Music and dancing in the hills of Tamil Nadu
I woke with the sunrise around 7am. I felt so much better after having had a good sleep and was glad I'd not kept Xavier awake with my snoring. During the night I'd been woken once or twice by loud animal noises - possibly monkeys screeching... I read "The Long Way Down" for a little. Reading about Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman traveling through Africa on motorbikes and camping out hearing wild animals. I knew what they had experienced now. I decided to get up and wander around outside.
As if by magic our cook appeared. He must have spotted me and offered me a coffee. Just what I needed. So I sat and read on the veranda for a while. Everyone else slept on. I could smell burning and looking up could see the hedge surrounding the compound was on fire. The villagers were burning stubble from sugar cane in the field next to the compound and it had spread... Xavier was up by now and wandered off to tell them. Soon a man arrived barefoot and only wearing a loin cloth and started to beat the hedge with a stick to put the fire out. Nice one.
At around 9.15 breakfast was served. More curry, more banana leaves, more eating with fingers. This was getting to be second nature now. Soon after breakfast we packed up and headed off to our final destination in the forests. I felt sad that this was going to be the last day here. But looked forward to the following day when I would be in a comfy hotel.
The village we visited today seemed a lot better than some of the others. They even had a small primary school, and running water. The houses were good too. Drying in the sun we saw Maize and Chillis all laid out beautifully.
We all sat under a colourful awning outside the community hall.
The boss man from our customer was there. It was good to meet him and have a chat about what we were doing. I felt a bit under dressed for the first time. By now my jeans were pretty dirty and shoes covered in mud. No one seemed to mind.
After the meeting the tribal people performed a show of music and dance for us. This was all done on handmade instruments. A sort of flute providing the melody. 
Afterwards a group photo and then our farewells. This was the last group so now it was time for lunch and back to the modern world.
4 comments:
Wait. Just. One. Minute.
You have video of tribal dancing, pictures of villagers and all the different curries you've consumed, but you didn't get any video or pictures of THIS!?!!!
"Soon a man arrived barefoot and only wearing a loin cloth and started to beat the hedge with a stick to put the fire out. Nice one."
I cannot tell you how disappointed I am Simon. LOL
It all seemed very normal by then!! Only thinking about it now does it dawn on me that it would have been an interesting photo.
I've a thousand photos I've not published here, perhaps I'll stick a lot of them on Flickr or photobucket when I get a chance, I'm sure there must be loin cloths in there somewhere.
Hi Simon,
Its really nice to see the unprivileged people sharing some wonderful moments with you. Being the person in the group working to improve their life styles and heir economy, I thank you for exposing them to the world.
The time we spent with you really wonderful and enterprising - little adventurous also, Is it?. Looking forward to have many more good moments like this - Lloyd
Hello Lloyd! Wow that is a surprise to get a comment directly from the area! Thanks so much. I really, really enjoyed my time with you all and seeing the wonderful work you are doing. I can't wait to come back again. I'd love to come and spend sometime working with you. If I can arrange it I'd like to come out and do something practical on the ground to help. Not sure what that could be. But I'd like to come in my vacation and give some of my own time to the projects. I'm so glad I met you all. Take care and keep in touch. Simon. P.S. We have a box full of clothes collected here which I want to get sent to you to distribute soon. Mostly childrens clothes.
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