3rd day in Chennai

Wow, what an eventful three days! Chennai is like no other place i've ever seen... the lonely planet guide (the hitchhikers guide to chennai) says this about chennai..

'Chennai has neither the cosmopolitan, prosperous air of Mumbai (Bombay), the optimistic buzz of Bengaluru (Bangalore) or the historical drama of Delhi. It’s muggy, polluted, hot as hell and difficult to get around. Traditional tourist attractions are few. Even the movie stars are, as one Chennaiker put it, ‘not that hot’. '

On our first day, we visited the Fort and George Town. not very interesting in its self, but we learnt a lot about how to get around and how not to get run over by a rickshaw (surprisingly easy to do actually, as they seem to just drive around you). Oh, and we had our first of many samples of the indian coffee... absolutely horrible! we've tried asking for it in as many different ways as we can think off, but every time it comes back tasting of tar. The food though, is absolutely amazing! they're not that big on their meat dishes so there is a lot of veggy stuff, but its so tastey!.. we think they should just stick to food and let some other country deal with the drinks.

The next day, we slept for most of the morning to try to shake off some jetlag, then we 'popped out' to book our train ticket to dindigul (where the hospital is)... which we couldnt get, so we went 'out' to a different station to try our luck there. After a couple of hours, we managed to get the ticket, and we were so far away from the hotel that we decided to go 'out out' for something to eat (absolutely no chance of a beer by the way) - michael mcintyre has it all summed up pretty well!

Today, we've been to the train station again to check out seat numbers for our sleeper train to dindigul, and it appears that we're on a waiting list and wont find out until 7 this evening if we can get on or not (the train is at 9!!!). im sure we'll get there eventually. Then we went to the beach, and left (about as much as there is to do). Oh, and we prayed for a begger today who had no fingers, and all of a sudden we were surrounded by about 5 or 6 other street people all wanting to be prayed for. it was very surreal, but i think they really appreciated white men praying for the lowest of the low. one man down the street said that he had seen us (we stick out like a sore thumb regardless of how many beggars are around us!) and that he was very pleased to see it.

anyhoo.. off in search of our hotel now so i will leave you in suspense as to whether we get on this train tonight or not.....