Mysore and 1,000 Year Old Temples

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The final leg of our trip was in the state of Karnatika. As in most Indian states, they spoke a different language, Kannada (pronounced like the country "Canada" with an Indian accent). This was by far my favorite part of the trip, with its grand palaces and ruins, traditional countryside, and progressive, modern capital of Bangalore. Indian history is often divided into the history of the north and the history of the south, as these two areas were often ruled by different cultures and/or kingdoms. So it was great to experience great Hindu architecture and explore the old Hindu kingdoms of the south. Even I was shocked to see some places that I thought were now destroyed and only still existed in stories.

Our flight into Bangalore, Karnatika from Trivandrum was 3-4 hours late which cut our time short in Mysore, but luckily we made it to the town in time to check out the magnificent palace. We killed some time at the airport talking to some Christian Missionaries from Colorado mom recognized from the hotel, who were interesting (except they had been in India for weeks now, and literally knew nothing about Hinduism. You would think one would at least read up on the local religion before attempting to change the people, especially a religion thousands upon thousands of years old. But it ended up being an interesting conversation and exchange of information).

Our new driver for Karnatika was awesome, and sped the whole way to make sure we got to see the palace. The Mysore palace is where the Maharajas of the Kingdom of Mysore ruled (a blood line that is still intact today). The main palace, after being destroyed and rebuilt throughout history, now stands at over a hundred years old and is the most luxurious building I have ever seen, easily rivaling the palaces of Europe. You can't take pictures of the inside, but every inch is covered in intricate carvings, paintings, gold leaf, silver plating, and stained glass; every archway, doorway, and window is a piece of artwork and the floors are covered in a mosaic of gemstones making various patterns and images. The travel book calls the inside of the palace "gaudy", but I think one would be hard-pressed to find a palace in the world that wasn't (I think that was the point of palaces of the past). The Palace sits on acres and acres of gardens, including twelve different temples and elephant and camel stables. We missed Republic Day by just one day, otherwise we would have seen the palace by night illuminated with 97,000 lightbulbs on the outside alone. Not only is the exterior an obvious mix of ancient to modern Indian, Mughal, and Western (mainly Roman) architecture, the inside too is a blend of all different places and styles. My favorite part was the gateway to all religions, that had a Mughal (Muslim) style arch that lead to Catholic style doors, topped with Jain and Budhist overhangs, that opened into a small Mandir for a Krishna Murti. The entrance fee to see the palace?... 5 rupees (thats about ten cents in the US$). Mysore is also known for its authentic Sandalwood factories (making sculptures, incense, and oils) and its silks...which meant more shopping. Luckily we had gotten in town late, so there wasn't too much time to sit in the silk shops. In the morning we headed up to Chamundi Hill and its temple that overlooked all of Mysore. It was 4:30 in the morning though, so all you could see were the city lights, but plenty of monkeys were already awake hanging around the temple.

We left so early because we had a full day of driving through the rural Karnatic countryside on pothole ridden "roads" and gravel paths to the ruins of Hampi. The Karnatic countryside is picturesque though, with traditional farming communities, huge Banyan trees, wandering nomads with huge herds of goats, cattle driven carts, and bouldering hills (sometimes topped with modern windmills). On the way we stopped at two temples of the Hoysala Empire, one built in about 1100 AD (Channekeshava Temple in Belur) and the other finished in 1200 AD (Hoysaleswara Temple in Halebid). The "dark ages" of Medevial times is truly an era to describe the West, because in the East, this was an incredibly prosperous era.

The detail of the temples is amazing. Every pillar is unique and different, the exterior of the building is covered in intricate carvings and statues (each unique) that depict various stories and deities of Hindu tradition. What you see now is just the skeleton of what what the temples used to be, for they were once painted with great detail to bring the carvings to life, fine silks were draped all over, and precious metal statues guarded every doorway. After a thousand years, some parts have been plundered, the paint is gone, and many statues have been taken, but to walk around and through the temples is no less awe-inspiring. The temples were surrounded with larger statues and mini-temples (one was a large face, and I could not help but think it was going to come to life and say "Welcome to the Legends of the Hidden Temple", I wish it would have). The guide showed us one carving of a Western dressed figure, claiming "they copied us", another carving of what really looked like missiles, and yet another that had people with helmets that looked like astronauts (all of this made 1,000 year ago). It has long been known the interesting references in some of the scriptures and ancient stories (which I am assuming these sculptures are depicting) of incredible weaponry, space travel, and more. I think it is probably mis-communicated due to thousands of years of oral traditions, some things lost in translation, and the still current disparity in all cultures between poetic and literary expression and literal truth. Either way, it was interesting to see and would probably make a great History Channel conspiracy/prophecy documentary (there are similar "out-of-place" images in some Egyptian hieroglyphics). All these are pictured at the bottom. The temples were great pit-stops on the loooooong drive to Hampi, but I would have sat in a car for a week to see the old ruins of Vijanayger, and the views on the drive there weren't so bad either. Next, we go to Hampi.

Kerala Coast

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Kerala, or "God's Own Country" was mythically formed out of the sea when Parshuram, a reincarnation of Vishnu, threw his axe into the ocean. New genetic evidence reveals that the the first humans to migrate out of Africa settled here possibly 80,000 years ago when the shorelines of the world were far different then they are now. The first human ritual (a mantra perceeding teh Dravidians or Aryans), is still performed once every 12 years; western anthropologists theorize this mantra, consisting of pure sound with no inherent meaning, is older than language itself, man's first form of music. You can see the layers of history in this place that later became a major ancient trading post connecting Greece and China, a welcome place for refugees, the land of great Hindu Emperors, and areas that stayed pretty much independent of all foreign conquers until India's independence. It was the first democratically elected communist government in the world (the communist party still holds the majority). Interestingly, on the verge of Indian Independence, it had some of the worst poverty and health issues, and is now one of the most well off states with the highest literacy rate in the country (90 somethin percent). Britain's Michael Wood calls Kerala "nothing less than the laboratory of the human race".

The coast is very unique, not only lined with beaches, but has an area known as the "backwaters", an inland area of lagoons, canals, and lakes. We stayed one night on a houseboat (a floating one bedroom resort), that had a "captain", a crew, and a chef (there was more of them then there were of us, it was only me and mom). We floated down canals lined with bungalows, huts, rice patties, and huge coconut groves. Again, I would love to show pictures of a very unique place that most people don't even know exists, but they are gone except a few. It was very peaceful bar the occasional water bus that was blaring South Indian music. It was also interesting to see how people lived in 10 feet of reclaimed land in between two canals or a lagoon. We spent the next night in a resort on an island in Allepey, "India's Venice", as it is called. It is completely different then Venice, but the town is connected through canals and such. We had dinner in the hotel restaurant which was pretty fancy (or tried to be) but oddly played songs like "You and me baby aint nothing but mammals..." and "Johnny doesn't know", which was really awkward.

We took a day trip to the port town of Cochin, the best town to see the layers of history first hand. Chinese fishing nets from ancient times still line the coast right outside the colonial Portuguese fort and boardwalk/fish market. Vasco de Gama's original place of burial is down the street from St. Thomas's church and "Jewtown". Christians (lead by St. Thomas) settled in the area in the first century AD and Jewish refugees fleeing persecution came around the same time. The descendants of these same Jews run the famous and colorful Jewtown Market that has all kind of handicrafts from across India. We also stopped by the Mattancherry Palace that has some intricate Medieval-aged Hindu murals on the wall, some of the only ones left of their kind in India (the place was filled with young school children who seemed bored with the palace and insistently wanted to give high fives). We ended the day in "New Town", which was a modern day city, so mom could look for silk saris (without a book and the free drinks they serve you, I would not have survived the shopping).

In the Capital of Kerala, Trivandrum, we got to experience the Sri Padmanbhaswamy Temple (some parts of the temple are said to be at least 2,000 years old). It was open to practicing Hindus only, so we had to rent some lungis, pretty much a sheet to wrap around your waist, and men had to go shirtless. We stood in a long line (yes, a REAL line, that worked!!) that weaved around carved stone columns and murtis and through open courtyards with wandering cows.
On the way to our beach resort, we stopped at Varkalla beach, known for its red cliffs, and had lunch in an open-air place on the beach. There was a group of American students studying abroad eating with some French dudes. Sadly, there was a loud American girl that was rambling on and on to the French about how America is the greatest, and how it meant soooo much to every American that they had a Black president, and how American girls are the most adventurous and how she thinks she experienced the true, real India (as she sits at a beach resort with a table full of Americans). She was definitely "that girl" you probably want to strangle in your classes, haha.

But the beach was beautiful and our last stop was at Kovallum beach, where mom and dad went on their honeymoon thirty years ago and where the Beatles escaped to in the 70's. The beach was packed with Indians and Europeans, lined with shops, restaurants, and hotels, and clogged with huge fishing boats. Mom was kind of shocked at what it had become, saying it was a deserted, natural beach thirty years ago. It was still cool to watch the fishermen fishing the same way they have done for hundreds and hundreds of years, and the view from the lighthouse was amazing. I also still find it funny that Indian men are welcome to hit the beach in their tighty whities yet women swim around fully clothed. For the first time though, I did see Indian women in bathing suits on the beach.

The resort we stayed at was nice and we celebrated Republic Day (January 26th) with a flag ceremony in the morning. They had all the security guards dress up to try and march like military men. They were all off count, arms swinging at different times, and when they went to turn, it literally looked like the three stooges, but it was still a nice ceremony. The temple next door was also celebrating some festival, and had speakers all through the area with someone singing (or screaching) the Ramayana from like 4 in the morning until 11 at night, which was a little out of control.

I really enjoyed the history and layers of civilization of the state and the coastal area is a real natural wonder. I hope one day I can go back to Kerala, but the final destination of our trip was by far my favorite place in India so far, so stay tuned for the trip to Karnatika.

Munnar: Mile High Tea

It is especially true that you never have enough time in India, but my short trip to the south was still one I will never forget. Over the next week or so I will be writing about the trip down south (one entry cannot do the ten days justice), starting today with our first stop in Munnar.

From the mountains to the backwaters, time doesn't seem to exist in the state of Kerela. You can just sit...and stare, for hours on end and it feel like a few minutes. We left the house at 3 am and flew from Ahmedebad to Mumbai to Bangalore finally to Cochin, then drove up winding mountain roads, edged by huge cliffs with no rails, for four hours to Munnar. The first glimpses of South India were straight out the jungles in the Ramayana Comic books we had as kids. Sadly, I cannot share many of these awesome scenes with you, as my Camera Curse continues...later in the trip, all the pictures from Munnar (except one, the picture above) and one day of the backwaters were wiped clean from my memory chip and replaced by 4 question marks that said "unidentified picture" (if anyone know what this means or how it happened, please enlighten me). But since I am in the land of the Buddha, I should take a tip and let go of such material things (i'm still kinda mad...). But imagine the Appalachian mountains were as green as the Irish Isles, dotted with coconut groves, wild mountain flowers and the occasional pack of wandering mountain goats. Munnar's hillsides are covered in Tea plants, those are the bushes you see that mosaic the mountains. It is a pretty stunning place, and we got there just in time to stop off at a roadside tea shack to watch the sun set. Anish told me the tea was something else ("like crack"), and it was. That is, it was so good that it was heavily addicting , I could probably drink it by the gallon, but was limited to a little dixie cup that looked like it had been used already.

The hotel was a very nice government lodge, and I noticed that there was a fire moving down one hillside towards the town, the power was also flickering on and off (a daily occurrence I got used to). I pointed at it and asked the bell boy if someone was going to do something before their town burned down, he smiled at me nodding his head and repeating "yes...fire. yes...fire", in perfect English. It was kind of of strange, but a lot of the people in the South can speak English really well but don't understand (or pretend not to) really simple sentences. By the time I got out of the shower, the fire was gone and in the morning the whole hill was black (I asked again what happened and all I got was "yes...fire").

In the morning we went on a thirty minute "speed boat" ride on the dam-made lake. It was a clear day so the hills were especially bright green from the tea farms. We grabbed some roasted corn and some fresh carrots and then headed back to town. In the afternoon we went to the national park that had panoramic views of the mountains and tea plantations. It was also a protected area for Shail's cousin, the endangered Nilgiri Tahr, or mountain goat (lowe u shail). The bus ride up the mountain to the park was pretty intense. There was barely enough room for one bus, yet they some how thought it was a good idea to go barreling up the mountain and around180 degree turns without slowing down. About three or four times the breaks were slammed, because another bus was coming down the mountain, and then, terrifyingly, the driver would just start backing up (I don't know how much he could see) and pulling to the side which was the cliff with no rail, to let the other bus by. Mom and some other aunties at one point yelped a little "Ahhhh!" and "Oh mai gohhd!!" So I got a little laugh in while my life flashed before my eyes.

We ended the day with some fresh ghee roast Dosa and chai and went to a small local Katha Kali performance in town. Katha Kali is the traditional theatre of Kerala ("story play"). So we sat down in the plastic lawn furniture in what looked like a vinyl Lowe's garage, but it was the real deal, nothing commercial about it. It was also really funny, but again sadly, my video is gone. But at the beginning, the woman character (played by a dressed up, "healthy" sized man, a picture is below) was showing the different emotions, so there would be a thud of the drum and twang of some instrument and her/his face would change from Sonesh's Bill Cosby face, to straight rakshas, to sorrow, to fear and so on ( I could not hold it in any longer and had to put my face down to chuckle). The show was good though, and I put some pictures up from the Internet so you could see what they looked like. We saw a short skit that was kind of a battle of the genders, which ended in the woman turning into a crazy rakshas and the King (the one with the really thick white make up) killing her (I don't know exactly what it was implying).

Munnar was such an amazing place to start the trip. The quiet hills were misty in the morning, bright green during the day, and a hazy orange at sunset. Houses, temples, churches, and Mosques hung off the side of cliffs with panoramic backdrops, and tea and spice gardens covered the hills. I got my first introduction to the South, which is like a different country- different cultures, languages, and people. Enlarge the one picture I have left of Munnar and you can see the tea fields a little better. Below is a picture from the plane and a quick stop we made at the birth place of Shankracharya. Here is a decent link to pictures of Munnar.

A Family Affair

I spent the last two days visiting many different villages, towns, and cities in Gujarat to see family and to check out the places where my family (parents and grandparents) grew up. All Gujaratis know what "gham" they are from, the village of your paternal ancestry, often going back 10 generations or more. So I was really excited to see Tharapur, my village, where Panudada and Virendradada were born. This video is a series of short clips from Tharapur and Nadiad (my mom's mom, Ramaba, town). We hit the road early in the morning and drove through the Gujarati countryside and farmland. We stopped first at Nadiad which was crowded and much poorer then the big city, but had a big central temple where over a hundred young kids were peacefully meditating in a courtyard (there were a handful that were not paying attention at all, picking their noses, or harassing other kids). We went by the house my mom lived in, now fully renovated, and the neighbors ( my mom's aunts and uncles) promptly invited us in for Chai and nasto. In India, you don't call in advanced to visit, you just show up and mention your surname. We then went on to Tharapur, which was a sobering experience. The "old town" had all narrow dirt roads, was pretty dirty and very overcrowded. We winded through through the alleys until mom saw the gate to the area where the Amin house was (somehow it remained unchanged and she remembered it even though she had not been there since she first got married thirty years ago. As we approached the house, mom asked some women if they knew Panubai (my grandfather), and turns out one of his cousins still lived next door. She showed us around the old house, told us some stories about what had been going on in the village recently, and introduced us to a Baa that had lived there all her life and supposedly knew everyone (she especially remembered Kaushik Kaka, my uncle). As we picked up some fresh coconut water on our way out the village, I felt pretty overwhelmed. I thought about what my grandfather's generation had to go through to get out of this place and wondered how they did it. Next time I see Virendradada, I have lots of questions, which I'm sure he will be happy to sit down and discuss for hours on end.

We made our way to the college town areas of Vajnigar and Anand to stay at Prakash Masa and Jayshree Masi's bungalow (they come and stay 9-10 weeks out of the year). It was paradise- big bungalow with an exotic garden and a swimming pool. We had a relaxing evening and caught an early train to Baroda in the morning. It was my first time on an Indian train, and we rode second class, which was crowded and rich in "interesting" smells. In Baroda we visited all of my mom's family that was still there, including Mota Dada (my mom's oldest living uncle), who asked if Anish Could sit palate yet. They all asked how Anish was doing, reminisced of the fun the had when he came on his trip, and wondered if he was getting married anytime soon (I told them to keep an eye out, haha). The baby is my second cousin Aditi's new baby who is 6 months old and wears clothes for 12-18 months old kids. The visit with them was short, but I will be back to stay with them.

Sorry this entry was almost all "business" but I have to go pack for my ten day trip down south, and I'm about to watch Obama get sworn in!!! India is all about some Obama, its awesome. Today's paper had a cartoon with Obama dressed as Gandhi with the headline saying "Good luck Obama!", haha. All of you in South Carolina, enjoy the snow for the 3 hours it will last!

15 Tulip Bungalow & The City of Dust

A lot of my time in India will be spent in Ahmedebad, Gujarat, also known as the City of Dust, and for good reason. I'm staying at a family friend's house currently that some of you know. Rajiv Kaka and Mona Auntie are doing fine and are as caring and generous as always. The kids have grown up a lot and are in our equivalent of high school. Staying at their beautiful bungalow reminds me of how different everyday life in India is, the close family and efficient household; only what is needed is used, fresh organic food is bought, cooked, and eaten daily, 15 year old solar panels help heat your morning shower, and the lawn man cuts the grass with an old school manual mower.

There is, of course, the other side, overpopulation, littered streets, those less fortunate, and the smog. I experienced all this riding on the back of Ayush's scooter through the city. It has been 8 or 9 years since I have been here, and I hardly recognized the city with its main highways, huge shopping malls, and condos being built left and right. I was surprised to find all the newest style clothes in the mall, and shocked to find T-shirts that read "Textually Active ;)" and "F.B.I.- Female Body Inspector", if you have seen these shirts in America, or don't think its funny, say them aloud in an Indian accent. With all the changes though, there was still the infamous dust, the occasional camel trotting down the main highway, and the feeling that a car, rickshaw, scooter, or bike was going to slam into you every time you headed around a roundabout. In the words of Mona Auntie "if you can drive here, you can drive anywhere."

The first day I arrived was the day after Uttarayan, a huge kite festival ushering in spring where literally every rooftop teems with people, from children to grandparents, flying kites and tryin to maneuver them to cut other peoples' kite strings. 3 hours after I came home from the airport, I went with Ayush's friends to celebrate the festival in an area where a lot of the buildings reminded me of the outside of the Towers (my freshmen dorms): discolored, stained concrete. The inside, however, was a fully contemporary condo with all the modern amenities. His friend's condo was in the middle of hundreds of full rooftops of kite flyers (the picture at the bottom is before the rooftops were full and my camera battery died). It was real wild. Music blaring from all directions, people dancing, and every so often the happy scream of "Lupetttttt!!!" when someone cut someone else's kite down. At first I thought I was just jet lagged and hearing things, but no, there was the faint sound of Maroon 5 coming from one rooftop and Ne-yo from another, and, rest assured Katie Bauld, the backstreet boys are still very popular among 15-18 year old boys here, even on religious holidays. I couldn't imagine what the day before (the actually date of the festival) must have been like. It was my first real Indian festival, not some knock-off in a high school gym or an intramural field. I now know what kids from India mean when they are in America and say "you have no idea." Not bad for the first few hours in India.

Hello from the Motherland!

HALLO!! I am finally in India and decided a good way to keep in touch with everyone and document my trip would be to start a blog (thanks Alkesh Kaka for the idea). I don't know when and where I will have internet access but I'm going to try my best to keep things updated. I will be in India until April 30th, visiting family and friends, volunteering with Indicorps (www.Indicorps.org), and traveling all over. My mom will be with me for the first three weeks. Then from April 30th to June 9th I will be in Europe with family and to travel. Make sure you holler if you are going to be in Europe at the same time. I have been looking forward to this trip for a long time, but will miss everyone back home greatly. Hopefully this blog will help me keep connected back home and will make my trip better!

So first things first, I have to talk a little bit about my interesting flight over here. I flew from London to Mumbai to Ahmedabad via Air India. Air India is exactly what it sounds like India...on a plane. I'm pretty used to the Indian way, but it was down right hilarious on a plane (the following is in no way complaining). As soon as I walked on, there was one auntie screaming to one of her friends that she had saved perfect seats (the air hostess kept trying to explain to her that there were assigned seats on everyone's ticket) and the smell of nasto was already everywhere. By true Indian Standard Time (IST) we left two hours late because the power kept turning on and off in the plane, to which yells of how to fix it were heard from many passengers. There were about 5 brave white people total on the plane whose faces throughout the flight were priceless. We each had our own individual T.V. screens for movies and such, and they were probably some of the first touch screens ever made. So the Kaka (older indian man) behind me was jamming his screen, AKA my seat, with his thumb for about 30 minutes trying to get some 1960's Amitab Bachan movie to play while his wife poked me through the crack of the seats, telling me to put my seat up so he could watch the movie. Between jerking back and forth while he tried to figure out the touch screen and mom's face of disgust, I could not stop hysterically laughing. As soon as the plane's tires hit the runway, people started getting up and getting bags from the overhead compartment while the air hostess' yells to remain seated with seatbelts fastened were met with blank stares. I was just waiting for a bag to come flying out and hit someone in the face...oh and it did, and it was wonderful. Once we landed in Mumbai, we didn't get off the plane, but kind of put our feet up on the seat while the cleaning crew came in and got the plane ready to fly to Ahmedebad. The flickering power costed us another hour, but finally at 4 a.m. 14 hours after boarding the plane in London, we were standing in the customs line.

The zig zagged or 'jig-jagged' line turned into, of course, a mass of people pushing and shoving their way to the front. Finally someone figured out you could unhook the belts that made the lanes for the lines, and before I knew it the line turned into a mob that just pushed its way to the 6 customs officials. The cops came, yelling at everyone, saying we were uncivilized, to which the crowd yelled back that there was "no system", and that if the security people had had a system this would not have happened (I thought the system was the line). I sat in the mob, half delirious, unable to move, sandwiched between the ladies in full burqas from the Air Iran flight and some Guju kakas behind me who kept on giving me advice on the best way to get in front of everyone else. Then I saw the poor 20 something white kid yelling, "I need some water!!!" When we got to the customs desk, the guy said that the picture in my passport was not me, because I looked older in the picture then I did in real life (I guess the guy in the picture ate all my food). I got all our bags from the zoo that was the baggage claim and me and mom hurried outside to meet our family friend who was picking us up. I stepped outside the airport, took a deep breath of dusty, kinda funky Indian air, and could not have been happier. I had finally arrived in India.