Mysore - Oct 3, 2009

Which country Saaaaar?
If I have to hear this sentence one more time, I’ll go mad, well, incidentally by the end of the trip I had reached insanity then.
The moronic family I had the pleasure of traveling in the night with, could not really fathom the weather. The rains had made the Celsius drop a lot, and they clicked on all the fans and covered themselves up with thick blankets! When I coudn’t bear it any more I dangled myself from the top berth and clicked off the fans, so there. I’m a very adjusting person, not very good at confrontations, so I did this deed in the stealth of the night when I was sure that everyone was fast asleep. As I was hanging almost half of my body down to reach the buttons to the fans, the father coughed, and the mother adjusted the blanket slightly; I froze in that precarious position. Okay, it wasn’t exactly Tom Cruise in MI, but it was a moving train, so it was a dangerous assignment!! I made sure that noone was looking, and then flicked the switches and in another second was lying back on my berth. I had expected to play on confusion, there were 5 of them, all asleep, and I was on the top berth, quite far from the switches, so the finger of blame could hardly be pointed at me, SUCCESS!

Had taken the night Hampi express, which tossed me at Bangalore at 6 in the morning, I had been warned it’s a bit chilly in the morning, no kidding it was. My connect to Mysore started promptly at 7, and the sleeper section quickly became almost like an unreserved one, with people piling in. I took my seat opposite a chap called Babu R, working with Seagate in B’lore. He was heading to Srirangapatnam to visit the Ranganathaswamy temple. He had been to Minneapolis and we traded stories of how cold US could be (funny how climate conditions always pops up into conversation everywhere). A nice, religious fellow who had been to both Rameshwaram and Tirupati. Babu told me that most people came in unreserved in the morning. We were criss-crossing between populated towns and field with standing water in them, but the bright sunshine did cheer me up after the last 4 days of rain.

Reached Mysore at 10 am, the air surprisingly mild, neither warm nor cold. Got sweet talked by an auto chap into lodging up at this hotel called Jayanag after I had researched to go to either Dasaprakash or Calinga. For 390 a night, you get a double room, with tv, and attached bath, no AC. I was .5 km from the KSRTC bus stand and was pleasantly surprised to notice I was bang in the middle of the road which had the Palace on one side (about a km) and St. Philomina’s church on the other (just over a km towards the other side). Took a bath, ate a masala dosa (!!), and changed into my shorts ready for exploring. Felt a bit weird to come back into the bustling city life after the quietness of Hampi, with the street hawkers on the roads selling their wares (keychains, memorabilia in shape of deities, combs, wallets, undergarments!)to the ATMs , the corner grocery shop and the traffic!

I always take a long walk whenever I reach some new place to take in the surroundings, get the street names, and other landmarks I can see. The place was full of silk and jewellery shops (the road my hotel was on had almost every shop selling jewellery, almost every!). Even at 12 noon the streets were filled with people, ended up at the wrong gate (apparently entry to the palace is open through only 1 gate of the 4) and walked around 3 gates before reaching the 4th and last one (phew, sunscreen my new love). You can take a tanga ride around the palace circle for 20 bucks a person which is a nice experience. I passed the big clock tower, city bus stand, and Corporation building before I joined the queue to get in. 10 minutes in the sun and 20 Rs later I was in. you have to remove footwear to enter the main building and the buggers don’t even allow photography! You deposit your camera inside the main gate to the right for 5bucks. A shame, there were so many beautiful snaps I could’ve taken out. There are free audio sets in English and other languages that you can pick up from the palace entrance that serve as a guide inside the palace, would be wise to try these. I passed and joined the horde into the palace. The first passageway is adorned with a few paintings as you pass into the ‘marriage chamber’ through a path circling ‘kusti akhada’. The paintings put on the wall in this room are beautiful, depicting royal processions, full with the elephants, horses, camels, townfolk, the royalty, palaces etc. In the middle of this room is an area about 15 feet in radius maybe, surrounded by bronze pillars going up to about 2-3 stories culminating in a dome. Look up here to admire the beautiful work on the tinted glasses, peacock motifs and all. As the circular route continues, you can see beautiful bronze and silver work (small stools, boxes, small statues with various designs) and paintings of royalties in another room.

Passing on you come to a room with silver bordered big glasses and thrones, be sure to look at the ceiling and doors to look at the intricate designs.
Still circling the akhada you come to the other side where a big gold palki is there which is now sometimes used in religious ceremonies (how I wished I could click snaps here). A couple of cannons are still standing right outside this passage. Onto the first floor now as you come to beautiful paintings and statues of various Indian deities in a big chamber overlooking the open grounds in front of the palace. Spent a lot of time looking at each of these, as you come to area where the royal dignitaries and other members and guests used to sit and observe the parade from. The view from here is surely princely, the huge ceiling extending onto the front has amazing paintings, absolutely beautiful, gods, sun signs, temples, everything mixed with the curving designs. Still on the first floor you pass through the big Throne chamber where the king used to sit, the throne a dazzling gold, and high enough that on the side there are a few steps to get to the cushion to sit on (the king was literally above everyone else). The doors to this room have beautiful white design on brown base (or was it black?) covered with glass. Passing out you get to see the big full silver doors in a small room. Outside the palace museum there are a couple of temples, did visit one, but nothing of note that interested me there. There is also an elephant and camel ride if you care to take one. I collected my camera and proceeded to take snaps of the only things I could, the Palace outside compound.

Came back for a snack to the hotel and rest a bit and headed out to St. Philomena’s church, the tall peaks of which I could see from my hotel roof. It was pleasant to see big, functioning church, temple and mosque within a km of each other in this area. At 6 in the evening the church looked nice in the evening sky, with tinted glasses and the brownish grey walls provided good photo ops (no photography inside the church, i shamefully did click a couple). I sat in the church for half an hour just looking at the statue in front after which I headed fort to the basement where there is another statue, (don’t ask me which) and a donation box with a tube extending down. There’s an area for lighting candles; the caretaker asked if I wanted one, I shook my head, feeling guilty at following a religious process when I don’t believe in it. The walls here are set with big 2 feet by 1 feet black stones on which the names of big donators is etched. Passed through a 50 metre tunneled passage with the numerous names on the black walls, the light at the end coming from the opening above gave a surreal feeling. I’m not a religious fellow, but strangely, walking through that dark path, all alone at that time, surrounded by so many names which I felt with my fingers along the way, into the light; well you had to be there to experience it yourself.
Returned back to the hotel, good thing that most people here understand Hindi, which is quite convenient for me. I headed out for the third time in the day towards the palace. I stood in awe of the illumination that adorned the palace outline in the night, even the Chamundi hill in the distance looked beautiful, with its dark mass bordered with small lights.

Day 1 fruitful enough, time to rest, and, oh yes fried rice (don’t even think of trying chapattis).