Jungle at foot of Nilgiri Hills
We reached the jungle not long after the mountains materialized. The light changed instantly, reaching through the leafy canopy with golden fingers, scattering sun and shadows. …We stopped to buy young coconuts from a lonesome roadside stall and drank from them by the car. The whole region, by decree of the United Nations, is one of the world’s protected zones, home to tigers and the last remaining wild elephant population in Asia. Ours was the only vehicle in sight that afternoon. It was eerily quiet, except for invisible creatures that cawed and chattered near enough that I ignored the...
Read MoreSouth India’s Misty Mountains
It’s true what they say about the Nilgiri Hills, where my father’s father was born, and where his grandfather appeared and disappeared, the blue haze never leaves their sides. Share...
Read MoreHills of tea
You can’t forget the tea for long in Coonoor. It surrounds the town, cascading down the mountainsides onto terraced plantations of emerald green. My father always suspected that his grandmother had been a local tea picker. He’s not sure how he came by the impression, but whenever we make Nilgiri tea back home, it’s always steeped in the fanciful notion that we are brewing an ancestral crop. Share...
Read MoreHand-picked tea
The armies of women who are hired to pluck tea wrap their heads in brightly coloured scarves, just as they did in my great-grandparents’ day. They wade chest-deep between the shrubs, removing the waxy upper leaves with a swift flick of the wrist. Share...
Read MoreWelcome to Jamaica
Buying Jade her first young coconut at a roadside stall in Falmouth, Jamaica. Share...
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