August 15: Visit to Mahebourg

August 15 is an important day for Indians and Christians. It is the day of independence for India and the Feast of Mother Mary’s assumption. While India was celebrating the Independence Day, Mauritius was celebrating the Feast of Mother Mary’s assumption. Basically it is a public holiday in both the countries. But hard luck that it fell on a Sunday :(

I went for the 8:30 mass in the nearby church. As usual the mass was in French of which I had no clue. We had planned to go to Mahebourg by 10:00. So I had to wake up early to go for the 8:30 mass. As usual watched the flow of the mass and came off. I hope they start English masses in the Catholic Church soon.

But unfortunately, the Rajesh and Abhijit slept late and hence wanted to start late. So started only after 12. Rajesh is a fan of the public transport and we leave it to him to decide on the destination and the best way to reach there. So we took a bus to Curepipe first and then from there to Mahebourg. What a journey. It took us almost 3 hours to reach there. By that time we were famished also

But the scenery at Mahebourg was fantastic. Another very serene sea. The sea was calm and what a colour the water had. Check out the photos at www.picasaweb.com/georgeckuriakose .

We had a great lunch at the restaurant by the sea. What a view. We had a very relaxing lunch. Spend almost 2 hours for the lunch . Then we went for a stroll to the sea side.

Mahebourg was the location where the war of 1810 between the French and British happened. It is since 1810 that British had been ruling Mauritius. There was an exhibition also going on at that time. But did not have the time to see that. We were there till about 5:30 and then came back to the bus stand. They said that the next bus was at 6:00. So waited for that and travelled back. As this was an express bus, it was faster and took us through the express way. Reached near Shop-Rite in about an hours time. Then walked back home.

And that walk brought the end of the weekend. Looking forward to the next !!!

Week of Aug 9 to 14

It has been since I posted anything. It was that the last week was nothing great. The usual office week and just a couple of exceptions.

Kappa – Meen: I had mentioned about meeting Andrew from church in the last post. He called me on Thursday and said that there is Kappa Meen at his place if I am interested. My favorite food and me not being interested. I obviously said yes. He came to office around 6:30 to pick me up. There was another friend of his and we picked one more guy on the way home. Wow, I would have to say, Andrew is a great cook. He had made beef curry, fish curry and kappa. What a dinner, I would say. It was after a very long time that I had very satisfying dinner (it was 2 weeks into my stay in Mauritius)

Now onto Saturday. Just did a run and some shopping on Saturday. I had not mentioned about my runs earlier (not runs, basically walk-runs :) )

I have one again registered for the full marathon (42.195km) of the Standard Chartered Marathon on December 5th. Having gone through the training once (could not make it to the run), I know it is not an easy job. Need to a have a large amount of discipline to get through to that. I seriously hope and will be able to do it this year. Just praying that no injuries hamper me during the training time

So as part of that, did the 10km walk-run on Saturday. That itself tired me out. Then went for shopping at Shop-rite, the nearest hyper mart from home. I was serious about my cooking in the coming week. SO bought some vegetables, chicken and prawns. More about that later.

I was pretty tired by the time I reached home and went off to sleep. We had planned for dinner at Rajesh’s house that day. Had his maid cook chicken curry and then got some bread. So a pretty sumptuous dinner for a Saturday night

That closes off the week.

August 8, 2010: Visit to Church for a Malayalam service

After last Sunday’s mass, while walking back home, one person came to me and asked if I were an Indian. I said yes and we exchanged our names. That is how I met Johnson. He said that there is a Malayalam mass held every month on the first Sunday. For august, it was moved to the 2nd Sunday and welcomed to attend the same. I said, no problems and we agreed to meet at Quatre Borne at about 1:30 on the 8th.

After getting up in the morning, decided to do some shopping at nearest hyper mart – Shop Rite. This was about 2 km from home. So it would give me a good exercise also. So went for the back, bought a few necessities for home and did a 4 km walk. Pretty good for exercise

So by about 1:45, I reached the Quatre Borne bus stop. Johnson joined me over there and we took the bus from there. Actually the church is close to my office and next to Shop Rite. So basically a 20 min walking distance from home :)

We reached the church by 2:00. Johnson and all had to set up the church before the priest comes in. The priest is from Kanyakumari and uses a transliterated Qurbana book to conduct the mass. He is well supported by the choir. Anyway a small community of about 30 people. There was a sendoff for a couple who had been in Mauritius for about 2.5 years. They also welcomed to me to the community. Felt very good to be part of the Malayalee community here. After the mass, there were some snacks for all. Nice time to meet up with people. I also discussed with the priest the importance of having English mass in Mauritius. In the island there is just one catholic church in Rose Hill where English mass is conducted on Saturday evenings. Told the priest that with more number of people coming to Mauritius, it is important to conduct English masses. Else the catholic would turn towards the protestant churches which hold mass in English. He said that he would take this up with the priest.

After the mass, there was a meeting to plan for the Onam program to be held on September 12th. So next month also, the mass would be on the 2nd Sunday. So I stayed pack for the session. Met a lot of Malayalees – many were working in the hospital (Apollo and Fortis), met fellow banking colleagues, and then some having own business. There was a Dy CEO of SBI and a manager in Risk department of Bank of Baroda.

Anyway stayed back in the church till about 6. While returning back, one of the church members, Andrew came with me to my house. So we had a nice time talking about life in Mauritius and other generic chat.

So that was the end of a nice weekend in Mauritius

August 7, 2010: Trip to North Mauritius

, Finally the weekend. I was better prepared for this one. My colleague from Singapore, Derek had reached here on Thursday. So it was decided that we would go out to explore some part of Mauritius. We decided to take a tour of North Mauritius

We arranged with our taxi person for the tour. A tour of North Mauritius is about Rs 2,000/- while that of south is Rs 2,500/-. So the itinerary was to check out the beaches of North Mauritius, some garden, etc. let me describe one by one

I started from home at about 9:00 AM, picked up Derek from his hotel. Then we went off to Port Louis first. We visited the Aparvasi Ghat at Port Louis. This is the place where the first laborers from India landed. This was the immigration point in the 19th century for the start of the new experiment of using workers instead of slaves in the sugarcane fields. The laborers were kept in the Aparvasi Ghat for a period of about 2 weeks to make sure that there is no contagious disease etc among the travelers. Post which they would be taken to the sugar cane fields to work. Aparvasi Ghat has been declared as UN heritage monument in 2006. Manmohan Singh had visited the place and a monument has been built for the occasion. (I am not able to upload the photo here, hence uploaded at my picasa album at http://picasaweb.google.com/georgeckuriakose/Mauritius)

After this we went for the beach trip. None of us bought the beach wear and hence the trip was more to see the beauty of Mauritius than to jump into the waters. Anyway every place around Mauritius is a beach. I think this is what separates it from places like Kerala or Singapore. This is Goa where you have numerous beaches in which you can get into the water. So we started off with Troux Aux beach, Grand Baie and Cap Malheurex. The Troux Aux beach (I think) had a Hindu temple by the beach. (Now I am confused with the names and the description of the beaches)

Grand Baie is the tourist spot on the North side. There are a number of shops and restaurants around the place. The place is also very costly. Paid MUR 1700/- for lunch for 2 and that too without any starters, desserts or drinks. Cap Malheurex is the northern most tip of Mauritius.

The difference in the beaches in the North is that they are very calm as compared to the ones in the West (Flic en Flac). The surfing is done on the western beaches, while the beaches in the north is good to laze around. Best thing to do with your family would be pack your car with the picnic goodies, find a good spot on one of the beaches, park your vehicle and laze the whole day. Wow, what a life . Will do this once I take a car on hire.

After the beach visit, we went to the botanical garden. The garden has a lake with the giant water lilies. The leaves are round in shape and can grow upto 2 m in diameter. But as this was not the season, they had not grown to that size but were still huge. Even a bird could sit on the leaf without it sinking. The garden also nurtures a number of large tortoises. These tortoises can live for more than 100 years

Since, it was just about 4 and we had the taxi for 2 more hours, we were wondering what to do. That is when Derek suggested that we go to Eureka Creole Mansion. This is one of the oldest French houses in Mauritius and there is a waterfall next to it which is very beautiful. So we went off to Creole Mansion. It is about 200 years old but still well maintained. The things inside the house were just fabulous. The most interesting part was the backdrop of the mountain behind the mansion. Check out my picasa photos. About 100m from the mansion is the beautiful Eureka waterfalls. What a lovely sight. We could see 3 waterfalls one after the other

So that brings us to end of a lovely day. Too tired to do anything else for that day. So I went back home, had a nice bath and went off to sleep.

Intro to Mauritius

As today was an office day, let me talk about Mauritius in general

Mauritius is near the African continent, next to Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. It is a small island, about 60 km long and 40 km wide. It has a population of about 1.5 million. The interesting part of history is that the island did not have any original natives. This was a port in historical days for the sailors to take rest, eat dodos and capture the large tortoise for the journey ahead. This is how the dodos got extinct and the large tortoises got into the endangered list. Dodos thought that the humans were like other animals and would leave them alone after having their fill. How were they to know that we belong to that category of species that do not look too much into future and environmental balance?

Anyway as the time passed the island went from Dutch to French and finally to the British. Hence the country still has a vast French culture. French is also an official language. The French and British brought the Africans to work as slaves in the farms here. After the ban on slavery, the British brought workers from India and China. So finally the island ends up with a multi-cultural mix of the English, French, Indian, Chinese and Africans with Indians being the majority. All traditional Hindu festivals are celebrated in Mauritius. The best part is to find the aunties here still wearing sarees and the youngsters wearing the salwars. (My maid knows Hindi better than English  )

As Mauritius is in the Southern hemisphere, it is winter right now. The nights are really cold and going up to 12C. The shops also close off pretty early. Almost all stores close off by 5:00 PM. The supermarket remains open till about 7:30. (That reminds me I have to go early to pick up things from the supermarket)

That is all for today’s gyan 

August 1, 2010: Off to first Beach visit

First Sunday at Mauritius. As part of the morning run, I checked out the timing for mass in the nearby church. The mass was there at 8:30 and then later at 10:00. I decided to go for the 10:00 AM mass which was in French. So I landed at the church at 10:00 and attended my first French mass. Understood the proceedings without understanding the language.

Left for Flic en Flac at about 12. Took the local bus from here. Flic en Flac is the closest beach to Quatre Bornes, but not the best in Mauritius. The best beaches in Mauritius are supposed to be in North. Decided to go north either when we have more time or when Rini and kids are here. The bus ride took almost an hour. It did a criss-cross across a number of villages (as any private bus in Kerala does ). Anyway reached by about 1:00 PM

The first glimpse of the beach in Mauritius was wonderful. The beaches are serene and absolutely vast. Generally all beaches would have an island / ships, etc in the horizon. Flic en Flac did not have any such things. Hence the horizon was very clear

The waves were tremendous. The showers from the waves were absolutely fantastic. Was able to capture a few such snaps. But because the light was too bright, could not capture it well. Need to go at about 5:00 PM to capture this when the lights are not so bright. We decided to return early as the shops would close by 6 at Quatre Bornes. On Sunday everyone closes very early

By the way Mauritius seems to be a land of rainbows. The weather has a constant drizzle and hence a good scope of rainbows. Captured beautiful shots of rainbow on my iPhone. But not able to upload to my PC, hence uploading on my facebook

July 31, 2010: First weekend

Day 3 in Mauritius, yet not seen the famous beaches. I should be able to see some water today 

Anyway, there was some program for the morning. One of my colleagues was coming to download information before he is going on leave. A lot of colleagues are off in August as this is month for school vacations. So they are off to India to enjoy the holidays. I would have to find my way in the office in the next 3 weeks (no office details on the web. Hence being secretive  )

I had sent a long list of items to the land lady to provide in the house. SO I called up to check what the status on it is. She said that she had bought a few things and would come home. She brought a few containers for the home. Still to get more cooking utensils, so that I can start my cooking 

Went off in the evening to Port Louis. This is the capital of Mauritius. It is about 15 km from Quatre Borner, the place we are staying. By the time we reached Port Louis, it was 5:00 PM and everything was closing down. Port Louis has the philately museum which has 2 of the oldest stamps. Also a great waterfront area to watch for the ships and the playing of the water. Need to go again before 5:00 to PM to see the monuments and museum.

There was a kick boxing show at 7:00 PM. So spent our time out there, waited for 7:00 PM to see a bit of kick boxing and started for home. The interesting part of Mauritius is that there is lot of time in hand (which is a very dire commodity in rest of the world). This makes Mauritius life more pleasurable

As my land lady told me, take your team, enjoy everything. Don’t hurry on your things. This is an important message not just for Mauritius but for life in general. We do things in a hurry to do the next thing. I wonder if I have to come to a situation where I am not able to do anything. I hope Mauritius will teach me that – “Do nothing for some time”

Anyway this was a good lesson for the trip back. We reached the bus-stop at 8:30 when we were told that the last bus to Quatre Bornes should be arriving soon. So we waited and boarded the same. At about 8:45, the bus broke down. Even after continuous trials, the driver was not able to start the bus. He then called his office to send the mechanic. I was wondering if to take a taxi and return back. But then on 2nd thought, there was nothing urgent waiting for me at home. So decided to relax and wait for the bus to go on its sweet time. Finally we started again at about 9:30

Finally with this trip, I was able to match Mauritius for my Indian friends. I would say the place is similar to Kottayam with better infrastructure. There are no power cuts here and the roads are much better. The shops close early. Roads have deserted look after about 7:00 PM. So finally got it !!!