Monday, December 28, 2009

The waterways of Kumarakom

Cruising the waterways of Kumarakom

The other day I took a break at Kumarakom with Ajith and his family. It was a nice trip, gliding past houses with canoes parked on the canal much like people park cars elsewhere; passing so many houseboats (too many!) with air-conditioners, the whole works; stopping for tea at a nice restaurant on the waterway; finally watching the sunset from the huge Vembanad Lake where, with a little imagination, one can pretend one is on a boat in the ocean...

A kettuvallam on the waterway

A little musing on the concept of the houseboat: when I was a kid, houseboats were associated with Kashmir. It was after I left Kerala after graduating as an architect that the kettuvallam took on its current avatar as a houseboat. In one and a half decades, the Kerala kettuvallam eclipses its Kashmiri cousin as the image of a houseboat for the average tourist! Such are the ways of tourism propaganda!

Sunset on the Vembanad Lake

Ajith, Pallavi and Sapna

For them, it's a daily mundane ritual...

5 comments:

Unknown said...

i like the caption of your last photograph !!

Vidzzzzzzzzz Raj said...

cool but after a while i would feel seasick from vidya

Srikumar said...

Don't worry, it's not that bad. It's quite soothing actually!

Professor Ravindra Deshmukh said...

I am disturbed to see your all out efforts to give pics and text and ask 'Is it architectcure?' to others. I regard you a competent researcher and now on I expect you to use an assertive lingo. My friendly advice - Summerize all your six points with paragraphs of text and pictures into six bulleted sententes and say - This is Architecturein the domain of dolomites!

You need not to worry about someone who contradiced with you. Contradictions are part of any research.

Your pics of Kochi and Himalayas are splendid. Congratulations for opening them to masses.

DEshmukh

Srikumar said...

Thank you, Sir! That was more of a "fun" post so that our friends all over can have a laugh at "Is it architecture?" days gone by!