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Mark Moxon's Travel Writing

India: Pondicherry

The Pondicherry shoreline
The Pondicherry shoreline

Pondicherry threw me from the first second. Rising on the morning of our departure from Mamallapuram, we grabbed a quick two-silce Breake Fast and headed for the bus stand, where an almost empty bus was waiting, proclaiming 'Pondy' on the front. Empty buses don't exist in India, but there, in front of us, was one with leg room and space for luggage, and not only was it empty, but it only took an hour and a half to do the three-and-a-half hour stretch south to Pondicherry. It quite unnerved me.

Sleeping rickshaw drivers
The hard-working rickshaw-wallahs of Pondicherry taking a well-earned rest
Place de la Republique
Pondicherry is where India meets France, and India wins hands down
The park in Pondicherry
The park in Pondicherry

1 Bottles of Black Label are ominously labelled 'The taste you grow up to'. This is, of course, only two letters off the real story.