Thursday, November 2

I read The Hindu online every day. I have a subscription so I read it almost daily wherever I find myself. As a result I learn a variery of odd or inexpected things.

Yesterday I learned about Keraleeyam, ”an annual event designed to showcase the world-class features of Kerala to the global community”. According to the Keraleeyam website, the ”primary objective of Keraleeyam is to shape a new Kerala distinguished by excellence, fostering socio-economic prosperity throughout the state, promoting sustainable development across all sectors, and crafting forward-thinking developmental policies”.

Keraleeyam has five main sites, and 35 satellite sites. Today we decide to go to Kanakakunnu Palace which seems to have one of the largest selections of events. It turns out much larger than we expected. We spend hours in the art exhibition; admittedly sheltering from the sudden torrential thunderstorm gor some time, but still enjoying it.

I photograph some tribal artists just before we get grabbed by a white-haired, ponytailed Indian with a bulky video camera on his shoulder who wants to film us giving our reactions to the event.

We eventually shake him off by turning left when he expects us to turn right, only to bump into two media students who want us to go through our reactions again in more detail.

They will prove somewhat nimbler than the camera man, and much harder to shake off.