The south-eastern coast of France to the east of Marseille is blessed with warm waters, sand and pebble beaches close to some amazing and massive rock structures bordering the sea, called Calanques. Scenic that these things are, the tourists just love them.
One of the weekends a colleague of mine, Christophe invited me over to his parents place in a village called Saint Cyr and I was only too glad to join him, to escape from the suffocating boredom of the hotel. Tophe, along with his wife Valerie, son Bastien and lovely little Amandine took me through a circuitous route driving up, and stopped in the middle to show me a cliff. Looking below the dizzying heights of the cliff, we saw stunning views of the sea, the town of La Ciatat and calanques of Cassis. It was nearly impossible to capture the depth of the cliff in a photo, even with wide-angled shots.
Tophe’s parents were a warm and friendly couple, with his mother being the Goddess of Home-made Desserts for a sweet-toothed disciple like me. After a sumptuous dinner and walk along the beach, I went to sleep without any expectations of the adventure filled weekend to follow.
Next morning saw us go on a long trek along the hilly coast, through some bushy forest area. Tophe and Valerie were quite athletic, and I was lagging behind them while seeing my well preserved calories being burnt away. Despite the desolate beauty of the place, it was a bit frustrating to see how some people had cleared some restricted forest area to have an unobstructed view of the sea from their sea-side homes. At end of the walk, we arrived at a beach where we were to meet the rest of the family.
Tophe handed me a pair of goggles and mouth pipe, and for the first time in my life I went for diving in the beach. For a poor swimmer who had marveled at the vibrant diversity of marine life only in TV channels like the Discovery or National Geographic, it was an ‘eye-opening’ experience. In the 2 days I dived a few times, saw some interesting fish and marine plants and gained in confidence. This inspires me greatly to explore the tropical waters in SE Asia.
After having tea made the Indian way (with milk, lottsa sugar and froth), the evening was ‘petanqued’ up, along with some more friends from ST. Late in the evening, we visited an ancient village Le Castellet with its houses of stone, and had dinner at with Crepes of Brittany- the French version of wheat dosai with topping.
On Sunday morning, I woke up at (an unearthly hour of) 6am, to accompany Christophe on a ‘hunt’ as an apprentice. He happens to be a serious diver with all the right gear, costume and harpoon to carry out fishing under water. On the way to his hunting waters we had to climb down a small cliff. I found that while Tophe we carrying his heavy equipment and walked like other homo-sapiens do; I was on all-fours for most of the descent! When he went into aqua-mode, I had all the time in the world to take quite a few abstract photos about joys of an amphibian existence. But I don’t remember the subtle meanings behind the images, when I see them in the computer now!
That afternoon, I was entrusted with the responsibility of at least 10 lives, by being asked to cook some Indian dish for lunch. The famous Indian spices company MTR, came to my rescue again, and I made some Puliodharai(tamarind rice) of varying spice levels, and the natives improvised by adding some coconut milk to the mix, to get a less pungent sauce for the kids.
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