Sleeping until 10.
Still not long enough.
Most of them hadn’t even gone to bed that late. Only Suraj, Shanki and I had played cards until 3:30.
When I woke up, I noticed a breath of fresh air in our flat.
An infectious laugh.
A constant smile.
Durga had arrived.
The reason I’m dedicating this day to her is quite simple.
Until then, the group had mostly spoken Malayalam.
The positive way of looking at this was that I got to improve my Malayalam and learn a lot about how differently languages can be structured.
Great for Light on German.
To my ears, languages such as Mandarin, German and Hindi often make individual words relatively easy to distinguish. The boundaries between them feel clearer. Once you learn the words, the sentences gradually become much easier to understand.
Languages such as French—or Malayalam, in this case—feel slightly different to me. Sounds and word forms connect more strongly, and Malayalam adds endings to words that carry extra information. The result can sound like one continuous stream.
This made me realise that my Malayalam was not yet good enough to keep up with native speakers.
I might know quite a few words, but recognising them inside rapidly spoken sentences—especially across different dialects—was still challenging.
From my perspective, nothing needed to change.
They see each other maaaaybe once a year. They should enjoy their time together. They are an incredibly close-knit group, and I felt uncomfortable interrupting their natural flow.
My suggestion was simple:
You guys do your thing. I’ll do mine.
The only problem was that I still couldn’t move around independently because my credit card wasn’t working.
But for them, leaving me on my own was not an acceptable solution.
After I spoke with Hari—and especially after Durga arrived—the atmosphere changed.
Throughout the day, we had hours of insightful conversations. We talked about parenting, pregnancy, men and women.
I wrote down one quote because I still need to think about it:
“Women are trained to work all the time. And when they don’t, they feel guilty. That’s what our society has turned them into.”
Potentially explosive topics.
Possibly a little too explosive for my taste.
So instead of saying something merely for the sake of saying something, I mostly listened.
That day, I also discovered why I had packed aspirin from the wide selection of medicine Mom had prepared for me.
Durga had a cold and actually needed some.
With that being said, it was another packed day.
Lunch
For lunch, we found a beautiful restaurant:
Unfortunately, the food wasn’t particularly tasty.
We had also somehow ended up sitting fairly close to the toilet ventilation, so every now and then, an aromatic breeze drifted in our direction.
The food looked good, though:
Once our stomachs were full, we jumped back into the car and drove for another hour to the shopping mall.
Shopping
Yesterday’s shopping expedition had not yet been completed.
We had been equipped for the Mehndi Night, but not everyone had all the clothes they needed for the wedding the following day.
So we had to go shopping once again.
It’s a true paradise for anyone who loves colours and elaborate designs.
Apart from that, I doubt anyone will be heartbroken if I spare them the remaining details.
Two personal highlights are still worth sharing, though.
First, there is one thing about India that I love and that makes me laugh again and again and again:
The way certain things are spelled.
Pothique.
What?!
Yes, my dear family and friends.
Apparently, that’s a boutique.
It took me a moment to understand what it was trying to say.
Second, the shopping mall had hired what I can only describe as an elevator conductor.
Never heard of that?
Neither had I. And I probably invented the job title.
They had hired someone to sit in front of the elevator buttons and operate them for the customers.
In case you don’t believe me, here is the proof.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
Shopping took a while.
Afterwards, we went to get something I vaguely remembered, although I couldn’t immediately remember where from:
Boba.
There seemed to be a strange fascination with this far-too-small place.
People dressed up, took pictures and made the world a much better place by sharing their works of art.
Later, I finally remembered where I knew boba from:
Taiwan.
I think I had it at Taipei 101.
Anyway.
After three power cuts and one hour of waiting, we finally received our drinks.
Because everyone had ordered a different tea, we did something that made even me hesitate slightly:
Everyone tried every drink—using the same straws.
By the final power cut, we could barely tell the difference between the inside and the outside of the shop.
It had become dark everywhere.
We drove home for another hour and ordered shawarma—a version of dürüm, or perhaps rather the other way around.
We took a short rest.
Then Hari made a call.
Until that moment, he hadn’t been sure whether he had enough energy left.
But somehow, he did.
He decided to drive another hour back home to Kodungallur so that he would already be there the following morning for Prabhu’s visit.
Hari had invited him. Would have been kinda bad, if he wasnt there after Prabhu drove 5 hours by car to reach punctually at eight o'clock in the morning.
For the Palm Leaf Library
The entire day had actually been lovely, and it would have been nice to stay and spend more time with the others.
Prabhu, however, plays a central role in my visit to India.
That’s why I decided to go with Hari.
Plus…
Hari had no time the following day, so someone needed to take care of Prabhu and show him around.
That became Vichu’s and my job.
After another day running on far too little sleep, we finally arrived.
We ate some more dinner.
Slept.
Done.
See you in the next one.
