India, India....
I flew from Colombo to Thiruvananthapuram (what a lovely name) for a few days in the southernmost province of India.
Main reason of this short trip was actually work: I had to visit a customer there.
I managed to have one day off to go around and get my first impressions about this country:
Although Thiruvananthapuram is considered a small town, compared to India of course, I was shocked by the density of people, cars, two and three wheelers, buses, dogs, rats and cows roaming around the streets at every hour of day and night and making as much noise as they can.
Here street rules are literally anarchy, and being not used to that at all, I had to be extremely careful and concentrated everytime I stepped out my hotel.

Garbage burning on sidewalks, old women selling any kind of imaginable thing: from rotten fish to lottery tickets, terribly loud ringing horns every 2 seconds, disgusting smells coming from everywhere, unbelievably spicy food cooked in nonexistent hygiene (to be eaten with hands), and so on.

You may think: what a horrible country! Well, not really...

After passing the hygiene barrier and after having acquired a certain tolerance to heavy crowds, I could see beyond my first impression: What a colorful country full of beautiful people, smells and tastes coming from outer space, wonderful street markets,...
One thing I particularly appreciated is not being observed as an alien or a "walking wallet" all the time: people just don't care about me, it's just like walking anonymously in any European city. And that helps a lot be fully part of a crowd, and therefore live like locals do.

Funny fact: I have been twice to the same very dirty street restaurant for dinner. On the second night a guy approached me and told me: "Hey, why you come here? There is a big modern international restaurant serving burgers with A/C few hundreds meters from here...". I had to explain him I didn't come to India to have burgers with A/C! Plus, and once again after having passed the creepy hygiene barrier, food is truly delicious, although extremely spicy, in such places.
And I believe that Indian people are better in cooking curries rather than hamburgers...but I might be wrong....

I must also say that my stomach starts to be used to this kind of food, I would probably have not stepped into this kind of places during my first week in Asia....

On the travel facts side: I have been to Kovalam beach early in the morning where I met some fishermen pulling the nets (yes, again!).
This time the guys were very aggressive, as soon as the catch was pulled on the beach they literally and physically started fighting, to get the better pieces at the better price.
It was surrealistic scene: 60 years old men, only wearing very basic underwear wrestling in the sand surrounded by living fishes!

Rest of the week was spent working in a medical laboratory...and here also I noticed the abyssal difference between Indian standards and rest-of-the-world standards.
One can say that a medical research laboratory in India looks like a tire factory in Switzerland, which doesn't mean AT ALL that they are doing worst job than anywhere else. Please don't misunderstand me! It's just another way of working and thinking, not necessarily better, not necessarily worst, just different. And for the few things that I saw, their research level has nothing to envy to the ones in Europe or North America. Indian are smart people! Plus they are modest and simple...and here feel free to misunderstand me.

India, India...