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Kerala with Two Girls in Tow
text & photo by Barbara J. Euser

Excerpts:

       Like pink and yellow butterflies they edged along the road, an endless stream of women with silken saris fluttering in the breeze. We had just flown into Trivandrum, at the southern tip of India. As we left the airport baggage claim area, we were overwhelmed by the heat and smells and press of people. Our solid, square London taxicab was an island of peace parting the waves of humanity.
       The narrow, winding road was the main artery between Trivandrum and points north. We were headed to the game preserve at Periyar, a national park in the Cardamom Hills region of the Western Ghats. But that was too far for one afternoon’s drive.
       I was sitting on the jump seat, facing backwards, so Dean, my husband, and two daughters, Helane, 13, and Piper, 9, could ride facing forward. Normally talkative, the girls were silenced by all the sights and sounds . . .

. . .

 . . . Back at Periyar, after a short nap, we boarded a tourist boat for a sunset ride along the park’s waterways. We struck up a conversation with a family from New Delhi. The older daughter was about the same age as Helane. Speaking British-accented English, she told Helane about her school. She went to an all-girls school. Did Helane? At her school they wore uniforms. Did Helane wear a uniform to school? I heard her ask Helane what kind of money we used in America. I saw Helane pull a dollar out of her bag, which the girl rubbed between her fingers and turned over and over again. They drifted slowly down the railing, out of parental earshot . . .


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