Chennai

On Friday night we traveled by train to Chennai which is the capital city of Tamil Nadu. It was a nice train where we had 6 beds that folded up into chairs and even a curtain to separate our little ‘room’ from the rest of the train. We slept the night on the train and honestly I slept better there because we had AC all night long whereas at my apartment the power goes off and so it is very hard to sleep when I’m so hot.

                When we got to Chennai we visited a woman named Shiamala Baby who is working to improve the lives of the Dalit community in her area. We were taken to a couple of different villages to talk with the people and learn from them. When we would come into their area they always gave us a warm welcome where they put the bindi and sandlewood paste on our foreheads and cheeks and then flowers around our necks. One young man even told us that we looked beautiful with the marks on our foreheads and implied that we look boring with our usual bare foreheads which I found interesting.

                On Sunday we went to St. Thomas Church and a museum where Doubting Thomas from the Bible was supposedly buried. Afterward we went to the beach see the ocean. I’m glad I got to see the Indian ocean from India, but I must say, Kenya’s got the upper hand! Maybe it was just this beach but there were no palm trees, few shells, no reef, and way too many hawkers!

                In the afternoon we went shopping and then boarded the train to come back. We arrived in Coimbatore around 11pm and I was so tired! I enjoyed Chennai but I definitely prefer Coimbatore because Chennai is too busy and  crazy and hot. I saw some very humorous signs though: