First days of the Manipal trip

Friday 21 to Sunday 23 Feb 2025

Written by the staff members Tarja, Subas and Cata

From left: Tiina, Sari, Meri, Ansa, Elina, Krista, Eveliina, Cata, Tarja, Subas, Kamilla, Laura and Natasha.

First one of many group photos on Helsinki-Vantaa Airport. We are all set and ready for the adventure to begin! Our group consisted of 10 students and 3 staff members, many of whom visited India for the very first time! We all came from different locations, some by train, some by bus and met at the airport, full of excitement and expectations 😉

The direct Finnair flights went smoothly, and we landed safely in New Delhi. It was on time so the extra time we had reserved for the transit, some 5-6 hours, was not really needed but we used the time to sort out the customs formalities, have breakfast, chill out and sleep.

A little queuing, but the formalities we had been warned about were surprisingly smooth and did not take that long.

The airport in Delhi was spacious, cool and nice. We walked around and found a nice place for breakfast and another one afterwards for coffee.

Our first of many culinary experiences in India! The name of the food is Dosa, a very common and tasty dish. This one is 'Masala Dosa', one of the common types of Dosa. And the 'soup' like dish in the small plate is 'sambar' and other small sauces are various chutneys. It tasted extremely good and we were very hungry! Note, the food is served from a banana leaf plate!

Teachers Tarja and Subas having well-deserved  coffee and cake for dessert!

 

After two more flights by Indian airline IndiGo, first Delhi to Bangalore and then to Mangalore, we arrived in Manipal – FINALLY – and were warmly greeted by our coordinating teacher Sumit and transported by bus to our residence, MAHE’s Hostel Satkar Paradise in Manipal.

Tired, sweaty but happy in the bus. There is no picture from the hostel upon arrival, but we were up for a few surprises such as no towels, soap or toilet paper in any of the rooms… Also the air-conditioning was only working in some of the rooms and the tidiness of the place was, hmmm, let’s leave it at that 😉…

Sumit came to rescue and got us most of what we needed – and also we experienced that you can solve most things by creativity – a T-shirt works perfectly well as a towel! (The next day Sumit took us to buy proper ones 😊). Then, finally, sleep!

 

There was filtered water in the hostel, which we learned to use quickly. The taste was not bad at all after the water was cooled and saved a lot of plastic waste so we used this a lot. We had refrigerators in our rooms which was great! (Otherwise also the rooms were spacious and nice and the beds quite comfy, after all!)

All refreshed the next morning, Sunday 23 February, and set to go! This day was our only free day on the trip so we had planned a trip to the seaside! But first a walk to the MAHE university food court were we had all our meals.

Outside the main gates of MAHE, on our way to breakfast.

The food, by the way, was really good and as a bonus we always got some nice cold fruit juices! The dishes were spice, but most of them not that hot, and there was plenty to choose from. 

Finns cannot live without coffee so we found a nice cafeteria on campus  and became regulars there straight away – they had many types of coffee to choose from (the Uni Café only had one, which was good but not strong enough unless you had really many cups…)

Next we took tuktuk rides to Maple beach. Tuktuks were the best way to move around, very affordable, cool, and fast! Much better than taxis in our opinion (though we never tried those).

 

Malpe beach was big, hot and nice – Cata is a beach person, see that happy smile 😊. There was also a statue of Mahatma Gandhi by the beach, already now familiar to us from all our Indian rupee banknotes… 

We took this boat and went for a short visit to St Mary’s Island, a very nice recreational place not far from mainland. 

There was a real party on the boat, and pop music playing loud! Youngsters are full of energy and fun, everywhere! A lot of dancing going on up there in the front… 😉

Safety ensured and we are ready to start the boatride!

Happy ladies on holiday (just for one day, haha…)

Group picture on the island. We walked around for about an hour and then took the boat back to Maple beach.

On St Mary’s Island they never run out of water 😊

Back on Maple beach we enjoyed some refreshing coconut drinks, and after that we started walking back to were the tuktuk left us, to find some place to eat as it had been a long warm day with just some snacks so far…

Fishing Indian style – the nets were big and full of fish, took a lot of teamwork to get them up… The guy in the water is the boss, giving instructions on when to pull.

Someone’s home on a perfect location by the beach, that we passed by on our walk. 

Cute straydogs were around everywhere, these were resting by the beach.

We found a nice restaurant called ‘Bubbles’ near the beach, and finally got some dinner.

There was a great view over the beach from the restaurant. Somewhere by the water we saw a camel and a horse that people were riding. Many people had gathered to watch the sunset and the chill out at the beach.

After dinner it was already getting dark. We took a tuktuk back to the hostel and called it a day. And what a perfect day we had – now we were relaxed and ready and full of expectations when the actual work week with a lot of activities; lectures, field trips and events was about to start the next morning 😊.