Water, water everywhere

Is it safe to drink the water? Number one visitor question. Answer usually given: No, mostly because of our unfamiliarity with Indian micro-organisms. Everywhere we go there are bottles of water—tourists of all kinds imbibing, and even many of the people of the area. Plastic everywhere, and no place to dispose of it. (Bottled water we've been drinking is said by the guide book to likely be heavy in pesticide! Yum!) The amount of non bio-degradable waste accumulated just by our group of ten is staggering to think about. The infrastructure challenges here are great—1.2 billion people who need clean water (compared to our 311 million) and places to dispose of garbage.

Water is precious and in some sense sacred, too, to most people here. At least certain waters—we're far from the Ganges, but here at the tip of India where the Indian Ocean, Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea flow together some folks travel hundreds of miles to see the sun rise and set (along the same horizon), and to bathe in the waters. And a bit north of here in the mountains, the Ghats, where stunning waterfalls flow people not only bathe to get washed, but bathe because that's what the waterfalls invite them to do. Most of the temples we've seen have water, pools of water.

This is a part of India that has some big rivers, a monsoon season, and water coming out of the mountains to keep the fields green—even in this the dry season. We've driven past miles and miles of rice fields, coconut and banana, sugar cane. Green, green, green—everything .. But water here is a contentious subject as well. Kerala and Tamil Nadu argue over dams and water allocations—just like California and its neighboring states. Some of the rivers have crocodiles in them, we've seen a couple of those basking in the sun—and we visited a crocodile sanctuary where efforts are being made to preserve them. They cool themselves off by opening their mouths really wide—impressive. (Makes me wonder if some of our politicians aren't doing the same....)

Temple pool at Suchindram, Tamil Nadu 

Women washing clothes in rivers, and pools (often among the water lilies), and in the pool by the village temple—a central gathering place for the community, and a place to bathe and wash too. Often not kept clean by Western standards, but getting a lot of use nonetheless. Some of these are beautiful, and they carry a spiritual weight too.

We took a short boat trip into a mangrove swamp that helped to preserve a village during the tsunami. Not all areas were so fortunate: the 04 tsunami was devastating to portions of Southern India. One town we visited lost 400 --mostly fishermen and their families who live along the beach in thatched roof houses. This city where I am now (Kunniyakumari) at the southern tip of India suffered 1000 deaths. And, further north, this enormous boulder is where one man told us he spent 8 hours waiting for the waters to die down. The caretaker at a shrine area, he scrambled to the top and sat there giving thanks for his life.

So, water and its centrality to life is something we share with the people in this area. We can't live without it: although at times it is terrifying in its capacity to destroy. It's a source of energy and means of transportation, it is essential to agriculture. Also comforting, healing, cleansing, water reminds us of the One who is like a river: source of life, settling in the depths and moving, always moving.  

Sunset where Bay of Bengal, Arabian Sea & Indian Ocean meet