Kochi's folklore museum : )

Kochi's very own folklore museum deserves a spotlight in its own right as a sacred spot of preserved history. It is dense, maximalist, and filled to the brim with artworks that span decades into the past. This is primarily a family-owned business with over 30 years of historical artifacts in storage, so you find yourself walking alongside religious motifs and palatial décor that was likely used rigorously by Kerala's royal courts and nobility.

There are over 6,000 pieces of individual works to admire, and as I traversed the three floors, staring into the symmetrical designs and woodwork, it stunned me how brilliant those artisans were to achieve this level of fine quality and workmanship, especially considering that their work has outlived them and now immortalizes an actual era of Indian history. Meanwhile, the museum itself boasts intricate woodwork on the staircases, doorways, and ceilings, so no matter where your eyes settle, there is a whole world of paint, design, and material to appreciate. So perhaps the museum itself adds to the rhetoric of the art it preserves.

Many of the paintings and busts are closer to touch than most museums would permit, so you have a rare opportunity to inspect the art pieces from multiple angles.

I could spot stonework, woodwork, metal, and marble across different frames and statues, which fully makes you acknowledge that the mastery of such art was indeed real and complete in the past, and almost seems to be a second discovery in the modern age. Which brings us back to the wonderful city of Kochi today, busy and bustling as it used to be centuries ago, with a sitting reminder.

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Climbing the tallest church of our savior in Copenhagen, Denmark : )

Every road I took or boat I ferried on, I was just not able to escape the sight of this magnificent building in Copenhagen. Out of a lingering, unreconciled curiosity, I stepped into the Church of Our Saviour, which describes itself as Lutheran-Protestant. Since the actual interior was under construction at the time, I took a ticket to climb up the 400 steps and catch a bird's-eye view of the city. To be honest, I knew nothing about this 17th-century marvel, so all my next discoveries were as much overwhelming as serendipitous. The Baroque design inside was accentuated by actual pieces of the construction, including previously mended façade portions and statues, which oddly added to the spiritual effect of the climb. As I ascended over some creaking and thin wooden steps, I began realizing that the tower is really, really tall. I mean, the 90 m height totally creeps up on you with the full effect of a cardio workout as you carefully squeeze past woodwork and other descending peopl...

Staycation in Gingelom, Belgium!

Look, I started this trip with a rainy morning, so I will make sure you relive it again with me. Sure, I had a couple of cakes and coffee to pump up my spirits when the joyful cloud of grey decided to accompany me on this vacation. And where else would I be headed to, but Gingelom, the most eventful of all municipalities in Belgium. I am being slightly sarcastic, but I actually had a great time—so why was I there in the first place? Let me take you back one month, talking with my friends about how nice it would be to enjoy the summer of Belgium in a relaxing BnB somewhere we have never visited before. And in that research, we discovered Gingelom. The official webpage for Gingelom describes it as a landscape of sunken lanes, orchards, rolling fields, authentic monuments, and much tranquility. That was the bait, and we were hooked. Right, back to the bus we come—fortunately rather empty and peaceful towards this side of town in Limburg—and to be at complete liberty switching seats ...

The Parakeet Problem, Belgium : )

I think parrots are the orange cats among birds, because what else can explain how captivating their nonchalance can be, especially amidst the litany of crows, pigeons, and ducks that patrol each city. Sometimes I am able to get a response from a few of them, but these green citizens of Belgium are rather smug and settled with their complicated history of invasiveness. As one story goes, tropical ring-necked parakeets were first released into the city by an amusement park in Brussels wishing to contribute to developing birdlife, and over the last five decades, their population increased by 250-fold. This is no surprise of course—parrots are basically green pigeons, and they are smart in surviving urban environments. Now it does become a concern for Belgium's native bird species like the wood nuthatch, who cannot successfully compete against these big parakeets to find burrows in trees for nesting. From a Darwinian context, it is only a matter of time that parakeets dominate the b...

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