday, close to 1:40pm, and I was pretty sure no one would pick up the phone. To my surprise, a voice answered!! And guess what??!! The ship that was leaving tomorrow, the very same ship by which we had to go, had a few vacant seats thanks to someone else’s cancellation!! He asked us to come to the office immediately as they close by 2pm. So NDTV, Caveman and myself rushed out, got an auto and headed to the SPORTS office, which is some 16km from Dwarka. The rest paid up the restaurant bill and followed us later on.
At the office, the guy worked out a deal for us by which we could visit both Minicoy and Kavaratti, even though the package (Swaying Palms) we were paying for had only Minicoy in its itinerary. We were six guys, and took a package for 3 couples. Probably Dostana has helped India open up a lil - a welcome change I should say. It helps lessen the competition for the rest of us straight guys. Well, for the junta, we were just too excited that the trip was back on. We couldn’t care less about the details. Since credit cards are not accepted in the SPORTS office, we went around scouting for ATMs. The Dhanalakshmi Bank ATM was the nearest one, but too bad, no money in the ATM. We then headed to a few other surrounding ATMs and collected the required cash. Having paid the money and taken the receipt, we went back happily. Ship travel virgins like us didn’t know that it’s necessary to take a boarding pass for every leg of our journey from the port of departure itself. But well, in hindsight, this story wouldn’t have been so interesting if we’d not been so naïve.
The rest of the day was heaven - till evening. This evening, the cab owner had sent a few of his chelas and goons to the guest house is search of us. But our group had split into two. While three guys (NDTV, Caveman and Swaying Palm) had gone shopping for beachwear in the city, the remaining three had gone to book bus tickets for our return journey to Bangalore. We'd not booked this earlier since we didn't know when we'd be returning back from Lakshadweep. But once the package was decided today, we were able to fix a return date. The New Year's time always puts pressure on the resources of any transport system, and the buses were no exception. We searched high and dry.. for govt. buses, private buses, volvos, a/c, non-a/c, trains... But it was fruitless. Finally, one travel agent near the railways station called up the bus depot and found out that there were exactly 6 seats left in a volvo. He asked us to catch an auto and head to the bus station immediately. He also asked the bus office guy to hold the tickets for us, saying that we'd be there in 5 minutes. Jags, loverboy and myself rushed to the bus station in a rick hoping to get the bus tickets. Infact, the auto driver took us on some really bumpy roads to save us time. But all that travel through the gulleys was a waste. As soon as we reached the station, Jags and I rushed to the counter, leaving loverboy to pay the auto guy. But as fate would have it, by the time we reached the bus station, which is hardly 10 minutes away, the volvo seats had been taken. However, we were able to get tickets for the the 3rd of Jan for non-a/c. This was for the same day that we wanted, but in a non a/c bus. We took it anyways. Loverboy had lost his way from the rick to the reservation counter. This guy can't speak even a bit of Tamil for nuts. Even though Malayalam is spoken in Kerala, most of the people understand a lil bit of Tamil, and that's how I manage in Kerala. So apparently, after we left loverboy behind, the auto guy asked loverboy for more cash than what we'd settled for before. Unable to bargain and ask him to reduce the fares, loverboy thrust 20 bucks in the hands of the auto driver and ran away into the crowd in the bus stand.

So with the bus tickets done, we came back to the guest house. The other group had called us a few times by now asking us what was taking us so long. Those fellows always leave the dirty work to us and then wonder why such stuff takes so long.. I had the keys to the guest house, so the other group had to wait outside on the lawns for a couple of hours while we did all this circus. Hmmm, anyways, in the meanwhile, the cab owner's goondas had scared the hell out of Caveman and party, and they'd agreed to give them some cash, though much more than what we'd said earlier. But after all that shopping, they didn't have cash with them, so the goons were waiting along with our boys for us. As soon as we went, they took the cash from us and left. Later on, I came to know that the owner was quite pissed that I'd called him a cheat. Infact, the goons had been asking "Where's K?" from the very beginning.

That night's dinner was in Subway, right opposite Dwarka. The sandwiches were just OK, not really worth the price. We'd also had some pizzas delivered to the guest house earlier, and I should say that our experience with international food chains in Cochin has not been good so far.

Day 3: Tipu Sultan, here we come!!
The ship reporting time given to us was 9am. We made it to the wharf on time – 10am to be exact. That’s definitely “on time” by our standards! Now remember, any time you go on a cruise, never, never, never, never, never forget to take a boarding pass for the journey you are about to make. We did exactly that mistake. We go till the ship and the security guard stops us there and asks us for a boarding pass. Since the ship is owned by a different department and the tourism department just has a quota in it, some haggling ensued between the tourism dept manager and the ship manager. Each called up their higher ups and after some adjustments that were made through the phone, we were let in to M. V. Tipu Sultan – an ageing beauty which must’ve been state of the art way back in 1973. We’d not taken first class tickets, but Tourist Class. So, it was an A/C chair car. Well, the chair car was OK to sit, we didn’t care much about how to sleep anyways. We all slept on the deck under the stars that night. And how did we pass time that day on the ship? Quite as any other day. We were hanging around the wheel room (the cockpit of the ship) when we were allowed access inside. We also found a young naval officer from Bangalore taught us how to check the GPS, calculate bearings and change maps. Later, we spent time on the deck spotting dolphins and flying fish. Imagine standing on the edge of the ship with dolphins jumping around in the deep blue sea!! Now imagine five of them racing against the hull of the ship, jumping here and there.. Yea baby, it sure was amazing! Tall fellow was so excited, he felt that he’d got his money’s worth already.
In the evening, NDTV taught us a new game with playing cards, and of course, UNO on the deck attracted a few Curious Georges. Tall fellow and NDTV went to this other bunch of people playing cards next to us and learnt how to play poker. Somehow none of us had the patience to learn or play anything new now, so we decided to play that some other time.
I should say food on the ship was decent enough to eat. But the common toilets always made us think twice before eating and drinking. I guess the old ship needs some maintenance!
Nevertheless, I should say a ship journey is a must for everyone!

Day 4: Pearly Gates/ Heaven/ Minicoy

Dear Minicoy,
You’re the closest to heaven that I’ll ever be, and I don’t wanna go home right now..
This morning, after breakfast, we were on the deck when we spotted an island far away. We were nearing Minicoy! The lagoon is surrounded by clear shallow waters for more than 2km around the island. So, the ships cannot come close to the island, but stop far away. We need to transfer to small boats to reach the island. All the other tourists to the island were day tourists which meant they’d get back to the ship by evening. However, we’d stay in paradise for 2 more days. We had our lunch along with the rest of the junta and then dove straight to the green sea. Ok, I need to step back here for a moment to give you a lil background about Minicoy. This is a relatively large island compared to the others – measuring 15km by 12km. Minicoy is about 400km from Maldives, and is the southernmost of the Lakshadweep islands. So, they culture and traditions of Minicoy are very similar to that of Maldives. It has a hospital and a police station, among other things. The sand is pure white, and the beach is pure green. You can shift your gaze to the distance and see the colour of the water gradually change to deep blue as the ocean floor goes deeper. The people are the friendliest bunch we’d ever seen and go to any extent to keep their guests happy. They were probably trying to promote their island for tourism, but the place is so freakin damn good that we’d suggest it to everyone anyways. Rashid and party took very good care of us in the resort. We swam in the water, dived into deep waters RDB style and played around soaking in the sun. We were then taken to the beach side resort a couple of kilometres away in an open autorickshaw – an indigenous invention. It’s an auto used to transport goods – the ones which have an open trailer behind. The trailer has benches for passengers to sit. It so happened that the resort manager had a son studying in BMS college in Bangalore. He was impressed with the two BMS junta in our gumbal, especially when he came to know that his son had played cricket under the captaincy of loverboy. We got a free upgrade to A/C rooms even though we’d paid only for non-A/C since the entire resort was empty right now.

Apparently, a group of 15 couples had cancelled their trip, which effectively meant that we had the entire resort to ourselves. This being the only place for tourists to stay in the entire island, this also meant that we were the only tourists on the island!! It couldn’t get better than this. The comforts of a five star beach side resort, and the whole island just for us! In the evening, we took the kayaks on the beach and took off in the waters without informing anyone in the resort. And of course, no life jackets on.

Loverboy and swaying palm (a.k.a Tall fellow) too came along with us even though their swimming skills are nothing to write home about. After all, the water is just knee deep, so in case you drown, all you gotta do is stand up and pull the kayak back with you.
So we were in the water for about an hour on our kayaks when one of the resort guys came on another kayak in search of us. Since we’d not informed them while going, they were worried that we’d got into some trouble and sent this guy in search of us. Meanwhile, Caveman took NDTV, loverboy and me walking on dead coral reefs. The corals are basically calcium deposits, and when they’re dead they become hard and rough. Goodness gracious, we got back onto our kayaks after about 15 mins with bloody scratches all over our feet.
Back in the resort, we relaxed, clicked pics, and enjoyed a few games of carom. Later that night, Caveman caught a huge crab on the sea shore. We washed it in fresh water from the tap, dropped it and made it scramble around like crazy in the dining hall. Swaying Palm freaked out and jumped about like Olive Oyl (Popeye’s girlfriend). The crab was now transferred to my hands and after a click-click session, we left the crab back in the sea.

Good night for today, lights out.

Day 5: The Chief Guests go Scuba diving, Snorkelling and catch an Octopus
This being the 31st of December, was the most memorable day for us. The morning started off with snorkelling in the coral reefs. We spotted fishes, sea cucumbers, sea urchins and lots of other marine life. Snorkelling is done off an uninhabited island close to mainland Minicoy. We reached the place by boat and immediately started off. We were six of us with about 3 guides. The group split up very soon and each one was headed in different directions, slipping and crashing against the hardened coral reefs every now and then.
After about an hour of snorkelling, while we were headed back to the shore, Caveman and party seemed to have found something fishy. By now the other group too joined them and it seemed like there was something going on there underwater. Jags and me (who comprised the third group) quickly joined in and came to know that Caveman had spotted an octopus. They were desperately trying to pull out the poor creature from beneath the reef, along with the help of the instructors. Thanks to the poking and pulling, the octopus started coming out in instalments – first one leg, then another.. It still tried to save itself by injecting ink at us in a last ditch effort. Caveman not being someone who gives up so easily, put his hand right into the reef and pulled out the whole creature, which by now, was dead. Not wanting to throw away our prized catch into the ocean, we got it back to the resort. Having got it back so far, we asked the chef to cook it for us. So here we were, five veggies and a non-veggie who only likes chicken, asking the chef to cook an octopus which we’d caught ourselves.
After a nice heavy lunch, we set off for scuba diving today. The scuba diving instructors charge Rs. 500/- for a dive which lasts roughly 5 minutes. Those brilliant five minutes when you see colours and shapes you’ve never seen on land. Those five minutes which you’ll cherish for a long time. Those five minutes when you’ll kick yourself for not having bought an underwater camera. Those five minutes when you almost forget to breathe through your nose! Thank god that you actually need to gasp for breath through your mouth, else I’m sure every first-time scuba diver would gasp out of excitement and gulp in water and phinish!!!
A few more pics in the sea, and back we were at the resort. The instructor Ali has his own boat in which he headed back to his place.
The manager told us that today being the 31st of December, there’d be a party in the resort. A few distinguished villagers and officers from the island would be there too. By evening, the guests started pouring in. I guess they were about 50-70 in number.
We on the other hand, were busy playing another game of carom when we were mildly asked by the manager if we’d like to start dinner. It was close to 9:00 pm by now. We said we’d have it later. He asked if they could serve us soup as we were playing. We said OK. So they served us soup right there. We continued playing till 9:30pm when the manager came again and asked us if we’d like to have dinner. We wanted to have it later, but that’s when the manager insisted we continue playing after dinner. After all, we were their guests at Minicoy, so how could anyone at the party start dinner without the guests starting?! So, basically, we held up a bunch of 70 hot-shots of Minicoy – IAS officers, village heads et al, just because we were too intrigued in our game of carom! The embarrassment didn’t stop there. We were made chief guests of the evening, and a cultural program was held showcasing the local dances, music and traditions of Minicoy. After this, the Guests of the Island (the Bengaluru Boys) were called on stage to perform. The dumbstruck six-some managed to shake a leg for a minute or so before being sent back.

The crowd dispersed. New Years rocked!!! And the song “Hibbarulashe” set to the tune of “Dil Dekhe Dekho” kept ringing in our ears. Even though booze is banned on the island, we were offered a bottle of rum for Rs. 2000/- by one of the guys at the resort which we politely turned down.

1st January, 2009 : Adios amigos!
A bittersweet symphony indeed, today was our last day on Minicoy. After paying a visit to the Minicoy lighthouse and the fishermen’s village of Boduathri, we said goodbye to all the locals we’d met and headed to M.V. Kavaratti for our overnight voyage to Kavaratti- the headquarters of Lakshadweep.
M.V. Kavaratti is a spanking new ship hardly 6 months into service. It is a really really cool ship. It has first class, second class and bunk class cabins. While tourists are only allowed in the first class, the bunk class is meant for locals to travel between islands as well as to the mainland. The bunk class is the cheapest, and is a dormitory with no windows. The locals use the ship to transport birds and other animals as well. This ship was already full of people who were a part of the Samudram package. Fat aunty from Bangalore later told us that they’d visited Kalpeni before coming to Minicoy and that Kalpeni sucked big time. Everyone on the ship felt that Minicoy was the best. And we were glad to have made the right decision of staying there.
Now as soon as we boarded the ship, we were asked for boarding passes at the reception counter. But the office guy in Cochin had given us nothing but a bill saying we’d paid 60k for the trip. It was never communicated to the ship that we’d be travelling on MVK. So we were as good as ticketless travellers. After arguing and realizing that there was no point, we gave up. Manager Khoya told us that he’d arrange bunk class for us for tonight. The next morning when we landed in Kavaratti, we were supposed to check with Director on the island and have the emergency quota released which would then accommodate us in first class. The loos again were horrible, and stank from a mile away. Our luggage secure in the police strong room, we slept peacefully that night in the bunks. Swaying Palm is so tall that he couldn’t fit into the bunk. Caveman was looking for some adventure and didn’t feel like sleeping in the dorm. So the two of them slept on the deck that night. Of course, before that we all “added minerals to the ocean” as Swaying Palm mildly puts it, not from the deck mind you, but from the helipad. We had two folks guarding the staircase of the deck while the rest went about their jobs.

Jan 2nd : Snorkelling and beach volleyball in Kavaratti
The next day in Kavaratti was amazing again. This time, it seemed like all the colour had shifted from the seas onto land, thanks a bunch of 150 people from Pune who’d come as part of the “Agarwal Club”. The F-23s were too good it was definitely a sight to behold. Best part, we didn’t need underwater cameras for this.
Jags, Caveman and I swam to the scuba diving place and snorkelled. We wanted to dive too, but there were already 43 people from the Agarwal Club, and there was no place for anyone else. Damn these people who come in big groups and spoil the vacation of other smaller groups of people. However, snorkelling here was brilliant. The coral reefs are more here than Minicoy and the fishes seemed to be everywhere! They seemed to be getting between our legs while swimming – we encountered almost a few hundred of them at one place. The colours of the fishes here – orange, white, yellow, blue… And not one or two, but groups of fishes of the same colour. A sight to behold indeed.

By the time we got back to the shore, Loverboy and Swaying Palm had decided to join the Agarwal Club kids for a game of beach volleyball, thanks to a certain F-23 who was playing with them (was that Neha? Not sure). It’s another thing that she left soon after. The rest of us joined in now. A fun game it was, with me playing like a blind man. However, we won the game and thrashed their asses.
Just when we assumed that an adventure is over, the next one seemed to be brewing in the bay. Back on the ship, with no luck of the emergency quota, we were under the impression that we were stuck with the bunk class. However, that was not to be. We were not even stuck to bunk class anymore. After dropping us at Kavaratti this morning, the ship had been to Kadmat and back. While the ship was already full with passengers, the ship folks had managed to get in more people onto it. The locals were filled to the brim in the bunk class. Since this class doesn’t seem to have any reservation system, all our seats were as good as lost. Well, we’d had a horrible experience the previous day that we didn’t really bother that much. We had our sleeping bags, and could sleep in peace anywhere. However, the rooms of the Agarwal club had been changed and allocated to some firings. There was high drama on the ship with Manager Khoya being cornered by a bunch of uncles from the Agarwal Club. Khoya by now in tears, was ready to do anything for anybody.
Now just before boarding the ship in Minicoy, a bespectacled Cisco boy had come to us in search of Swaying Palm. He’d seen his NetApp t-shirt from a distance, and come to speak to him. Apparently, he had friends at NetApp. Well, we’d forgotten about him after that. He was travelling alone, and seemed to be in his own world making new friends (or friend, should I say). This guy was in a 2- bunk room in first class. First class, as the name suggests, is truly first class on board this ship. Each cabin has a private bathroom – and at that point in time, that meant luxury to us. Cisco boy (his name was Mythreya by the way) told us that the other berth in his room was empty, so we could make use of it, as well as the loo. After Minicoy, this was a second heaven for us. It gave us the passport to eat and drink as we liked! While we were sitting in the room and rejoicing all this, Khoya appeared with two firangs. He’d decided to allocate both Cisco boy’s berth and our berth to them, but thankfully we were in the room when that happened and were able to save the room. So that night, Jags slept in the bunk with all the valuables while the rest of us slept on the deck of the ship. Adding minerals was done through the first class cabin today though.

Jan 3rd: Back in Cochin
The ship arrived in Cochin, albeit a few hours late. That’s the thing with these ships, they let you have an awesome time, and then some more. So, invariably, your other plans go for a toss.
After a good lunch at Dwarka, our adda, we bid adieu to Kerala and headed back to Bangalore by bus.
Total cost of trip – 15k
Total experience on trip – Priceless

This was one of those “There are some things money can’t buy, for everything else there’s Mastercard” trips.
And hell, we rocked!!