Madras,Chennai

Madras is the fourth largest city in India, with a mere 6 million people (behind Delhi, Bombay and Calcutta). Similar to Bombay, it is actually a product of the British invasion, being merely a village before then. They built Fort Saint George, a huge fort to protect their spice trade in the 17th century, now part of the central city.

I booked into the Hotel Imperial, a hotel that costs 6 US dollars for a room, and you get what you pay for. It was a pretty dirty, ‘hotel near the bus station’ kind of place, but Hardened Indian Traveller can handle this scene now. The sheets were an appoximation of clean, so that was enough. But I think it is trying to be a two star hotel, because there are all sorts of hotel personnel to take care of your needs, like getting mineral water and such. The hotel’s best feature is that it’s way off the road, away from the noise of Chennai, which isn’t as bad as the other big cities, but bad enough.

There wasn’t a lot to see in Chennai – saw a museum of Fort Saint George, which was mildly interesting – it contained real mortars and mortar shells and huge paintings of British Royalty long since gone. Next stop was a Christian Church which was most interesting. In case you didn’t know, South India has a large Christian influence, and one reason lies in the churches of Chennai. It is at one of these churches, San Thome Cathedral, a beautiful church built in 1504, where the remains of St. Thomas were buried (until they were moved to the Vatican). That is St. Thomas, the famed ‘doubting Thomas’ that put his fingers into Jesus’s wounds to prove that he was resurrected. I had no idea that one of the twelve apostles ended up in India to spread the Christian word.

Which brought up an amusing contrast. Here I was, someone who was born a Catholic, but for all intents and purposes, having been in the Hindu sphere for most of my life, looking at Indian Christians praying to Jesus. Does not compute! But the tomb of St. Thomas felt like a special place and I was glad to have stayed there for a while. I didn’t notice or feel any extraordinary current, but it was still seemed special nonetheless.

So after the tour was over, I ended up eating fried prawns and chapattis for dinner at an outside cafe which played tinny Indian music way too loud, though it managed to drown out the nearby traffic noise somewhat. At this point, I can no longer stand Indian city traffic, I’ve crossed some threshold where it is just way off the scale for me.