17-18/feb kathakali in fort kochi
I meet alessandro, from Florence, that bought a vespa in chennai, in the south of India, and is planning to spend 3 months touring india. Italian and vespa, of course! He has given me a book, a quite special present, from jules verne; ‘around the world in 80 days’, in Italian. Yes, still in kochi, twin city of ernakulam.
I walked around, updated my web pages, ate thaly… easy and nice day, meeting a few Indians, talking about football with them… The next day was a bit more active;
I rented a bicycle after a very good breakfast in a very nice place, and extremely cheap. I think that I still havn’t found any place in India with bad food; you can always find lots of tastes in each dish, and I guess that’s why they use a lot of spices. The only problem is that sometimes curries are too oily, and if you eat that everyday… I don’t think is that healthy. Anyway, in this place the food was excellent. I started pedaling, and I did a big tour around fort kochi, the historical area of kochi. First by the beach, following the famous Chinese fisherman’s nets, the ones I talked about in the backwaters chapter. After that, towards the fort, surrounding the sea shore. There are quite many Christian churches, muslim mosques, and hindu temples. But here, in kochi is also possible to find jewish synagogues. Jewish have stablished a big community here, a long time ago, the oldest in India. And so, there were many Israelis in town. And it is nice to see all these different religious buildings living together, and all those names of the streets, some of them hindu names, christian, muslims, jewish…as the most normal thing of the world. People should come and see, and learn about convivence. The western area of fort kochi it’s the rich one. A kind of urbanization, with big houses, very well-kept, cars… There’s not big poverty in this area. I’ve realized that in kochi, goats have taken the place to cows, but like these ones, they keep on eating the trash. Today, is Friday, and everything is very relaxed and quiet. Streets are semi-empty (if this is possible in India), and that’s why today is Friday… absolutely logic, isn’t it! Synagogues closes on Fridays and Saturdays, and the rest of ‘public’ buildings, closes on Friday as well. Just a few shops for tourists are open. So I guess I’ll have to wait till my trip to Israel to see a synagogue!
In the sunset time, I was looking for a good spot to take pictures to the sunset through the Chinese nets. In that waiting time, I met I guy from Israel, traveling also by bike, a royal einfield, a very very nice bike! And a man from England, that has been traveling for the last 3 years… wow! After taking the pictures, something more cultural. I was at a kathakali show. Jorge, the Portuguese guy told it was worth watching them. And so did I!
Kathakali is a dance-drama from kerala, from the 2nd century a.d., but popularized in the 17th century. Kathakali means story play, and at the beginning there were over a 100 plays. Now 30 of them are kept. All of them based in Ramayana and mahabharata, books talking about conflicts between gods and demons (many times under human forms), and about the exploits of Krishna. In this play, there are 2 men playing percussions, the actors, and the story teller. All of them have been studying kathakali for at least 6 years; First the story teller explains the bases and history of it. Then, the first actor appears, and following the rhythm of the drums starts defining the ‘alphabet’ of kathakali, how to say yes or no, feelings, animals, and different situations of life. Only moving the eyes, in a really amazing way, moving the muscles of the face, I would say all of them, moving the neck, head, hands, fingers, feet… He never speaks. Only men are allowed to play kathakali. So I guess that if you know all this very complex alphabet of kathakali, you can understand the whole play, but with a 10 minutes introduction is not enough. Plays used to long more than 10 hours, but this one is a special show for tourists… Our play goes about a nice looking warrior, jayanthan, than meets a girl, a very hot girl, lalitha, an avatar of the demon, under a human form. Nacrathundi is the demon. The play explains their meeting, how they get close, how they discuss, the moment he recognize the demon in lalitha, and the fight of jayanthan with nacrathundi. Not even a single word, and millions of precise movements with all those parts of the body, mostly the eyes, face-muscles and neck. During the show, the story teller is singing, and the drummers playing the drums. Everything together quite interesting, and takes you to another time. And what for me was more important; I’m not 100% sure, but I would say that this kathakali has influenced a lot, the Indian cinema, and video clips. The choreographies, the way men and women act… and always with music as a backgrond. So, I would say that:
Ramayana and mahabharata (2nd a..) – kathakali (17th a.d) –Indian movies (20th a.d)
After that, dinner with alessandro (33) and another Italian (52), quite surrealistic, artist and dreamer. The dinner went on till the restaurant closed. Very nice dinner, and very interesting people. It’s amazing to see how here, everyone has been everywhere!! All the continents, and even in very strange places…
24/2/05
I walked around, updated my web pages, ate thaly… easy and nice day, meeting a few Indians, talking about football with them… The next day was a bit more active;
I rented a bicycle after a very good breakfast in a very nice place, and extremely cheap. I think that I still havn’t found any place in India with bad food; you can always find lots of tastes in each dish, and I guess that’s why they use a lot of spices. The only problem is that sometimes curries are too oily, and if you eat that everyday… I don’t think is that healthy. Anyway, in this place the food was excellent. I started pedaling, and I did a big tour around fort kochi, the historical area of kochi. First by the beach, following the famous Chinese fisherman’s nets, the ones I talked about in the backwaters chapter. After that, towards the fort, surrounding the sea shore. There are quite many Christian churches, muslim mosques, and hindu temples. But here, in kochi is also possible to find jewish synagogues. Jewish have stablished a big community here, a long time ago, the oldest in India. And so, there were many Israelis in town. And it is nice to see all these different religious buildings living together, and all those names of the streets, some of them hindu names, christian, muslims, jewish…as the most normal thing of the world. People should come and see, and learn about convivence. The western area of fort kochi it’s the rich one. A kind of urbanization, with big houses, very well-kept, cars… There’s not big poverty in this area. I’ve realized that in kochi, goats have taken the place to cows, but like these ones, they keep on eating the trash. Today, is Friday, and everything is very relaxed and quiet. Streets are semi-empty (if this is possible in India), and that’s why today is Friday… absolutely logic, isn’t it! Synagogues closes on Fridays and Saturdays, and the rest of ‘public’ buildings, closes on Friday as well. Just a few shops for tourists are open. So I guess I’ll have to wait till my trip to Israel to see a synagogue!
In the sunset time, I was looking for a good spot to take pictures to the sunset through the Chinese nets. In that waiting time, I met I guy from Israel, traveling also by bike, a royal einfield, a very very nice bike! And a man from England, that has been traveling for the last 3 years… wow! After taking the pictures, something more cultural. I was at a kathakali show. Jorge, the Portuguese guy told it was worth watching them. And so did I!
Kathakali is a dance-drama from kerala, from the 2nd century a.d., but popularized in the 17th century. Kathakali means story play, and at the beginning there were over a 100 plays. Now 30 of them are kept. All of them based in Ramayana and mahabharata, books talking about conflicts between gods and demons (many times under human forms), and about the exploits of Krishna. In this play, there are 2 men playing percussions, the actors, and the story teller. All of them have been studying kathakali for at least 6 years; First the story teller explains the bases and history of it. Then, the first actor appears, and following the rhythm of the drums starts defining the ‘alphabet’ of kathakali, how to say yes or no, feelings, animals, and different situations of life. Only moving the eyes, in a really amazing way, moving the muscles of the face, I would say all of them, moving the neck, head, hands, fingers, feet… He never speaks. Only men are allowed to play kathakali. So I guess that if you know all this very complex alphabet of kathakali, you can understand the whole play, but with a 10 minutes introduction is not enough. Plays used to long more than 10 hours, but this one is a special show for tourists… Our play goes about a nice looking warrior, jayanthan, than meets a girl, a very hot girl, lalitha, an avatar of the demon, under a human form. Nacrathundi is the demon. The play explains their meeting, how they get close, how they discuss, the moment he recognize the demon in lalitha, and the fight of jayanthan with nacrathundi. Not even a single word, and millions of precise movements with all those parts of the body, mostly the eyes, face-muscles and neck. During the show, the story teller is singing, and the drummers playing the drums. Everything together quite interesting, and takes you to another time. And what for me was more important; I’m not 100% sure, but I would say that this kathakali has influenced a lot, the Indian cinema, and video clips. The choreographies, the way men and women act… and always with music as a backgrond. So, I would say that:
Ramayana and mahabharata (2nd a..) – kathakali (17th a.d) –Indian movies (20th a.d)
After that, dinner with alessandro (33) and another Italian (52), quite surrealistic, artist and dreamer. The dinner went on till the restaurant closed. Very nice dinner, and very interesting people. It’s amazing to see how here, everyone has been everywhere!! All the continents, and even in very strange places…
24/2/05
posted by Unknown at 18:39
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