Pondicherry

Pondicherry, former French colony, is divided into two totally different parts by a channel running through the city. The part between the sea and the channel is still very much the face of the France - streets with villas, museums, memorials, parks.

And the part behind the channel is 100 per cent Indian - Indian restaurants at every corner, cows, rubbish, more cows, more rubbish.

French part

Statue of Gandhi

Policemen in Pondicherry still live in old French times.

Pondicherry is maybe the only city in India, where there are street names on the houses, and besides, they are in a readable writing...

Milion different kinds of bananas....

In south of India there is Ganesh, the God, standing in front of each temple, in his full size. He gives blessing to people with his trunk. However, Ganesh is trained so that he only reacts on Rupees....

All gourmets should immediately head to Tamil Nadu or Pondicherry. There is the most delicious food in the whole world - super-good, unlimited quantity for just 30 Rupees and ecological after all - instead of plates, they use banana leafs, which afterwards go behind the restaurant, where they are easily accessible for cows, who then give shit, which is then again used as an energy for cooking new food.

"Meals" is the name of this south Indian lunch. Consists of rice, many different salats and sauces, sometimes also chappatis or pappad or both and very often there is cardamom desert included.

The best dish we have ever eaten !!!














Banana leaf-plate factory














Typists waiting for somebody who would use their service




Near Pondicherry, there is a place that does not belong to any country but to all of the World, or at least this is what they say.... It is called Auroville after the founder Sri Aurobindo. It is a place where ecology, modern technology and spirituality meet. The village attracts many visitors, but unless one has a possibility to live in the village and feel the difference, the short trip to the visitor center does not show much of the atmosphere of the place.

However, visiting Auroville, even shortly, is like a jump to a different World than India for a while.

visitor center

The idea of the Auroville

Visitor's area in Auroville

solar cooker

approaching Matrimandir...

Matrimandir - a symbol of the Divine's answer to man's inspiration for perfection. In other words, place for stillness and meditation. Entering is possible only with special permissions.

"The whole World yarns for freedom, yet each creature is in love with his chains"

/Sri Aurobindo/

"Man seeks at first blindly and does not even know that he is seeking his divine self; for he starts from the obscurity of material Nature and even when he begins to see, he is long blinded by the light that is increasing in him."

/Sri Aurobindo/