About the Book: The Curry Coast: Travels in Malabar 500 Years After Vasco Da
Gama
Retracing the footsteps of explorer Vasco da Gama 500 years after his arrival on
the shores of Calicut, Binoo K. John finds himself in a land of graceful rivers,
serene beaches and lush, tropical greenery. At the Kochi and St Angelo forts,
where battles were fought between local kings and Portuguese, Dutch, English and
French invaders from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, Binoo sees the
foundations of a diverse, cosmopolitan society being laid. From his studies of
the social reform, Marxist, Communist and Naxalite movements which swept Kerala
before and after Independence,