Mid semester retreat - June 25 2012

We had the opportunity to go on our midsemester retreat which ended up being way fun after we left the first location we planned to go. We ended up taking a train from Coimbatore to Kanyakumari, the most southern point of India where the three seas meet, at midnight. We didn't end up pulling into the station down there until noon, 12 hours later. We walked towards the main stretch of hotels that Lonely Planet recommended and found a place to stay. We got a room on the top floor of a hotel with decent acoomodations and access to the roof which was sweet for the location. It overlooked the entire city, overlooked the whole sea allowing us to see the sunrises and sunsets, and we could see the nice mountains behind us. It was cheap and when split between us ended up being nothing for a hotel. Things turned south though as the weather wasn't very nice, there were lots of people trying to sell us stuff and they were super persistent and annoying, there was no beach, the sunsets and sunrises didn't end up being too nice since it was overcast, and some guy tried hustling us for what we thought was a free tour of a Gandhi memorial. We met a few Europeans while down there and your just pulled towards them because of their white skin and the ability they have to relate with you. We took a boat to an island where a monk had meditated and received revelation. We were ready to leave Kanyakumari so when the time finally came we were ready at the train station. We then took a sleeper train that night to Rameswaram. We picked up a parcel dinner and left around 1:00AM in the morning. We pulled in to Rameswaram around 6:00AM, walked off the train, and started walking to where we thought the ocean was. We wanted a hotel close to the beach and what we got was quite an adventure. There were hundreds of people dripping with water. We found out that Hindus come to the ocean to bathe and then walk into the temple a hundred yards away and wash from 22 wells. It was exciting seeing all of this going on, the city was very bustling at 7:00AM. We found a guy who was willing to take us around to some of the local sites. This place is actually very popular because of its religious sites. One spot is where Rama is believed to have fought Ravana. They also have Adam's bridge and Rama's foot. The last place that he took us to was the beach. It was beautiful. Blue waters and nice sand. The water was very warm and enjoyable. We layed out in the sand for quite some time and I ended up getting fried after a few hours. A few days later my skin started really peeling and I looked like a monster.  Our last trip was to Madurai. We left Rameswaram at 5:00PM in the evening and pulled into Madurai around 9:00PM that night. Josh and I went out looking for a hotel. We were ready for a place that finally had wifi and a littler nicer accomodations so we forked out a little more for it. We found a boss restaurant that served all of this food that we had never tried before and it ended up being way good. Something that we have found hard to find is customer service and help with the menu, but this place was willing to help and make our experience enjoyable. That next day we woke up, ate our complimentary breakfast, fell back asleep, and then went to the temple later that day. This temple is one of the largest in Southern India and it really is beautiful. We got lots of pictures and ended up doing a lot of sourvenior shopping for friends and family back home. They had some pretty cool stuff. One of the groups favorite parts about the place was that they had a tailors market. You could get anything that you wanted tailored. If we had more time, Josh probably would have gotten a whole new warddrobe. The girls picked up some tailor made purses and then our time was winding down so we had to take off. We went back to the hotel, crashed or emailed for a few hours, packed, and took off to the train station. We ended up leaving around 1:00AM and getting home around 7:30AM. Overall as the trip went on we had more and more fun. It was an enjoyable mid semester retreat. Everything else including job shadowing hours, research, and adapting to the culture is going well!