Kottakupam

Kottakupam.
April, 02-2020.
It's been a long time that I was writing my daily story about my travelling to and through India. Maybe 2 years, I cannot remember exactly, but my plan is to start again; or to go on with my story. The story of my stay in India. 
Today is Friday, 2 april of the year 2020; and the story has become really a very exciting story, not only for me or for India, but for about everybody in this whole wide world: I am sure everybody everywhere will understand what I mean: the worldwide crisis of corona that changed me and everybody's situation of daily life and that started and still is going on for the coming period.
 I have made a lot of wonderings around since I started my journey in India 2 years ago: I remember I started in Chennai, an aeria they call Velachery, where I had a room in the house of my good friends. I stayed there for about 3 months and I made journeys to Pondicherry, Banalore, Madurai and Cochin from where I took a train back to Chennai after I decided that the wheather was really much too hot to stay there longer. I remember I allowed myself a stay in a very expensive hotel, which I usually don't do, but the wheather was really not bearabale for western person like me, although I am used to some hot clamat changes. I remember I took a train back to Chennai and I was surprised that the journey only took about 7 hours. I was to late to buy a reservation, so I just had to try my luck by asking the "t.t.t." (the peron in the train that is resposible for controlling the tickets and that everybody sits on the right place ot seatnumber) if maybe somebody did not appear, so his seat would still be empty and maybe available for me. But it was not my lucky day, there were no empty seats, so I had to find my place in the space between 2 compartments. I was able to put my suitcases underneath the chairs of some people and I was was sitting for a long time on this not very comfortable place. After about some hours I really became very tired, so I decided to ask the "ttt" if he maybe knew another solution. He told me: "yes there is; you can go out of this train; in the next station, there you can go out, and the next train to Chennai will arrive about half an hour; maybe you're more lucky and find an empty place there". That looked to me a great idea, so I decided to do that. Now I only had to find the place where I left my luggage. But that was not that very easy: after I walked back the rowls where I left my suitcases I could not find them! Wow, that seemed a disastrous idea! I began to panick! What  if I could not find them, my suitcases with my shakuhachi's and my clothes and all my other stuff. What could I do? It was already middle of the night so most people where already sleeping, I could not wake them up to ask about my luggage. So I dedcided to talk with the "ttt" again and I told him my problem. He was a really helpfull person and already called the police in the next station, imagine somebody had stolen them. I was so gratefull to this man! I decided to walk the walk the rows of seats again, and: serious, suddenly I found the place where I had put them! I was so happy! I told the "ttt" that I was stupid to have forgotten the place but that I also was very happy to have found them again. He immidiately called the police that they were not needed to come and the train arrived the next station in time, just after I found my luggage. I waited for a small hour to reach the next train to Chennai, where I was able to find a good place to sleep until I reached Chennai.
This was one of the stories I experienced during my trips through India.
I remember, after this first trip to Chennai, I went back to Holland. I was still living in Leiden and there was still a lot of things to do. One thing was to sell my house. I found a place to live for some time, not too expensive, in Epe, on "de Veluwe", a beautifull camping, very lonely, but nice to live, not too far from Apeldoorn. I travelled again to India, my friends in India had moved to Bangalore, so there was another place for me to stay with them. I travelled to Auroville and found a place to live in a guesthouse where I stayed for a long time, called "Kipaak". I travelled to Nederland again a few times, at last I found my place to live in a very small village not far from Auroville, called Kuyalappalayam. A very nice room, close to my friend Aspaks music shop, but the traffic was too much and the noise produced by cars, busses, bikes, especially heavy motorbikes went on from late in the evening till early in the morning. I decided to move again to a place not far from here, but in a very small village, called Kottakupam: and this is where I am living now. I remember also: it was about the day I came to live here, that the crisis of corona started.