Day 82 - Pondicherry

Day 82 - wow, can't believe I've been away from the UK so long! Craziness.

After writing the entry yesterday I popped back to the hotel and hired a battered one-gear-wonder in order to explore a bit more. Pondy is quite small, and laid out a bit like Milton Keynes - i.e. in blocks. Cycling is the best way to get around, but a bit of an extreme sport as nobody really bothers driving in the right place, and instead all go on their merry way, expecting everyone to get out of it. Must admit I don't have so much bravado, so in general have been getting around slowly, though more safely.

Apart from exploring, internetting, drinking excessive amounts of boost* and eating lots of pizza (mmmm, pizza), I've been sitting in cafes, working my way through the contents of the hotel's bookshelf. Unfortunately, as a large proportion of the tourists (not travellers, but people here on holiday) are French, the majority of the books are also French, so I've had to supplement my reading matter with early entires from my travel journal, which actually is very amusing. In retrospect I realise I spent most of my first month in India being ripped off by everyone, and wondering around permenantly red and sweaty - funny.

I think I will leave Pondy tomorrow morning and get the bus to Mamallapuram, a travellers hangout with a beach and cheap accommodation. This time I'm going to ring in advance to make sure I get a room!

* For the uninformed: UK has Ovaltine, Australia has Milo and India has boost. It's basically a malted drink that's got added vitamines and minerals. I started drinking it for the v&m's but am now addicted to it's malted goodness. I think I've probably become known as "the boost girl" in the restaurants and bakeries I frequent, as all the waiters find it utterly hilarious when I order a hot milk and mix up my boost of the day, and all feel the urge to point and say "boost" loudly. I entirely blame Becca for this addiction as she was the one to introduce me to it in the first place :-)