Day 38: Kochi

Today, we had an early start for our flight to Kochi. One thing that I must say is that US airliners are awful compared with the rest of the world. I have yet to sit in an economy seat and not have my own free tv with good new movies, tv shows, documentaries, etc. to choose from. In the US I have never seen a personal tv in economy class. The service is very nice, good food on every flight, even the 1 hour flights, full FREE bar (yes, free alcohol), and plenty of leg room for me, and I'm 6'4" (around 195 centimeters). On top of all that, the flights are relatively cheap, mostly cheaper than my flights in the US. No wonder Delta and US Airways are struggling and companies like Turkish Airlines and Emirates are booming. I am no Nostradamus, but I bet you that non-US airliners will begin to intrude the US market if domestic airliners do not change. Turkish Air is about to start hosting flights through George Bush International Airport in Houston. Emirates is hands down the best airliner I have flown yet. TV, new movies, video games, great food, beautiful staff, and the best service yet, the business class even had their own tablets to go along with their, what looked like a, 22 inch TV and full reclining seats; to add, that flight was only 4.5 hours long. I am excited to see what the Asian airliners will be like.

Well Kochi is not fully what I was expecting. The area that we are in does have tourists. We are right next to a beach on the coast, so as you could imagine, the culture is very laid back. Hinduism only makes up 50% of the population, the rest is split between Christianity and Judaism. I will say that I am glad I am doing the southern part of India as well, if I had left India and only seen the north, I would have left with as sour taste in my mouth. As of now, I am in love with the south. The heat really reminds me of home, very humid. When we sat down for dinner, I glanced over the menu and what did I see...? BEEF! I am so excited, the south has beef. However, the restaurant was out of beef, of course, so I stuck with a squid curry. Delicious.

I started off my day by just walking around the local area, checking out the beaches and the markets. The coast is lines with many old Chinese fishing nets that date back to the early 1300's, some of them still have the original wood. We participated in trying to haul in some fish, to my surprise, we caught mostly trash but did manage to get 3 fish. I can't imagine that these things are very profitable.

Our new group is a solid mix of new people, some from the UK, Canada, and Russia. I will say that one way that I am changing is that I say more European things, like "look at all that rubbish," or "where's the lue." When I catch myself saying, I am kind of shocked, but I have been around Australians, Canadians, and people from the UK ever since I left. Aside from the last tour where there was a family of Americans and one girl from Alaska that I traveled with in Istanbul, the Americans have been hard to find.

So not much really happened today, tomorrow we are actually starting the tour, so I will have much more to write about. Cheers