ATTACK OF THE FRUIT BATS

Hey everyone its Simon.
My mom has been very persistent that I start making blog posts- so here we go. I'll start with my morning, cleaning up bits of fruit from a mistake made last night. Margaret and I were very tired (relating to next blog post), so we quickly rushed through our nightly routine of closing up shop. As it turns out, someone forgot to put the fruit in the basket. I'm not going to going to play the blame game but it was obviously the work of Margaret. So when I got into work this morning, I found what was left of our bannanas, which apparently weren't good enough for our bat friends. Unfortunately, no remnants of apples were found, but the orange did turn up behind the counter covered in mold. Once that was done we had a uneventful day. So in regards to my day, "all in all, cant complain"-Mr and Mrs Kuthrapoli the big bang theory.

Kerala cooking class

Hey everyone. It is Simon again.  I don't know what to put here. Margaret arranged a cooking class for us at 6:30 pm on Tuesday night. As always we arrived somewhat on time. Upon our arrival the power went out, leaving us in the dark for the first half hour of the course which made things a little interesting. To my disappointment we did not get any fancy hats, although the chef had one. )''. The class consisted of 6 dishes, a palak (spinich) pakora starter, a plain parota for the bread, a dahl for vegetable dish, a fish marinated in something called pollichanthu (i still have no idea what it is), and finally coconut pancakes for desert (which were the highlight of the evening for me). Margaret took notes, while I slaved in the kitchen with an insane chef who must not have been able to feel pain. He stuck his hand into the propane jet of fire to light a single candle, had hot oil splash on him.

Here you can see the cook in action

cleaning up the mess I made of chopping

up onions, while crying.

Here is a bowl of hot oil with a handle

that clasps on, and is not very sturdy.

It also extremely hot next to the open

jet of flame which seems to get hotter and hotter.

This is my friend Freddy.

He had a very bad day and it's about to get worse.

Here I am grinding up coconut

for the rice and Freddy

Here we can see Fred all bundled

up in banana leaf moments

before he is thrown onto an

open fire.

Here are 6 of the 7 dishes,

(we had already eaten our appetizers)

Tomato onion masala rice, along with a 

tomato rose, nice touch by the chef.

Freddy in banana leaf with a tomato rose and

tomato flower with a candle inside, that almost cost

the chef his life when he used a jet of fire to light it.

North Indian dahl with, surprise surprise

a tomato rose.

Masala rice again.

Pancake desert minus the coconut.

Parota

Freddy still bundled up, only now hes been scorched in flame.

The class was a lot of fun, and I'm looking forward to choosing the next 7 dishes we will learn next time. None of this would be possible without our new friend David from Toronto, he watched the shop while were gone giving us a little freedom to enjoy a night out.

Goats'n'hose

Hey, it is Simon again. This post will be about the family of goats we pass each morning.

The goats are usually tied to trees by garden hose and have collars of hose- I don't know if its visible in these pictures.

The title is a movie reference.

teaser

This photo is a teaser for tomorrow's post (which I hope will be written by the model pictured here).

Powerless

Every day there are 2 scheduled power outages - a half hour in the early morning and a half hour in the evening - An hour without power every day to reduce consumption presumably .


We have had a wild couple of days on top of the regular insanity . The power was out almost all of Thursday - Simon says it cost us $ 4 . 00 in business . The back - up battery only runs 2 computers for an hour , so it was useless for most of the day . Yesterday there were several unscheduled outages and the lights flickered turning the computers on and off and on and off the rest of the time .

The first photo is of one of the power lines near the helipad and the second is a shot of the power lines in front of the cafe . Your eyes do not deceive - the municipality has looped the power lines around the tree branches .

Above is a photo of one of the switch plates in our house . Every socket has a switch to turn it off when not in use . On the left is the control for the ceiling fan ( it gets so hot you cannot touch it ). Up on the right is an emergency light that lights automatically when the power goes out . I was made aware by the boys that this  $ 14 . 00 purchase was considered a silly extravagance .

Today's Specialty: fried bat

My advice is - duck . If one of the bats looks like it is heading for your head - it probably is . Because they navigate through sight and smell and not echolocation, they are prone to mishap. This is Simon ' s yummy early morning photograph.  He is excited about the idea of it eventually falling on someone because he is a boy and naturally gross.

Bat-tastic

I was really freaked out the first time I looked off the balcony of the cafe and noticed the enormous bats in the tree 15 to 20 feet from my face (see fig. 1).  With some research I have discovered that they are Indian Flying-foxes (Pteropus giganteus) (see fig. 2).  Every night between 7 and 8 they stomp around upside down in the trees searching for nuts and then they hang while they eat their score.  They must move on to the next feeding site after that because they seem to disappear.

Now that I have started asking around I have been told that they will fly in to the cafe to eat my fruit if I do not guard against them.  I have purchased a blue plastic bucket with a lid to store fruit at night (see fig. 3).

Not only are they a fruit bat- they are a mega fruit bat.  Holy crap they are huge things to have crawling so close to your face.  According to Wikipedia they can have wing span as big as 4ft 10 inches (1.5m) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Flying_Fox ).  Although not quite as big as an actual fox, many seem as big as another member of the canine family of the subspecies Sporticus (see fig.4) familiar to many blog readers.

(figure 1) It is almost in the centre of the picture.  Sorry for the poor quality photo.

(figure 2) A better photo.

(figure 3) My basket.

(figure 4)  Note of clarification: Indian Flying Foxes are unlikely to be seen wearing apparel made from polar fleece and Thinsulate given their tropical habitat and an inability to work snap clasps. 

Home at last

I expect that this will be the last post of photos of our home. 

 This is the swanky house over the fence and I think the black cat's preferred home.

This is the water tank on my roof along with what appears to be the only metal ladder in the country.

Below this is a large cement balcony that would be great for growing plants if a person were to be home enough for such things.  There are several leaks in the water system on the property which provide water to likely local wildlife and likely will cost us a fortune.

The landlord showed up at our doorstep the other day to admonish us for changing the gate padlock as it had been preventing him from entering the property to pluck bananas and coconuts (we have bananas- who knew?). We explained to him that he is welcome to give us 24 hours advance notice before any plucking.

our address

I think this is a good mailing address for us.  I will post it in my profile to make it easy to find from now on.  I will let you know if it doesn't work as well.

Mami Wata Resorts Buliding
North Cliff near Helipad
695141  Varkala,
Kerala State,
India

home again

This is a picture of where the wall in our living room meets the ceiling.  Every few feet is a rather large rectangular opening to the outside for ventilation.  As you can see it is also provides useful access for small lizards, mosquitoes, TV cables and the like.

Below is Simon's bedroom.  It is on the second floor and has a balcony.  The picture below is the view of the neighbors from his balcony.  They seem to be building a new house (which may explain why their existing house is in such a mess).

Below is the bedroom given to the cousins.  They prefer to sleep in the shop together, so it is rarely used for anything other than hanging laundry.

This is our upstairs bathroom.  We use the toilet off of my bedroom and only use this one to shower.  You can see that this bathroom is fancy because it has both an Asian and a  western style toilet.  To the right of the sink is a shower head on the wall.  Over the toilet is a water heater which neither Simon or I know how to use.  Translation: our showers are cold and our bathroom is always wet.

I hope that those of you asking for more pictures of our house are happy and the rest of you are not bored by this installment of our home tour.

Black Magic

Last night someone left a black magic spell (a symbol created out of black chalk(?) with a chicken bone in the centre) on the doorstep of our neighbour's shop.  The shopkeeper has been very upset all day as this will mean very bad luck for him.  I thought it meant that he had pissed off one of the hundred or so Napali waiters in the area-just shows you how much I know.

Adil has decided that we may have a similar curse that would explain our recent dip in sales. We will pour alcohol around the perimeter of the property tomorrow to break any bad spells.  I thought that the cactus branch hanging from the rope over the front door (pictured above) was intended to protect us from such things, but obviously not.  I will update the blog as the situation progresses..

our yard

Sorry if this is boring, but some people have asked for additional, more precise pictures of our home, so here goes:
When you enter the gate and look right you see palm tree debris from the killer tree (above).  Sometimes 2 cream coloured stray puppies spring from the leaves and scurry under the gate (even when it is open- they are cute puppies, not rocket scientists).

 

When you are on my porch looking out at the street you have this view.  I sometimes pull the rusty black gate closed to prevent puppy infestation.

If you look to the left you can see where I read in the morning.

This is the view out my back door off the kitchen.  Ahead is a well and an outdoor bathroom.  In the foreground is my burn pile for burning paper(!?) which I am told I must do.  It is close to the house (12 feet at most) because I suspect that smoldering paper would be a weak defense from snakes.  The cat seemed unimpressed by my fire the first night and I have not seen it since.  Everyone is a critic it seems.

When you look to the left you see this outdoor kitchen with the same tandoori and grinding amenities available in the indoor kitchen and a pile of discarded junk.  This is where the puppies slept before the coconut tree started shedding puppy bedding.

The rest of the yard is wild with some jack fruit and some papaya trees.  I have decided to get the lawn cut.  It costs the same here as it does at home, but the man who does it here uses a machete and takes all day.  Note: The higher end hotels here have push mowers.

skype UPDATE

Simon (the business tycoon who pulled in $4.00 today in Internet sales) wants everyone to know that Saturday AND SUNDAY MORNINGS YOUR TIME are the best times to catch us on skype. 

Simon's Big Day

Simon had his first full day running an Internet service.  He was quite busy- at one point all 4 computers were full.  We even had a repeat customer.  He feels we need serve twice as many to break even.  Hopefully when all of the construction is done next door and the season peaks he will have his wish.

Our machines are in the country waiting on paperwork, our restaurant chairs are ready to be picked up and the tables should be complete on Tuesday (cross your fingers).  Simon and I also have purchased a new bright blue fridge to match the cafe interior-it is quite stunning.

I will post pictures when I have some.

Our House

Sorry for the long break.  The computers and Internet have been down for final repairs on the building.  I also went on a girl's day out to the big city.  We had a hunky driver to follow us around and carry our packages, so it was not too stressful.

Cathy has asked for photos of our house so here photos of the kitchen to start. We have a very nice house with very few problems really.  One listing, malfunctioning fridge (I couldn't bear to include a photo), one leaky toilet and several military skirmishes that seem to have broken out over our living room cabinets (refer to figure 4).

This is the kitchen sink and gas stove complete with grey market gas tank purchased for $20.00 Cdn.











This is the indoor BBQ station and chimney which I have not used and the stone grinding station (a stone slab with a rolling stone) for all of my grinding needs.

Above is our supply cupboard complete with bottle of olive oil ( a comfort to have even though I cannot open it)

So far the battles seem evenly matched.  I will keep you informed.

almost there

We have a working sink in the cafe with water and everything.  We also have 4 working computers.  Unfortunately, the electrician does not come until tomorrow, so we will not be able to run more than one until then.  The carpenter comes today about final adjustments and the coffee machine is in  Milan- hopefully on the way to us.  We should be able to start charging for the Internet by tomorrow.  Only God knows when we will have coffee and juice.

We will post pictures of the final product in a few days.

Chez Shawn's

Simon was so hot two nights ago he almost took an electric shaver to his own head.  I stopped him and promised I would make Shawn (the guy who owns the shop next to ours) cut his hair.  |So far Shawn has been refusing because likes Simon's hair long.

Below are the photos of the public spectacle that was the hair cut:

Consulting stylists:  Green t-shirt and grey t-shirt (vendors) , white t-shirt and purple t-shirt (difficult to see are cousin Arshid and cousin Aquib), orange t-shirt family friend with an opinion.  Several tourists also had advice on the process.

Shawn at work.

Although Chez Shawn's has a beautiful display of tropical flowers, it does not have big black capes to cover clothing.  Shawn looks on as cousin Adil hoses the hair off Simon with the garden "pipe"