Chamundi Hill

Just outside of Mysore is Chamundi hill.  It has a temple and a Nandi Bull on it.

People come and worship at both places.  Outside of the temple there were at least 25 cows/bulls and lots of monkeys.  We were told that worshipers donate the animals to the temple and that is why there is so many of them. 

A bull came right up beside our car as we pulled into the spot, so Vandata could not get out of her door.

I really liked the spot with the temple at the top of Chamundi Hill.  We did not go into this temple as we were told that most of them are similar inside and we have been inside a few of them now.  We feel a bit disrespectful going around in this tight space with everyone else praying to their gods.



Mysore

Made it to Mysore on the weekend.  It was really nice to get out of the city and see some of the countryside.  Even though it is only 140 kms to Mysore from Bangalore, there are no real highways, so this drive took us nearly 4 hours.  I really enjoyed seeing the rice fields and the little towns along the way.  We stopped on the side of the road and had our first experience with coconut water.  The guy cuts off the top of the coconut and you drink the water from inside.  I am not a big fan.  The couple who took us seemed to really love it and actually had the coconut cut open and ate this white filmy looking thing from inside.  As I couldn't even finish my 'water' I declined from eating the insides as did Ryan, so I don't think it looked very appealing to him either. 

At Mysore, there is the Mysore Palace.  It was built to resemble the Windsor Palace in England.

To get into the palace, there were two different prices, one for locals at 20 Rupees or one for foreigners at 250 Rupees.  Since we are now 'locals' we get the local price, sweet deal!  All we needed to show was our registration papers and that was easy enough.

As we were entering the palace, a security guard saw my camera and said that I was not allowed to bring it into the palace.  He was going to make us walk all the way back to the entrance to the grounds to check our camera.  Thankfully we were with an Indian couple and Ashwini knew to just bribe the guy 10 Rupees and he let us keep it as long as we promised not to use it inside. 

I snuck a couple of pics with Ryan's blackberry:

                                           

Ryan had his first experience with almost being pick pocketed.  To go into any temple or palace, you need to take off your shoes, so at the station where you can pick up your shoes again, it is really busy, with lots of people bumping into each other.  Ryan was bumped into fairly hard on the one side by a kid and as he turned to look at the kid, he felt a hand go into his opposite pocket.  As he quickly turned back, a older women was scurrying away.  Thankfully, he had all of his money and cards in the other pocket so she had nothing to take!

Me and Additiya:  The 2 year old really took to me.  They do not use car seats so Vandata, Additiya and me sat in the backseat, while Ryan sat upfront with Ashwini. Additiya had pretty much the full reign of the backseat, moving between me and his mother.  Additiya's native language is Malayalam, so we could not communicate but it does seem that the word 'no' is used pretty universal.

Mysore Palace at night:
 
                                     

                                       


As much as Ryan and I like Indian food, eating 3 meals on a single day was a little much.  All the bread and rice, it is so much food every time.  We could not believe the quantity of food that was ingested by Ashwini and Vandata and they are half the size of Ryan and I.  I don't think that we will be eating it for awhile.

Just another tourist

The weird thing is, there were no other toursits around.  We went to most of the major sights in Bangalore today.

Bull Temple:

Bangalore Palace:

Drinking stations that seem to be readily available:

A wedding:

Ladies doing some dishes:

An elephant statue at the Lal Bagh Garden:

It seemed to be out of season as most flowers were not in bloom.  I was looking forward to the rose garden and from the amount of bushes in the area, if in full bloom it would be beautiful but there were not many.  Too bad.  I will have to come back at a better time of year.  It was a nice walk around the garden even still.   

Hyper City

I had our driver Venkatesh take me to Hyper City today.  It was 40 minute drive from our hotel into the suburbs of Bangalore.  It is a glorified Walmart.  I felt like I was selling out by being there but I finally ended up getting my groceries. :)  I might end up back out here again once we move into our apartment to get anything and everything that I might need.  But I am determined to find a place to get the basic food items close enough to walk to.  Another day another story. 

This is Venkatesh our driver:

He made the drive worthwhile, pointing out different things on the way.  We got to know each other pretty well.  He has been married 9 years and has 2 kids (boy and girl) and is shocked that I have been married for 7 years and do not have any children.  His exact words were: 'but why, madam?'  It did not make any sense to him that we would not have any.  His kids are in exams right now as the summer vacation for school kids is April and May as that is the hottest part of the year.  He asked if our marriage was arranged as that might be the reason that we wouldn't have any kids. When I said that no it wasn't, he volunteered that his marriage is arranged.  He met his wife 3 months prior to their wedding and they had an engagement period for that time.  Odd concept to comprehend.  I asked him how the arrangment was made. It was his family that heard that she was available and they made it happen.  Venkatesh is very proud that his wife does not have to work and is a housewife.  He has a one bedroom apartment and very proudly pointed out that he has an attached bathroom. (I guess all places don't have a bathroom in them)  He pays 3000 Rupees a month on rent which is equivalent to 65 CAD dollars.  It puts into percepective the huge discrepancies here between classes.

Happy that I have some food in my kitchen for the weekend, even though most of you know that I don't do much cooking! ;)

Where are the grocery stores?

So after 5 hours spread over the last 2 days I have yet to find a grocery store.  The maps I have are not detailed enough so I am googling downtown Bangalore and zooming way in. 

City Super Market was my first destination.  On route yesterday I got distracted as I found the street that our apartment is on - Lavelle Road.  Just by chance I started heading down the road (there are no signs labelling the roads) and noticed the Bangalore Club which I knew was really close to where were going to be staying.  Excited, I backtracked and headed down the first side road which are called crosses (little dead end streets off of Lavelle) knowing that our apartment is on one of them.  At the start of the first street is a rod that stops traffic from going down the street and a security guard sitting next to it.  I ask him if the 'Aspire" apartments are down this road and he looks at me like I am retarded and says 'I don't think so ma'am.'  I keep walking down the street and come to the next cross street.  Again, a bar is across the front of this street and no security guard that I can see so I just walk around the barrier and low and behold, find our apartment.  It was a good moment!  As I walk back out of the complex, security guard now in place I am psyched that I was making good progress today in getting myself organized with my surroundings.  I decide to walk back to the hotel to make sure that I really know where I am so that I can get there again.  I walked for 30 minutes or so before I ended up at our apartment.  It took me 5 minutes to get back to the hotel.  Not the most efficient use of my time to get there but it worked!

Ok, back to the objective, find City Super Market.  I recheck the computer and send the map to Ryan so that he can print it for me at work so that I don't need to be back at the hotel every time I need it.  Out I head again.  This time, I really feel like I know where I am going.  I head back down Lavelle Road, just to get myself familiar with it.  I head the way I feel my memory is leading me as I think that I have the map ingrained in my memory.  I do the incredible.  I cross a road with 8 lanes (at least) of traffic and don't get hit!  I am walking along and see the next picture and know that this morning, I saw this place.  I took the picture on my first walk.

I stopped and pulled out the map that I did have and tryed to figure out where I went wrong.  A rickshaw driver stopped and got out of his vehicle and came over to try and help me.  It wasn't much help and he then tried to get me to take a ride with him which I declined and kept walking.  I gave up and ended up heading back to the hotel.

Today, we needed to go and get passport photos to register so our driver Venkatesh took us there this morning near Brigade Road.  He took off with Ryan and I waited for them to develop.  It took them an hour to develop them but for 250 rupees for 16 copies each, so cheap.  While they were developing I went out looking for a Spencers (another grocery store) that I saw on my google maps was really close to the passport place.  I walk around.  It is 10:30 am in the morning and nothing is opened yet.  During my walk I see these monkeys just hanging out on the wall next to the sidewalk:

I can't seem to find Spencers.  I finally stop and ask someone where it is and I get told that Spencers has gone out of business.  No luck there.

Get my photos and then start to walk home.  On my walk is a place that I remember from my map called Koshys.  It said that is was a grocery store.  I actually find this place but as far as I can tell it is not a grocery store.  Looks like a ice cream place and a fish and chip restaurant and a little hole in the wall that sells chips etc.  So I walk back to the hotel...

After I work out, I head back out to find the elusive City Place Market.  With new detailed map in hand, this should be a breeze.

I get to the right area.  It is a really poor area of the city.  I see my first cow!

And chicken:

I really have to watch my step but that is not new, you have to watch  out everywhere:

My walk is super interesting.  I really wanted to take pictures of some of the people.  They were doing things like washing clothes at the side of the street but I was a little shy in taking their pictures as they were all staring at me.  I hope to get over that so that I can show you how some of the people live here. 

Not sure if this next picture is a makeshift barn for these cows or if they just made it their own to get out of the sun.  Remember I am in the heart of downtown Bangalore.

I finally ask a man who ended speaking really good English where the City Super Market is and he told me that the City Super Market is an actual market - not what google would have had me believe since I googled grocery stores.  He said that it opened at 3 am every morning and since it was 2 pm in the afternoon, it had been done for hours.  So not the 'grocery' store that I was looking for.  I continue on my way...one last attempt before I go home.  There should also be a Foodworld somewhere near me, so I head to check it out.  I am standing in the exact position on the map that it says it should be and it is not here.  I don't know what I am missing but this seems ridiculously hard to find somewhere to buy some groceries.

I officially give up trying to find one (at least for today :))

Venkatesh is going to come and drive me to one tomorrow.  It feels like I am wimping out.

So here I am eating Miloni Subzi from room service.  I guess things could be worse... :)

First Weekend

Ryan and I went out and explored the area a bit more again on Saturday.  We had some coffee and took it easy.

Today, we ended up just hanging out at the hotel pool.  Felt like we are on vacation. 

Ryan is off to work tomorrow though so the vacation is short lived.  Not sure what I am going to get up to yet....what an exciting thought! 

Search for Our Apartment

We spent 2 days with Satish looking at different places to live.  I guess we can't live in the hotel for 2 years.  Some of the places we saw were 4000 square feet, 6 bedroom apartments.  Moving from our 1000 square foot place in Toronto, it is hard to imagine living in a place like that.  What would we do with all that space?  We looked at places in the burbs of Bangalore as well.  These places are in gated compounds that are houses and are a little community within themselves.  It is like you are in a suburb in North America somewhere.  We decided that we would rather be right in the heart of the city so that we can walk out our door and go to markets, stores, restaurants, etc.  Get the full experience of living here.  I didn't want to be dependant on our driver to come and take me everytime I wanted to go anywhere. 

We choose a 3 bedroom place that has a rooftop pool and place to sit out.  Really nice.  Once we move in, I will post some pics.

While we were looking, outside of the apartment we choose, is the picture above.  Random bull and cart. 

Day One

Ryan went into the office today, so I took a walk out to explore a bit.  We are in an area called UB City, which is in the heart of downtown.  It is a bit bizarre.  The little complex that our hotel is in is surrounded by a mall with high end store like Louis Vuitton and modern offices that house companies like 3M.  As you walk out of this complex, you are immediately enveloped into the 'normal' way of living.  Sidewalks are narrow, traffic is crazy and it is very very dusty.

A great tip that was given to us which is completely true.  Cars have the right of way, they will not stop for you as a pedestrian.  So to cross a street, you have to wait for your chance and then go for it.  Might take a while to get used to this.  There are food stands all over the place.  This guy is selling coconuts.  Stray dogs are the norm here and can be found resting in any shade they can find.  I am not sure what they call the last picture - haven't learned yet if these are for Hindi's or for Muslims. You can see them scattered around on the side of the roads as places of prayer.

Back to the hotel to hang for awhile around the pool.

Arriving in Bangalore

So here we are.  We survived the 19 hour flight from Toronto and have landed in Bangalore.  From reading other blogs etc. I was expecting to be a little overwhelmed when we got through customs and outside, but it was relatively calm - being that it was 4 am in the morning might be the reason?  There were probably 50 drivers waiting with signs and once we saw our guy holding the sign with my husband's name on it, we flagged him down.  He grabbed a couple of our bags and ran in front of us to the car waiting to take us to the hotel.  We were expecting to be instantly immersed in a 'smell', again info from all the research we had done but there was none.  

Being that it is 4 am in the morning, we were surprised at the volume of traffic from the airport into downtown.  Unfortunately, it is still dark out so we don't see very much other than the cars around us.  There is no such thing as designated lanes as far as we can see.  Cars just drive into any space that is available.  Any tiny spot that can be filled with a vehicle is and then they all move forward together while honking. There was only one close call with our driver almost smashing into the rear end of a mini truck who abruptly slowed down.  I think that we will make sure that we buckle in every time we are in a car.:)  Arrival at the hotel is a happy moment, my husband is already relieved that he will never have to attempt to drive to work every day (as we have a driver). 

We have our first dilemma already - who do we tip and how much?  Decided to tip the driver and bellman who brought our bags to the room.  Did not tip the security guard who kinda helped us with our bags out of the elevator.  In hindsight, I think he was looking for one as he hung around while we checked in.

Anyway, we made it to our room and we needed some sleep desperately so we crashed for a few hours!