This was a day of fun and frolic, heat and exhaustion, history and architecture: We toured Mysore, the cultural capital of the state of Karnataka. Our host at SDM Institute, Mr. Dwarakanath, is very proud of his culture and heritage. Given that, he made sure we saw every important site in Mysore. The day started out with a visit to Chamundeshwari Temple in the Chamundi Hills. From the Institution we can see the hills upon which it sits. The temple is named after a goddess, who, according to Hindu mythology, killed the demon ruler Mahishasura. The walk around and through the temple was gross; the reason being that we had to remove our shoes to do so, and there were cow pies and remnants of cow pies, as well as monkey pooh everywhere. My socks became encrusted - never to be put on my feet again. Fortunately, I had antibacterial wipes with me. I promptly cleaned my feet before putting them back into my shoes.
Coming down off the hill we stopped at a spot to look out over Mysore. Unfortunately, there was too much smog in the air to get good pictures. We then headed over to the school for Mr. D to give a yoga lesson. I observed, rather than participated, because of the vertigo factor. From there we had an address by a board member of the organization that runs the business school and various charitable efforts throughout India. They feed over 10,000 people for free every day, and during peak pilgrimage times upwards of 50,000.
From campus we left on sightseeing for the remainder of the day. We visited the Amba Vilas Palace, also known as Mysore Palace. It is the fourth largest palace in the world. We only were allowed to see parts that are public, as the prince still lives there. The exterior is beautiful, but the interior is gaudy. While we were there we were continually approached, surrounded, and harassed by people selling and begging. They are relentless. They even went so far as to follow us to our bus, then sticking their hands in the windows and the door.
We next traveled to the bird sanctuary. There were thousands of birds nesting there. Some had migrated from North America for the winter (although I couldn’t understand our guide well enough to know which ones). There were huge creatures flying around in the sky, and I thought they looked like bats, but I was contradicted by the know-it–all in the group, he telling me that bats don’t fly around during daylight. Of course, it turned out that I was right. They were fruit bats and happen to fly during the day and have a very large wing span. I was glad that we didn’t get too close. We did, however, get too close to the crocodiles. There were several in the water and others sunning themselves on rocks in the water and along the shore. Our guide had us within two to three feet of one that was sunning himself on a rock. Then he splashed him with water, some in the group were sure he would lunge out at us and have one of us for dinner. My camera lost its battery power and so I missed out on pictures of our final stop.
We went back to the Mysore Palace to see it lit up. It was really quite breathtaking. They have 94,000 lights on the palace and grounds entries. Why not 95,000 or 100,000 - all I can say is that this is India, and a lot here does not make sense to Americans.
We arrived home (to the Ginger Hotel) exhausted - and ready for a good shower.
No comments:
Post a Comment