The shrill alarm wakes us at 5:15am. We both lie there. Beth sighs- Beth sighs a lot. She has different sighs for different moods. I'm getting good at deciphering them. This sigh was ‘no. It's too early…but I do need to get up’. We’d both been lazy the night before and decided to leave packing to the morning. We shower, pack and get ready in silence. 5:45am we (still silently) leave the room and wait for the tuc tuc. JohnMiller’s stood there waiting ‘good morning Rachel, good morning Beth. Sleep well?’ He becomes the recipient of two silent death stares. I've decided his voice lies somewhere between Mickey Mouse and Kermit the Frog. The tuc tucs arrive and they're white! I've never seen a white one before. Chandra says they're hybrids. The train station is spotless and smells clean. There are no people sat on the floor and there's sand on the tracks where people have used the toilet when the train has been parked at the station. A dog bounds over to us and sits with us until we get on the train. Something about the dogs I've noticed is that they all have strange twitches. The train departs at 6:45am and the journey is only two hours long! Two hours! That's nothing. We’re on an express train to Alleppey and I spend the time trying to catch up on the blog. Two hours flys by and we have to get off the train quick time. Chandra explains, and to some extent defends, to me the urgency Indian people seem to have with buses and trains. Buses and trains will run on time irrespective if people are getting on or not. The buses don't even come to complete stops and people are well practiced at getting on and off when they're moving. Doors for buses and trains are always open too. Unlike England, the train driver will wait for instruction to say the platform is clear. In India? Nope. If that train needs to leave at 6:45am it will leave at 6:45am even if you're queuing to get on or not. 

There are women selling jasmine at Alleppey, the scent wafts into the station, and the tuc tucs are in formal queues infront of the train station. It's a beautiful welcome. In the tuc tucs, on our way to the ferry port, we drive along canals full of unusual boats, water surfaces covered in green plants and I think more cycle rickshaws than I have seen anywhere else. The canals have a ‘boat stop’ system similar to the way of bus stops at home, all with rickety shelters providing shade from the scorching sun as opposed to the wind and rain at home, which could do with a lick of paint and a few new screws, which stand over short jetties. The tuc tuc deposits us at the bus stop and we leave our bags with the boat and Chandra takes us for street food. Little six foot wide stalls line the loud, hot, busy bus stop. Stalls selling lottery tickets, fresh fruit, local crisps, foreign crisps, packets of dried fruits all manned by middle aged men wearing sweat stained button up, breast pocketed shirts, dhotis and some barefoot some wearing leather sandals, most of which boasting fantastic ear hair. Chandra orders omelettes from one man for the grand total of 15 rupees; banana stem for oil, eggs and onions. I look to my left and see a tall man (with the most impressive ear hair I have ever seen) sifting onion bhajis from a vat of boiling oil. Golden and crispy, they're practically calling my name and it occurs to me that I have been in India for 4 weeks and not had an onion bahji. I should obviously rectify this. He glances over to me…I'm pretty sure he'd seen me out of the corner of his eye, staring and salivating. ‘Onion bhaji. Only seven rupee’. SEVEN BLOODY PENCE FOR THE FRESHEST ONION BHAJI? I’LL TAKE THE LOT! That's a lie, he'd pulled about thirty of these babies from the vat, so I settled with two. One two-egg omelette, two small fist size onion bhajis (that tasted like fried onion heaven, I should add) later, carrying a bag of fresh mangos we head away from the bus stop to the boat stop. Staying much longer at the bust stop would have been bad for my health and waist line, there were so many stalls that I didn't even look at. Full bellied, we board the boat and make our way to our home stay. If im honest, Alleppey bus stop feels like the India I had expected. Greasy, dirty but oh-so-tasty street stalls, owned by chocolate-brown-skinned men with hard, dark, workers wrinkles, in bare feet, either gap toothed or betel red stained teeth- or both. But all smiling, these kind smiles that make you smile back, practising their basic English while you stand there ignorantly not knowing a single word of their language. Piles of rubbish in every space with cows roaming and trying their luck at munching the fresh produce on the stalls. Women in beautiful saris, smiling at you. And the head wiggle. The head wiggle that you can't quite work out whether you're getting a yes or a no. While I munched on my onion bahji from a piece of newspaper I fell a little bit more in love with India, with a massive smug grin on my face. 

The backwaters are worth a visit to India alone. We followed the tranquil waters for an hour and a half, passing dozens of women washing clothes against smooth rocks, hanging them clothes to dry on clothes lines tied between two coconut trees, children running along the mud paths trying to keep up with us, smiling, waving and shouting ‘hiiiiii…..hiiiiiii…..hiiiiii….byeeeee…..byeeeeeee….byeeeee’, chugging pass the boat stops of people waiting for a boat to their destination. It was an entirely different life to what I had seen in India so far. We crossed paths with impressive traditional Kerala boats, some with two bedrooms, some boasting two floors. In the calm waters I fell asleep and woke to the boat mooring against a small jetty in front of a beautiful white house. A small man stood under the porch at the front of the house, resting both his hands on his hips, grinning and waving at us. As he greet us into the house off the boat, he put beige thumb size ovals on the middle of our foreheads and handed us lemon and ginger water. Beth and I laughed that we looked like we had foundation on our foreheads that we had forgotten to rub in. We’re given a couple of hours to chill out before lunch and walk to the roof deck of the home for panoramic views. Rice paddies to the left, rivers to the right, rendering us all speechless. We sit and contemplate how beautiful the view is and how this roof top is perfect for a dinner party, and finish our free time with a nap. 5:00pm arrives and we are woken by Chandra for the Alleppey walk. The man who owns the house has two sons, one of which worked for Intrepid who gave him the idea to start the homestay, he is utterly adorable. I seem to have a affinity to elderly men, I want to shrink them and put them in my pocket and make sure that they are ok. Not ‘grandad issues’ as James put it and soiled. Beth and I nap, and wake to knocking from Chandra to a home cooked feast. Banana curry, potato curry, curried beetroot, rose rice. It's all cooked with coconut oil and I devour it. He serves us the food onto our plates and gives enormous portions. We have more free time and Beth and James go to off license to get drinks for tomorrow's boat trip. They come back bouncing off the walls saying how fun it was. Booze packed for tomorrow, we are taken on a small village tour. Unfortunately thick, dark clouds roll over us, bringing strong gusts of wind and pockets of rain. An electrical wire swings in its troughs between the rickety poles holding it up. Eventually the wires split and the wire falls into the water flooding the rice paddy, wriggling around like a fish and sparking. Coconut trees overhead start loosing their fruit while hot and cold winds blow over the rice paddy water. We abandon the walk and watch the effects of the weather from the roof top of the house and see two rainbows form. Dinner is served in the same style as lunch, generous portions piled onto our plates with each dish explained in detail. India makes me think being vegetarian wouldn't be so bad. Beth and I, having reached critical limit with JohnMiller go to bed at 8pm.