Fruits you must try in India

One thing I love about being back in India is eating all my favourite Indian fruits again! There's an abundance of fruits throughout the year, and some you can find year round. Here are some of the most typical Indian fruits...

Mango is everyone's favourite fruit. This is a summer fruit: available from April through to July. The very first mangoes of the season are available from the end of March and these are always expensive. But very soon there will be an abundance of many different types of mangoes. The number of different varieties is truly astounding.   

Guava is another of my favourite fruits. Especially the pink ones! In India, they're eaten with black salt, but for me, they're best plain (and not too ripe).

Jackfruit is another summer fruit. This is the largest tree-bearing fruit, and it's also very ugly! The smell puts off a lot of people, especially when it's overripe. It's painstaking work to extract the fruit from the outer shell: inside are yellow rubbery sheaths with large seeds hidden inside. The taste is a bit like melon, and more like Wrigley's Juicy Fruit chewing gum!

Papaya is a fruit available throughout the year. It's commonly served when its very, very ripe, but I prefer it before it gets too ripe and mushy, sprinkled with lemon. Many people find papaya has an 'off' taste, but the lemon juice neutralizes it.

Pomegranate is another difficult fruit to 'clean' but so worth the effort. The pomegranate 'seeds' in India are extremely sweet and a brilliant ruby red. 

Custard apple is another interesting and odd-looking fruit. The easiest way to eat it is to scoop out the white flesh with a spoon and spit out the many large black seeds. Yummy.

Sapota (called chikku in the North) is another fruit I can't get enough of. This is a round fruit that looks like a small potato. It has a yummy caramel-like taste, and I eat it skin and all. I've been buying them at the same fruit shop lately and one day there were none left. “No more sapota?” I asked the fruit seller – because in India you have to always ask. I'm glad I did, because he told me to wait, and reappeared a few minutes later with a basket full of sapota. He had just picked them from the tree behind the shop! “Organic”, he announced, with a smile on his face.

What's your favourite Indian fruit?

The fisherman

During my early morning walk along the beach in Visakhapatnam, I came across this man staring at the sea. It wasn’t a contemplative look, it was a look of concentration and complete attention. He held a net in his hands. He was obviously a fisherman.

I looked out to the sea to see if I could see any fish just beyond the shore. I didn’t see anything except surf and sand. I decided to stick around to watch him in action.

He suddenly dropped the net from his shoulder and looked like he was ready to react at any moment. Did he see a fish? I looked again into the surf and saw nothing at all...

Suddenly he ran into the sea, casting his net in a wide arc. He dragged it towards him. Sure enough, there were two fish caught in his net!

I was amazed the way he was able to fish from the shore with just a net. He must have a very sharp and trained eye to spot fish swimming in the shallow surf.

He removed the fish from the net and put them in the bag he carried on his back. He would sell the fish later in the market for 50 rupees each.

The amazing cockroach

The last time I was with my friend A. (the contributor of the snake encounters stories in my previous post), our discussion somehow turned to cockroaches...

Before I moved to India, my experience with cockroaches was very limited. Thankfully I never had to share spaces with them, and the cockroaches I had seen were quite small… compared to the super-size cockroaches you see here. Luckily, I rarely encounter one at home and when I do, it’s usually already dead because the cat immediately stalks and kills anything smaller than herself. I’ve also learnt how to deal with them – dead or alive – I just take a broom and sweep them out the door.

My husband told me some amusing stories about cockroaches at the office. One day at the canteen, a co-worker found a dead cockroach in his food. When he complained to the management, the explanation he got was: "We have a new chef."

Another colleague told him about a co-worker who had the misfortune of finding one in her coffee cup. He thought it important to add that the unfortunate girl was a vegetarian.

Anyway, back to the discussion on cockroaches… A. mentioned an article in The Hindu by Menaka Gandhi which listed many interesting facts about cockroaches. A faithful Hindu reader, I didn’t recall the article but made a mental note to look it up. A day or so later, I picked up some newspapers I had put aside to read in more detail and one had the cockroach article...

So here are some amazing facts you probably didn’t know about the cockroach:

It can run three miles in one hour — the fastest insect alive.

It can hold its breath for 40 minutes.

It can live a week without a head, only dying of thirst because it has no mouth to drink water.

It can squeeze into cracks that are 1.6 millimetres thick — the equivalent of you trying to fit into a football.

It can survive temperatures as low as 0 degrees centigrade but when it gets really cold, it likes snuggling with humans or any other warm body.

It can recognise members of its own family just by their smell.

Its heart is a simple tube that can pump blood both backwards and forward and even stop at will without harming the insect.

The cockroach is the greatest escape artist of all time with an uncanny ability to sense danger, whether that of a live predator or a broom. How does it do that? With its hair (when was the last time your hair told you anything?)

You can read the full article by Menaka Gandhi here.

Snake encounters

In a recent post, I had written about some of the animals that share our living space, often without us noticing them. I had also mentioned that the night watchman had seen a snake on the road one night.

Snakes are quite common, even in cities. Recently a friend found a baby cobra in her garage. In Whitefield, on the city’s eastern limits, snake sightings are even more common. A friend has seen cobras in her Whitefield compound on several occasions and the community office has anti-venom available at all times. Snake catchers are often called in to come and catch the forlorn snake and take it to a forest outside the city, where it won’t be disturbed by humans. Snakes are not usually killed because they’re considered to be a manifestation of the snake god and killing it would be inauspicious.

Luckily I haven’t had many encounters with snakes. I did see a cobra once in Sri Lanka (caught in the photo above). And last year while travelling with a friend in Orissa, we saw what we first thought was a monkey’s tail resting on a wooden fence next to our cottage. But then the ‘tail’ started to slither away… which took some time, it was so big! And we had slept with all the doors and windows wide open because it was so hot!

Just when I was thinking of writing this post on snakes, I got an email from my friend A who lives in rural Tamil Nadu. The subject of the email was ‘snake stories’. I thought I would share them here:

About a month ago was out for my late afternoon walk. It was about 1/2 hr. before dark. Walking down a pathway saw a woman in front of me stopped. She was looking at something. As I got closer saw the scene of 2 snakes wrapped around each other. We stood in silence watching them struggling and every so often making a move like kissing each other! They were smack in the middle of the path so no way to walk around them. After about 10 min. we turned back to find an alternate way home. We couldn't figure out whether the snakes were fighting or mating! Next day looked on the Net and found something on youtube that looked similar to what I had witnessed. It was mentioned as a mating ritual. A week later met a guy who is a snake catcher. Described what I had seen and he said that they were definitely fighting to be 'top snake'. The amazing thing was though that they usually move in and out of the bush but in this case they stayed on the pathway as though giving a show. They were non-poisonous rat snakes. If they had been cobras don't think I would have stayed so close!

There is a man, Rom by name, who is a herpetologist. He has travelled the world studying snake habits. His wife writes a column in the newspaper called "My husband and other animals". The articles are both educative and amusing. She tells of the time Rom was working in Papua New Guinea studying pythons. One day he arrived home after being away for a few days and found his house door broken open. Just inside the door the thieves had dropped their tools. Nothing had been stolen. Why? His window sills were very wide and he kept pythons, for study purposes, on several of the ledges. When the thieves saw the snakes they hightailed it out of there!

The neighbour where I stayed for 18 months had a habit of beating snakes to death. Neighbours would call upon him when necessary. One day he thought he had killed the offending snake. As he walked away though the snake started chasing him. Lucky for him, he managed to run to safety.

I stayed in a nice little cottage for 1 year. It was located just outside a cashew trope and seemed to be in the pathway for snakes travelling back and forth for their food. One night I arrived home at around 9:30 p.m. Got ready for bed and on my way to the staircase (bedroom was upstairs) saw movement behind a chair located just next to the staircase. Behind the chair was a fat brown snake with diamond shape patches on it. It moved toward the staircase. Decided to talk to it as could think of no other options. Said something about 'I won't hurt you. When I come downstairs in the morning I want you gone'. It moved back behind the chair and I went upstairs, got into bed, making sure the mosquito net was tightly tucked around my bed. Next morning the snake was gone! Found out from someone later that it was a Russell's viper, poisonous.

My colleague, M, tells the story of a cobra falling into his rainwater tank. The snake could not get its grip on the sides of the tank to climb out. So M put a ladder into the tank and the snake came out. A week or so later M was walking towards his house when he saw a snakehead raised up moving back and forth. M stopped. After a few more movements the snake went away. He believes it was the cobra he rescued saying a thank you.

My next post will be about another type of creepy crawly! (Also inspired by my friend A.)

Mysore Dasara

I arrived in Mysore just before the start of the Dasara celebrations. There was a feeling of anticipation in the air as the city was busy getting ready for its most important event of the year.

(Above: the city is freshened up for the big event.)

Dasara (also called Navaratri) is an important 10-day festival which celebrates the victory of good over evil – this is when the goddess Chamundeshwari killed the demon Mahishasura.

(Above: a statue of Maharaja Chamarajendra Wodeyar is garlanded with lights.)

The Mysore Dasara is an elaborate festival which has been celebrated with much pomp for the past 400 years. This is a city of palaces and the former seat of the Mysore Kingdom.

(Above: Cultural programmes are held every evening at Mysore palace.)

The Mysore Palace is the centre of festivities. During each night of Dasara, the palace is lit up with colourful lights, as well as each important monument and square, including the streets where the Dasara procession takes place on the last day of the festival.

Many of the city's important buildings, monuments and squares are lit up specially for Dasara.

The Dasara procession is led by elephants. I happened to see them rehearsing for their big day. The lead elephant carries a golden palanquin called a ‘howdah’. This weighs 750kg and is made of 80kg of gold. The Maharaja used to ride in the howdah during the procession but for the past 40 years an idol of the goddess Chamundeshwari has been given this place of honour.

On Vijayadashami, the last day of Dasara (which falls on October 24th this year), the elephants will lead the procession through the streets of Mysore.

It's hard not to be impressed by the majestic beauty of the elephants.

Once Dasara is over, the elephants will go back to their respective homes. I found some interesting information on the Dasara elephants on this page.

Later on today, I'll go see my landlady's puja room which she decorates every year specially for Dasara.

Happy Dasara to all my readers!

An unexpected visitor

One thing I like about living in Bangalore is that despite the concrete jungle of the city, there’s a lot of flora and fauna sharing our living space. There’s a huge Rain Tree just in front of the house, which is a favourite hangout for all kinds of birds: the common crow, the lyrical mynah, industrious woodpeckers and huge predatory kites. I even saw a snowy owl twice. It was perched on a branch one night and turned its head 180 degrees to look at me. Another time I caught a glimpse of it in flight. During the day there are lots of squirrels running up and down the huge trunk and I’ve even seen a big lizard perched in a branch.

Other creatures are less noticeable. One morning the watchman of the building opposite our gate warned me that the night watchman had seen a ‘big snake’ slither across the road! “Be careful!”, he warned me. Later that day while walking on busy 80 Feet Road, I saw a flash of colour run into some bushes. I stopped to have a look. It was a red and yellow coloured chameleon!

One Saturday morning the crows were making more of a racket than usual. They had all gathered on one branch of the Rain Tree and were excitedly cawing to each other. I remember they had made a similar ruckus when a kite had caught its wing in a branch. So I knew something was up...

I went out onto the terrace and looked towards the commotion. What did I see? A monkey sitting in the tree! Monkeys are unusual in this neighbourhood. I ran to get my camera. When I got back the monkey was sitting in the sink on the terrace and picking something out of the bougainvillea. I managed to get a few shots of him and retreated back into the house.

I then had a look through the bedroom window to see what he was up to. I heard water running and realised that he had turned on both taps on the terrace! When I went back outside to turn them off, I noticed the branches of the mango tree shaking wildly. The monkey was feasting on the fruit. Afterwards, I found half-eaten mangoes lying on the ground underneath the tree.

It was easy to follow the monkey’s movements because the crows followed it from tree to tree, still cawing excitedly. He was now in a tree on the other side of the house and was busy tying a dupatta in its branches. I had a look at the clothesline on the roof and realised he had stolen it from there.

Later on my landlords’ daughter asked me if I had seen her dupatta which had mysteriously disappeared from the clothesline. I told her that I had indeed seen it...

Lakshmi the elephant

One of the most popular tourist sights in Pondicherry is Lakshmi the elephant. Lakshmi stands outside the Ganesh temple on Manakula Vinayagar Koil Street for a few hours every morning and evening. A local celebrity, she gets many visitors who come to receive her blessings and feed her treats like fruit, bunches of grass and sugarcane they buy from the stalls outside the temple. If you offer her a coin, she’ll take it with her trunk, hand it to her mahout (keeper) and give you her blessing by lightly tapping you on the head.

I found this short article which tells Lakshmi’s story.

I took this picture of Lakshmi in early 2003, almost ten years ago.

Lakshmi was smaller then, and noticeably thinner. As you can see, the same mahout is with her (he seems to have changed less than Lakshmi).

Meet Lakshmi the elephant:

Nature’s perfect drink

One of my favourite drinks is tender coconut water. Tender coconuts are young, green coconuts and are on sale on almost every street corner in every city in South India. The coconut water is slightly sweet and a refreshing drink on a hot day.

I often see heaps of green coconuts piled up on the sidewalk or on a cart by the roadside. The seller uses a small machete to hack away the husk and then uses the tip to make a small hole in the top where he inserts a straw.

Once you’ve finished drinking the water (I’ve discovered that even small coconuts can contain a lot of water!) the seller will chop the coconut in half so that the flesh can be eaten. He cuts away a piece of the husk which is used as a type of spoon to scoop up the flesh. The flesh is soft and jelly-like and delicious. (Above image: Wikimedia Commons)

You can also ask for a ‘parcel’ and take tender coconuts home with you. In this case, a hole won’t be made in the husk after it’s hacked away. With the tip of the machete, a thin strip of the husk is cut on each coconut and then they’re tied together so that you can easily carry them home! Once home, I use a knife to cut a hole and then empty the liquid into a pitcher. If I don’t do this right away, the exposed husk gets tougher and afterwards it’s too difficult to cut a hole! Then I put the pitcher in the fridge because I think tender coconut water tastes best cold.

Coconut water is also the ideal drink because it’s good for you. It contains sugars, fibre and protein and provides vitamins, antioxidants and minerals. It’s also an isotonic drink, similar to a sports drink, because it contains electrolytes. (Above image: Wikimedia Commons)

No wonder I feel instantly refreshed after having some tender coconut water. This is nature’s perfect drink!

Gaga for guavas

I got the image above from Wikimedia.

My favourite fruit at the moment is guava. It’s been in season for the past few months and it’s for sale on almost every street corner. There are two varieties: white and pink. I’ve been told that the white fruit is sweeter than the pink. But I prefer the pink because of its beautiful, brilliant colour and I’m convinced it’s sweeter too. Pink guavas also seem to be bigger and rounder than the white. As guavas ripen, the outer skin becomes more yellow in colour.

The guava seller at the market has a big, round basket full of guavas perched on the back of a bicycle. When he sees me coming, he starts picking out the pink ones because he knows I’m gong to ask for them. For about two months there were only white guavas available but the pink ones are back now.

If you want to eat the fruit straight away, he’ll chop it up and sprinkle rock salt and chilli powder on it. But I like it the natural way: plain, no salt, no chilli. I usually ask for 5 or 6 to take home. He always gives me an extra one. Maybe because I try to speak Kannada to him, or because he’s overcharging me, or because I’m a good customer. Not sure.

Dance of the peacock

Image courtesy of Benson Kua.

A few weeks ago I was staying on the banks of the Kabini river, next to a nature reserve. It was still April then so it was hot but the best time of year to see animals in their habitat.

We took a boat and jeep safari. From the boat we could see herds of elephants on the shore of the river, literally dozens. Big elephants, small elephants, baby elephants.

But elephants are a common site in India. Of course the animal everyone wants to catch a glimpse of, even fleeting, is the tiger.

Above: the Kabini river

Kabini is supposed to have a high concentration of cats: tigers and leopards. But the big cat would remain elusive during our stay.

We took the jeep safari early in the morning. It had rained the night before so the morning was foggy. The first animals we spotted was a family of elephants. We could only just make out their foggy outlines in the forest.

Can you spot the leopard tracks?

The closest we got to a leopard was its footprints. It had probably taken the same path only a few hours before, its tracks were still visible in the wet mud. But we were not lucky enough to catch a sighting, even a fleeting one.

When we would come across another jeep, the drivers would stop and the guides would exchange a few words: ‘What did you see? Any tigers?’ Others were more lucky that morning: they had seen four leopards. Two pairs!

We continued on our cat search but it was futile. However, we were in for a surprise. At some point on the road ahead there was a huge peacock. It was a male because only males have beautiful long tails. As we watched, it opened its feathers, and ‘danced’, prancing gracefully round and round, showing off its splendour, literally ‘strutting its stuff’. And then a second one, not to be outdone by the first, also put on a show for us. I was amazed by this animal’s beauty, its elegance, its brilliant colour.

I was watching the spectacle through binoculars so I couldn’t get a picture. But I didn’t manage to get a few other pictures of a peacock perched on a stump.

The peacock is India’s national bird. In Hindu mythology, the peacock or mayura, is Lord Murugan’s vahana or vehicle.

They say that when a peacock dances, rain is on the way. It must be true because it did rain that night.

Water for elephants

If you visit a temple in South India, you’ll be met by an elephant at the door. She’ll ask you for a coin which she’ll take from your hand and slyly drop in the lap of her mahout before ‘blessing’ you by tapping you gently on the head.

The elephant is revered in India because it is a representation of the elephant-headed god Ganesh. But temple elephants do not live in the most ideal conditions. They stand for hours in the hot sun, are kept chained in confined spaces and suffer from foot diseases.

But it looks like changes are being implemented with the elephant’s welfare in mind. I came across this article which describes how steps are being taken to treat Parvathi, the temple elephant at the famous Meenakshi Temple in Madurai, more like a god and less like a slave:

The Hindu, MADURAI, August 5, 2010

Parvathi, the 15-year-old female elephant of the Meenakshi Sundareswarar Temple here, is basking under a new shower system installed exclusively for its use.

Put into operation on Wednesday, the shower will use 5,000 litres of water a day for the elephant, which will be cleaned once in the morning and evening. The shower was installed at a cost of Rs. 20,000. The move follows a meeting of the temple authorities and individuals owning elephants convened on July 2 by the Chief Conservator of Forests at the Arignar Anna Zoological Park at Vandalur in Chennai, said R. Padmanaban, Executive Officer of the temple.

The meeting discussed the upkeep of elephants and the general health practices to be followed. Following the advice received during the meeting, the Meenakshi temple authorities have decided to replace with sand the stone tiles at the Yanai Mahal (the elephant enclosure located inside the temple).

The elephant would be served new health food as instructed during the meeting. “We have also stopped the practice of elephant blessing devotees from July following the advice from State government. This was done to prevent the elephant from contracting any disease,” he said. Parvathi, which was brought from Arunachal Pradesh, weighs over 3,000 kg. Health check-ups are conducted once in 15 days by veterinarians from the Animal Husbandry Department.

A similar initiative was undertaken recently at the Subramaniaswamy Temple at Tirupparankundram near here where a shower system was set up for the temple elephant.

This morning. 7am. City Market.

Bears being bears

As the jeep passed through the gates of the enclosure we were met by a whole gang of black sloth bears. They knew it was snack time. They bounded up to the jeep, following it. More and more bears appeared out of the forest and raced each other towards the jeep. It stopped suddenly and the two men in the back jumped out and distributed the morning snack: watermelons. I expected the bears to bite into the melons to get to the fruit inside but they used their long claws instead to claw open the fruit. In seconds they gobbled up the red juicy flesh leaving behind only the rinds.

As we drove along through the enclosure more bears happily bounced up to the jeep and each got a watermelon as a treat. Dr Arun told us their names. “This is Raju. He is very naughty!” Raju stood on his hind legs as if to get a better look into the vehicle to see who the visitors were.

I was at the Bear Rescue Centre at Bannerghatta National Park on the outskirts of Bangalore. This is the home to 90 sloth bears. Here the bears spend their days exploring the forest, playing on the swings and platforms specially built for them, hunting for the treats the bear keepers hide in the trees, sleeping and generally living a bear’s life. But these bears did not always live so carefree. The 90 bears at the rescue centre spent the first part of their lives working as dancing bears.

Dancing bears used to be a common sight in India, especially in popular tourist centres. As cubs the bears would be trained to dance and perform tricks. But first their canines would be smashed with hammers (that’s why they couldn’t bite into the watermelons!) and their muzzles would be pierced with a hot iron so that a rope could be passed through the hole. The life of a dancing bear was one of slavery and misery.

Dr Arun and his team of vets show us around the centre. There are a few holding cells for bears who are sick or under treatment. In one of the cells, Shankar sways back and forth from side to side. The vet explains that this is typical behaviour in caged animals. Shankar was locked up in a small cage for years. His owner had lost the key. He’s having a hard time readjusting to a life of freedom. He’s afraid of the other bears and can’t keep down food. The vets are trying different treatments to try to help him recover.

Bear kitchen schedule

Bear dancing is being eradicated thanks to organisations like Wildlife SOS, who run this bear rescue centre and three others across India. Their approach is not only to rescue and rehabilitate the bears but also provide assistance to their former owners. The Kalandar community have been making a living thanks to these bears for generations. When they agree to surrender their bears they get 50,000 rupees in compensation. They also receive training in a new trade and education is provided to their children.

Some of the members of the Kalandar community work at the rescue centre as bear keepers. We asked them how their families make a living. Many now work in agriculture, tailoring, handicrafts or have opened small shops. Their children have been able to access higher education. Two are studying engineering.

Bear food (not the cat)

What was touching was the affection that the vets and the bear keepers obviously have for the bears. They told us about their different personalities and the antics they get up to. I had never wanted to go to Banngerghatta National Park because I had only heard about the miserable zoo and the dreary safaris on tourist buses. But the Bear Rescue Centre was an inspiring place. No longer forced to dance or perform tricks for a few rupees, here the bears can finally be bears!

Dr Arun with two other vets and a volunteer

Photos courtesy of Anuj and Susmitha.