Well started a little early, but here is picture of the pumpkins Taylor and I worked on this weekend.

So it’s been awhile since I’ve posted anything; and trust me there’s plenty to tell you about. Since some of it happened over a week ago and I’ve inhaled enough carbon monoxide to kill an elephant (today alone), I’ll try to recount it all.

It was two weekends ago when another ‘Gore’ (white person) showed up. Yes, here was another lost soul right off the plane. Good thing we have good team members, because though the administrative staff here has been nice, helpful isn’t the first word that comes to mind. Well since Bret was new in town and I had gotten so much help I found it fun to try to share some of that experience with him. So we planned an action packed weekend that would take us through Bangalore and out to some sites in the direction of Mysore.

Well, in Bangalore I was told I had to go see one of the biggest temples here, Iskon. Well yes it is a big temple, and full of the history on the Hare Krishna Movement, but what a tourist trap. I’d show you pictures of the inside but they aren’t allowed. Well after seeing a fairly modern temple and being prayed for, and I’m sure I need it ;-), we were routed to the first stop in the temple where we were asked to sponsor a child. After that we were corralled through some more winding lines to use our book coupon to get some books; what they don’t tell you is the coupon only gives you a discount off the books it doesn’t allow you to get a book a book for free. And on from there we routed to a counter where we could buy food, and then to one where we could buy book stands (for our new books), and then to a place where we could buy jewelry, and then to a place where we could buy statues, and then…. (I think you get the point, hence it was a tourist trap).

Well not to be discouraged, we went on, I took Bret to see Bangalore Palace, I’ve talked about this before so I won’t take you through it again. Just one comment though, for a place they call a palace it’s a shame to see the condition it is in. So after the Palace we got some lunch…. like me at first, Bret wasn’t that hungry (2 weeks later and I think he’s still struggling with the diet). After lunch we went to see Tipu’s Palace. Once again not much of a palace these days and probably modest in its own time, but it is a wooden palace (something I have not seen here besides this one).

On exiting the palace and heading back to the car I ran into some bizarre ritual. Hopefully I caught it… I’ve posted it on Youtube so everyone can see… yeah some bizarre things come out of nowhere here.

After this we rounded off our day with a trip to Lalabrah Gardens. I’ve shown you this as well, but just thought I’d tell you where I went. The good news was the next day we had a little bit more of a trip planned... another KSTDC trip that would take us to seen a Bird Sanctuary, a Kesava Temple, and Cauvery Falls. Well I did get a picture of a bird and a bat, and a butterfly, but outside of that I don’t really have anything to share with you from Ranganathittu (I believe this means bird sanctuary). I actually saw more exotic birds site seeing around this country then I did at the sanctuary.

The next stop was Somanathapur, yes I told you about this place as well, but can I just dwell for a moment on how incredible this temple of more then 800 years in age is. If only the road to this place could hold up like this temple of carved soap stone has. Yes as you might recall, this is the road where we got our first flat tire on my other trip.

After the temple we were off to lunch, I did my best to recommend food for Bret. I enjoyed everything I selected, but Bret played it safe and stuck to the rice. I’ve tried more foods then I can name and most of them have a name that sounds like I said it with my mouth full of the food (at least when I try to pronounce them). So after lunch we were on our way to a beautiful waterfall.

It’s amazing, here 5 rivers come together to create this falls. I was told just a week ago the water was rushing so fiercely that you could not see the rocks. The funniest thing I saw at this place was the warning signs. Yes India loves to put up creative signs… Along the roads you see signs like “Speed Thrills but Kills”, well here they had some others; have a look for yourself.

Well, even though you may see the post before this one, I’ll end this one here and do a new one to tell you about the T20 Tournament (Cricket) and our time in Delhi.

Well this past weekend in India went by fast. Well Saturday couldn’t come any faster since I worked until just about midnight on Friday. Yeah it may be a blessing it may be a curse, but the time difference is getting a lot of work hours out of me.

Despite having a 5:45 wake-up, I felt ready to go when I woke up. Little did I know despite how ready I was, my driver well he wasn’t so ready. I don’t what it is with the cab drivers here in Bangalore, but the only place they know how to get to is entrance/exit of the place you are currently at (yeah not very helpful). If I was on the meter I guess I would really be paying through the nose, fortunately this was a flat fee, just as long as he could get there. Well long and the short of it, after several U turns and asking directions from ½ a dozen people we finally made it to the departure point for my tour. I was off on a Karnataka State run tour (KSTDC) with myself as company.

I’m sure when I got on the bus everyone was finally relieved, relieved that we could finally get going not that I made it safely I’m sure. Yes I was the last one on, but from my perspective I didn’t really have to wait… just worry I was going to miss it. With a long bus ride ahead to see Belur, Halebid, and Shravanabelagola, I decided to get some sleep.

In Shravanabelagola, there is a temple and statue nearly 1000 years old. The statue of Gomatheswara dates from 978-993 AD. It is the world’s largest monolithic stone statue…. of a naked Buddha. All the temples made on the top of this hill side are made of granite. The temples included the naked man himself are over 680 steps up to get to where they are built. You have to marvel at the amazing feat of determination, engineering, and craftsmanship that went into this. Here’s some of amazing pictures I took while I was here.

As if all this wasn’t enough to make the whole trip worth it I was going to see more places. Of course before that could happen, I had to work my way through everyone trying to sell me something. Little hand stone carvings, postcards, pictures, bronze statues; you name it someone is trying to sell it. I kind of got the reputation as the ‘deal maker’ on the trip. Heck the postcards started out at RS 100 ($2.50), by the time I was done I got them for RS 10 (25 cents). Honestly I would have paid the RS 100, but the fun of it was to bargain. Ravi and Vighnesh gave me 2 rules…. There’s nothing I can buy on the trip worth more then RS 200 and don’t tip more then RS 30…. I say I succeeded!

In between here and the next stop we got a chance to eat lunch. Now the place we stopped for breakfast seemed lacking in hygiene, so thank goodness I brought a few snacks. Lunch on the other hand was at a plain but respectable looking place. So without hesitation I looked over the menu. Thanks to all the help I had in the weeks leading up to this trip I was well equipped to order food on my own, and since I had tagged along with a few Americans I met on the trip I was sure to show off…. Ok so I knew to order a rice dish with what I ordered, besides the naan I needed something to soak up that butter chicken gravy.

Well after this I was off to Belur, here there was many more amazingly carved stone temples. The big attraction is is the Chennakesava temple complex; the main temple took about 121 years (3 generations) to create. The guides on this trip were very knowledgeable; they were full of many anecdotes about the carvings on the temple. How the sculptures of the queen dancing show her beauty and skill as show by how many ways she could turn her body at the same time. Some were about the sculptures of the queen looking at herself in the mirror as she admired herself so much (yeah even back then women still gazed into the mirror forever). The final stop was Halebid, this was really a lot more of the same thing. I actually slipped away from the group and wondered around the grounds. I met an Indian family that was out site seeing and had a nice conversation with them. It was nice to be on this trip and not have someone running up to me to sell me something; instead they just had questions about the United States. They enjoyed telling about the places they knew there and where they had family that was there. Well here’s some pictures, the grounds here are very nice though some of the carvings are a little more in disrepair then I saw at the other locations.

Well the week ahead includes the fun of training and making myself available to my peers State side. The big NETWORX migration is supposed to happen this weekend; here’s looking forward to it! In the mean time I guess I can go watch some more cricket as well.... yeah people here are fanatics about the sport so it's hard not to get involved!

Well this weekend started off a little slow; I worked on Saturday, watched a few movies, and did some grocery shopping. Yeah I know what excitement. Well amidst all this excitement I tried another new dish (ok, ok, whatever I eat here is a new dish for me), I tried Butter Masala Dosa. It kind of looks like a giant rolled up pancake but it’s got some potato and salsa like center rolled inside. You can dip it all kinds of stuff and I have to say it’s really good.

After that great excitement it was time for some rest though because on Sunday I was off to Mysore. Our first stop was Kesava Temple in Somnathpur. Now before I amaze you with the incredible beauty of this place I have to relay a little story to you. Well this place is off the beaten path, and our driver though he knew the direction to Mysore had no clue how to get to the temple. So as we are driving along and stopping every few minutes to get directions (which no one else seem to know either), we got a flat tire. Yeah the roads out there made the moon seem like a glassy lake on a misty morning. So quickly we changed the tire and continued on.

When we got to the grounds where the temple was, you could start to see the top of what was going to be a site to always remember.

Well the site is just a recently recognized tourist exhibit, so the government just began taking care of the grounds. That said, what lies behind the entrance to this temple was spectacular. Now this place is all carved from stone. The intricate carvings and statues depict the many forms of a single god in each of the god’s lives.

Yeah this place is so impressive, I could talk about it all day, seeing this was worth the entire trip but yet there was more to see. Well back to that tire story again; so when we left here, we decided since we had no other spares, and considering some of the road conditions we had better go get the tire plugged. So we found a place and after an hour we were finally on the road again.

So we set out to see Srirangapatna, this is another city just outside Mysore where the king would spend his winters. Here there were many attractions. Here’s a map that shows the where they are all at. We didn’t hit them all, but here are a few pictures of some of them.

Gumbaz

King Tipu’s Death

Dariya Daulat Bagh

Jamia Masjid

Yeah, even after seeing this there was more to see. There was so much as a matter of fact we didn’t even bother stopping for lunch. We instead made our way to another place whose name I just can’t pronounce, but if I say it fast enough you might think I said it right. The name of this hill is Sri Chamundeshwari Hill and it’s one of the 8 holiest hills in India (no I don’t know any of the others but this was the label on one of the signs). Here there was another temple to marvel at and an incredible stone statue called Nandi that is carved from a single stone.

Our final stop was to Mysore Palace. This place is phenomenal. The cost to build this in 1903 was 14.5 Million Rupees. Well from top to bottom this place is done up with no expense spared. Being treated as a holy temple, pictures of the inside are not allowed. They have 16 foot doors made up of silver, ceilings painted with pure gold, statues made of precious metals, ivory, crystal, and anything else you can imagine. Today the cost of a single door is estimated at 14.5 Million Rupees.

Well for the most part this was my trip to Mysore. After stopping for some dinner and shopping, we headed back to Bangalore. Remember that flat I mentioned earlier, well thank goodness we got the tire plugged. Coming up on about one in the morning I was dozing off on the ride back. I’m suddenly awoken by a loud bang and being thrown up into the ceiling; out of nowhere we find a speed bump in the middle of the highway (I guess they put them there just for fun). Needless to say this led to a flat tire. Well we changed that and finally got back to Bangalore. I was pretty tiered the next day, but the trip was well worth it. Hope you enjoyed my journey, talk to you all again soon.

Hey everyone how are you doing? I hope as good as I am :-D Yes, I'm doing well. Though life in Bangalore is different then back home it is a great experience. This city is filled with some amazing contrasts, next to the brand new buildings there are what they call micro-slums. I was surprised to learn that these weren't even slums, but rather temporary living spaces for construction workers. The buildings here are going up so fast, it's incredible to see all the companies here. The Bangalore skyline is filled with all the companies that bring technology and content to the world.


Here's a picture of AOL. They are in the middle of ECO Park. You should see the grounds inside these, they look nice from the outside. You'll also find a campus for Intel, Cisco, CAP Gemini, and Accenture behind these gates.

Well I know this isn't the most exciting post; this weekend there will be some more site seeing. For now my week has been full of work and food (I'm getting plenty to eat and I'm enjoying the spice). Well in the mean time here's some pictures of my apartment; I'll post some more on my visit soon.

My Apartment in India

Here's a shot of Bangalore palace. It must have been a magnificent site in its day. Today it's highly deteriorated and under renovation. I tried to merge a couple of photos together to get the full picture of this.



Thanks to Ravi, I had a great time seeing the sites. You can see a picture of him along with a bunch more pictures of the many things inside the palace.



One of our first Stops on the trip was to see some of the state buildings. Though we weren't allowed inside, here is where the State of Kanataka conducts much of it's business. Here you can see the State Assembly known as Vidhan Soudha and the State High Court.

Oh you want to see how traffic operates in Bangalore... here's a view:

Well here's a picture of the hall of the hotel I'm staying at. I swear the rug is some foreign 50's throw back. I have a suspicion that it might be one of the main reasons there is a constant musty odor when you come down the hall. No need to fear though, this is my last night here at the hotel... tomorrow afternoon I'm moving into a flat that is much more accommodating.

Though the hall is kind of nasty, the room itself isn't bad at all. Don't open up the curtains though or you might have to decide if you like the view out there or the view of the hall better.

Despite the fact I'm going to move out of this end of town, I decided to venture out out tonight. I've had good Indian food all week, so tonight I decided to go with Chinese food. I stumbled across a restaurant review and even though it only had an average rating, I decided to try it any way. The critic indicated with appetizers, drinks and dinner you could get a meal for two for about 900 Rs ($22). So needless to say I thought for one it might cost me 500 Rs, ended up costing me 800 Rs ($20). Well it may have been pricy, but I had a great meal, great service, and even a nice glass of wine. The staff was almost all Chinese; my waiter stop to talk to me for a bit and asked me a curious question.... He asked do you like it better here with the Chinese or with the Indians. I politely gave a non-committal answer but did indicate that I really liked the fact that when I came in the restaurant I had stepped away from the noise and smells of the Bangalore streets below (the autorickshaws really need to be destroyed... 2 stroke engine pollution is nauseating).

Now I had a very nice driver to take me to the restaurant and to return later to pick me up... but I'm confident he ripped me off. Dinner with tip cost me 800 Rs, the round-trip cost me 600 Rs ($10.50), more then 1/2 of what dinner cost me. I started to argue but just didn't have the energy for it.

Now I'm sure most of you don't care about my bathroom, but I've found some humor to share with you there too. Almost all the porcelain is branded as Hindiware, including the toilet (HIND), but the urinals I've seen are branded Larryware. I don't know if that strikes you as funny but as soon as I saw that I had to chuckle (yeah call me immature if you want).

Well I have an early wake-up tomorrow. Off to see a cricket match (well it's just a practice but cool to see the Indian team that just beat England). When I get back I'm moving to the flat. I'll takes some pictures of both the match and flat and tell you all about them then. Talk to you soon.....