Sunday, June 5, 2011

A major distraction

Lately, my weekends have been very busy, with lots of trips away from home. I had almost nothing planned for this weekend, and anticipated spending my time on all those routine household tasks that seem to get out of control when neglected for a few weeks. I had a minor distraction when I went hunting on my computer for an old photo I needed and realised while searching that not only did I have a mess of unsorted and unlabelled photos from a trip to South India that I made more than three years ago, but that some of the photos were missing.

You can anticipate the rest of this story. The hunt became a major distraction. I didn't ever find the missing photos (maybe something went wrong in downloading them from my camera?) but I ended up spending ages sorting the remainder, trying to label at least some of them - those I specifically remembered - and loading a selection of them to Flickr. But I guess for once the photos served the purpose that such mementos are meant for - refreshing visual memories, prompting recollection of events and sights that were half-forgotten and making me yearn to travel again.

So indulge me by sharing some of these photos with you.

We saw busy and chaotic cities

Streetscape, Chennai, IndiaCity roofs, India

and traveled the timeless Kerala backwaters in a houseboat.

Kerala backwaters, India

We visited innumerable temples

India 23

exquisite decorated palaces

India 55

and grand public buildings.

Chennai Law Courts

I was particularly fascinated by Cochin with its layers of local tradition, colonial history and modern development. For example, there is a centuries-old tradition of fishing using 'Chinese' nets whose pulleys are weighted by huge stones, and a sixteenth century synagogue that has been continuously used.

Fishing nets, CochinSynagogue, Cochin

And of course, there were the people...

Schoolgirls, Pondicherry, IndiaTilemaker's children, IndiaYoung women in the market, India

You can see why I want to travel again.

And I don't have long to wait. My travelling friend and I are in the last stages of planning a trip to Malaysia, leaving in a couple of weeks. I'm already making all sorts of resolutions to sort and label my photos as I go!

5 comments:

Rose Red said...

That sounds like the sort of cleaning I do - always getting distracted by something more interesting!

I too am not very good at sorting and labelling photos. Good resource,union to do it straight after your trip (how exciting!)

Lynne said...

My sort of cleaning - far more interesting!

How lovely to be travelling away from Sydney's cold weather!

1funkyknitwit said...

WONDERFUL !!! photos Lyn :D

Anonymous said...

what a wonderful distraction though. and those photos have given me itchy feet too. how exciting to be headed somewhere new soon!

Cecilia said...

Great pictures! Thanks for sharing.