Pondicherry, Seaside French Colonial Capital of India

It was a good move to come down to Pondicherry, about a two-hour dirve down the coast, for this the biggest Indian holiday. It's a much smaller city, and we're staying on the third floor of a western hotel with a rooftop pool/garden. Last night shortly after dark there was a couple hours of fireworks going on off all over the city. Not just round after round of ear-splitting firecrackers like in our neighborhood in Chennai, but an amazing display of fireworks going off in all directions in the night sky, soaring among the strings of lights that decorate buildings. It really was a festival of lights.

After a while we went down to the Renaissance Room, which is the non-vegetarian restuarant in the hotel. John was eager to try it because he recently did an elaborate project on the Renaissance. There were paintings from the period, and the food was quite good. My goal is to try one of the French restaurants here, the old French colonial capital, and we've all agreed that tonight we'll try Le Club, one othat gets raves for prawns, steaks, wine and fondant chocolate in our travel guide.
Walking down in the central park and at the beach, an area lined with French architecture, there were lots of families out enjoying the holiday. Widi waited his turn to get a photo at the statue of Gandhi, and we strolled along the promenade. Most of the Indians we encounter in Chennai and again here are middle-class Indians, struggling along to educate their children and make ends meet like middle-class people everywhere, I imagine, but well-dressed, friendly, and basically unaffected by my presence as a foreigner and the wealth that might symbolize. There is the occasional beggar, of course, but I would have expected more here. You can tell India is rising up in the world; there's a chubbiness to the people that you never would have seen in days gone by.

We also visited the Aurobindo Ashram, which was founded in the 1950s by Sri Aurobindo and a French artist, "The Mother," both very much revered by Indians today. There was a steady stream of visitors at the ashram, we meditated a little, and bought a book about Aurobindo's spiritual teachings. Overall, Pondicherry definitely gets the thumbs up for great French coffee in the cafes, French cooking in the restaurants, and le ambiance francais par toute, and really who can argue with a downtown situated by the beach?

(Written Oct. 18, posted Oct. 24)