Indian Road Trip

There’s nothing quite like a good road trip. The rhythm of tires on pavement, greenery flashing by, the here and gone nature of every scene you pass. Add to that the extreme colors, the odd juxtapositions, and the unique (to me) everyday life of India to the road trip, and it becomes something really special. Today we drove to Ponnampet in Sujata and Anurag’s (our hosts) jeep. A luxurious way to travel, the jeep has three full compartments for passengers: front seat, middle, and a back with two padded benches that face each other so that whoever is sitting in the tail end there can commiserate with the other over every toss and turn that the roads of India provide.

We drove to Ponnampet to visit a professor and friend who teaches in the College of Forestry at the University of Agricultural Sciences, a state school based out of Bangalore. He’s an interesting guy who has a large coffee and spice farm that is half biodynamic and half conventional, for research purposes. His farm, some 35 acres all together, is certified organic (though they define themselves clearly as biodynamic), and quite beautiful. When we finally arrived after about two hours in the jeep, we were greeted by an aging Alsatian, a garden of potted geraniums, and the most delicious snacks imaginable. Fresh chocolate cake in brownie-sized bites, spicy peanuts, and the kicker: sweet avocado pudding. I will no longer sequester avocado (known as butter fruit here) to the savory foods list. This pudding was smooth and refreshing, requiring nothing more (in addition to the avocados) than a bit of sugar, small slices of apples and bananas, and best of all, stray pomegranate seeds meant to explode succinctly in a mouthful of subtle creaminess.

After thoroughly gorging our sweet tooths, Dr. K showed us around his farm. We passed a bio-gas pit near the first cow shed, and several heaping rows of compost. At the second cow shed, I got my first lesson in biodynamic farming. Dr. K pointed out eight rectangular pits built right into the floor, and behind them a bag of cow horns. He pulled one out and explained that the best horns to use are those of lactating cows who die of natural causes. I definitely do not understand the whole process yet, but basically what they do is create a mixture of cow dung and some other things, and let it ferment in the horn for a while. On the full moon, they open the mixture and add it to 100 gallons of water, a significant dilution. This they add to their compost, and eventually their fields. It seemed to me like some kind of Effective Microorganism mixture, which we use on Mojo Plantation to quicken the compost and decomposition process, though grounded in biodynamic science rather than laboratory research. However it works, it was utterly fascinating. Dr. K explained to us that when he and his wife first started the farm, they had many problems growing their crops organically. They switched to biodynamic farming because of this, and the problems went away.

Elsewhere on the farm, we saw 50-year old coffee plants looking healthy as ever, a graceful Bronzed Drongo, and black pepper creeping up native forest trees. I even tried a raw peppercorn for the first time ever, and wow! After the initial spicy shock, it became a delicious and cleansing seed to chew on, with a lingering flavor as effective as the best kinds of mints.

After our farm tour, we drove back to the college and then into the hills toward Madikeri. On the way we passed a bus thoroughly run off the road and stuck in the bordering weeds, and dozens of school children in all manner of uniforms- stripes and plaid, kurtas and slacks. While driving between layers of brilliant green rice paddies, Anurag turned up the stereo and we rocked out to the blues. A cross between home and away, the road trip twisted on along the winding road until we finally came back into the rain. The forest grew lusher and the roads more pockmarked until the jeep was entirely splattered with mud and moisture. Back to our new home, we tumbled out of the jeep and into our rooms to crash for a while. The journey, just nine hours or so, had worn us out and filled up our thoughts for a time, as any good road trip will do.

Tumba maleh

The monsoon is back in full force.  It’s been raining for four days straight, with no end in sight.  Every so often the sky will turn white rather than gray, the rain will slow to a light mist, and we’ll all look up with some hope.  Two or ten or twenty minutes later, the sky opens up again, as if the downpour never really stopped.  We’ve learned the word for rain in Kannada:  “maleh.”  And lots of rain:  “Tumba maleh.”  

The rain has some benefits:
1- I tried my hand at baking for the first time here (thanks to a friend in Philly for the simple apple tart recipe.)  It was an experience, as it took me more than ten minutes to find the flour, and quite a bit of guessing about the size of a cup, a tablespoon, and a teaspoon.  It’s a good thing that apples, sugar, and butter in an oven almost always turn out okay. 

2- We have discovered the joys of coal.  Each night before bed we carry a rusty tin box to the wood fire that heats the spice-drying shed, and coax smoldering embers into the tin.  It dries our clothes and makes our little bungalow quite a bit cozier.

3- The leeches, astonishingly, don’t like too much wetness.  I haven’t seen any climbing their way quietly up my rubber “gum” boots in four days. 

Probably the best part of the rain is that it’s given me a chance to get organized, read up on local politics and farming practices, and start the first part of my project.  For this, Chitra and I trekked up the road a ways to a nearby farm to interview Hemavati, one of the women who works in the fields here at Mojo Plantation.  She greeted us warmly, offering tea and snacks, and we settled in along the wall of her long cement porch.  Behind us, a chorus of roosters, hens, and a solitary dog accentuated the survey.  Chitra invaluably led the conversation, jumping from Tamil into what she knows of Kannada, and back into English to keep me in the loop.  This is the theme of this place – finding translators, sitting patiently while other people talk, trying to piece things together.

The next day, we interviewed a whole group of women in the kitchen.  Almost all of the workers here have their own farms as well, most between two and three acres.  The farms and families are often connected by complex arrangements of marriages, siblings, and inheritance.  All of the women we have interviewed so far spend their days working for a wage, and their early mornings and late evenings tending their own farms.  On Fridays, their only day off from their “day jobs,” many of them take their extra fruits and vegetables, if they have any, to the village market to sell for whatever the going rate is. 

They work hard, rain or shine.  The excessive rain obviously poses new challenges to the farmers here.  This current “2nd monsoon” is unseasonal, coming far later than usual.  It’s supposed to be drying up now, and in a few weeks it should be dried up completely.  The tumba maleh threatens the plants we have all begun to seed, as well as this year’s crop.  But, as we continue to tell the guests – what can you do except wait it out and make the most of it?