Friday afternoon, after hassling for a few hours to get everything done, from finishing up the Diwali projects with my 4th graders, to making sure my ipod was charged for the next kid to borrow it for the weekend, we finally headed towards the Bangalore bus stop to catch a bus to Mysore. The group this time: Elsa the girl from Malaga, DJ, my new great friend, 40 years old, New York theater director/writer/dancer, gay, an amazing soul...and I. Not kidding, this was the least planned trip I have ever set out for in my entire life...not a good thing to do in India of all places but then again it is actually difficult to plan in advance here with the many layers of fraudulence and nonsense one has to get through almost always over rupees... but the weekend turned out to be safe and really wonderful.
We arrived at the bus station and asked where we could catch the bus to Mysore; buses towards this city run frequently, every 20 minutes. We grabbed a quick bite to eat and then a short lived but annoying nightmare began. We started to look for bus # 18, when it started pouring rain like I have not seen before here in India and there were people practically caring each other and pushing left and right with barely any room to move. We finally found the bus scheduled to leave at 8:40 pm, we were soaked wet off course and there was commotion going on about how there were five buses heading back from Mysore but they were stuck in a traffic jam so the wait would be anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour and a half (very typical in India). This explanation took about 40 minutes to obtain since no one, not even the creepy, mean men in the kaki uniforms pretending to know everything, knew what exactly was going on, and still no bus. By that time, I was about to cry as my feet squished out water from my closed toe shoes at my every step and I held on to my bags in complete paranoia, knowing my baby AKA my laptop, was in my backpack. I finally screamed out: "NO more, lets get a cheap hotel and head to Mysore tomorrow". We did and as we stepped into the budget hotel I breathed in deeply and said "Oh thank you Jesus"...yes, out load.
The next morning we ended up taking the train instead which took the same amount of time as the bus would have but it is much more comfortable and this already taking into consideration the crazy experience I had riding the train to Hampi. Nonetheless, Mysore is only two and half hours away and it ended up being very simple and quite enjoyable. We arrived in Mysore with a perfect amount of time to see the main sights of the city and enjoy a stroll around the palace area before heading back to the hotel. We first went up to Chamundi Hill on which they say resides the presiding deity of Mysore and its royal family, Goddess Chamundeshwari. There is yet another beautiful temple to see there dating back to the year 1128 A.D.; this temple is much more taken care of and cleaner than others I've seen. The view from the hill was beautiful; you could see the large Mysore palace, which is the main palace and here and there, a few of the 29 other palaces that were built in this city for the Maharaja's family.
Then our rickshaw driver took us to a typical Mysore Herbal and Oil shop. Mysore is known as the sandalwood city, since it is a large producer of sandalwood. They use almost every part of the Sandalwood tree including the oil that they extract from the inner, soft part of the stem. The oil shop was amazing; they had all sorts of oils that smelled so pure and wonderful. My personal favorite, Subba oil from the flower of the same name; off course it has a hint of vanilla in it =). It was great to learn about the Indian oils that they use for aromatherapy, reflexology, meditation and body massages all very popular here in India.
We then visited the Mysore palace, which I am not kidding, stands next to Versailles not in size but indeed in grandeur. The imposing facade has seven beautiful arches and the palace is built around an open courtyard. It has the most amazing "marriage hall" which I would refer to more as like a ballroom. I definitely busted out my ballroom skills with my new friend DJ =). The octagonal, painted pavilion has a colorful stained glass ceiling and the predominant theme in the glass as well as in the mosaic floor is the peacock.
Another notable sight in the palace is the golden throne, which consists of a main seat, a staircase and an umbrella, all golden. It has a Sanskrit inscription that reads: "Oh, King Krishna, Lord of the earth, you are resplendent with the blessing of goddess Chamundeshwari. You are the full moon of the autumn to the milky ocean of the Yadu race. This golden umbrella, which you have inherited from your illustrious ancestors, evokes the awe of the whole world". The history of the throne dates back to the 12th century.
Sunday night we actually got to see the castle all lit up since the entire building is actually lined with rows of bulbs following the contours of the structure. A total of 100,000 bulbs light up the palace every Sunday for one hour, it was so beautiful, it was fairy tale like.
Rewinding a bit though, Sunday we took a car over to Dubare, an elephant camp =). When we arrived we took a short boat ride to Elephant Island and as we pulled over to the tree root that served as the "dock" there were three elephants taking their bath in the river, it was so amazing. We then signed up to take a 10-minute elephant ride and Chandra, which I later renamed Pongo (because it looked like a Pongo, every sweet animal to me looks like a Pongo) gave us a sweet ride around the island. I just imagined "Las Isletas" which by the way are much more beautiful than this place by far, but with ELEPHANTS, that would attract more tourists to our lovely islands that unfortunately are barren of elephant and fish.
On our way back we stopped by the Tibetan, Namdrolin Monastery. As I explained in the last post, it was a village of Tibetan monks, from little 5-year old monks to 80-year old monks. The place was so holy and clean and peaceful. There were like five separate buildings, all Tibetan style buildings, and inside sat these monks in meditation. In one building they were singing hymns of prayer in Sanskrit and others were playing particular instruments, huge bongs and long, long trumpets I wish I new the name of. In another one of the buildings, the main one, there were no monks praying but there were three enormous golden statues of 60 feet in height, one of lord Buddha and the others of two Gurus. In a plaque next to the statues it says that they are made of copper plated with gold and inside the statues, are scriptures, relics of great beings, small clay mould stupas, and small statues, which symbolize the body, speech and mind of the buddhas. It was an astonishing sight, like nothing I have ever seen before. I honestly felt like I went to Tibet for two hours, it was a different world.
One of the walls read:
"In the Buddhist tradition, circumambulating religious objects like stupas, temples, etc. clockwise with faith, generates a positive energy bringing about happiness & peace of mind. Abandon all evil doings, practice virtue well, and master your own mind, this the Buddha's teaching- Lord Buddha."
The weekend in Mysore ended up being amazing and I was not expecting to see everything I saw; I am so grateful that my last trip here in India was to these places.
The way back was off course stressful and a bit scary. We were not able to get all the way back to Shanti Bhavan on Monday night because of Diwali celebrations. No one wanted to take us so "in land" so we had to stay in Hosur. Finally, in an hour or so we will head back to Shanti Bhavan. Luckily the children are not celebrating Diwali until today, so we didn't miss much. However, since I do not have my card reader with me, I will have to post pictures this coming weekend.
Thank you for reading about my experience.
Hugs and smiles.
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