June 9-10, 2007

On the 9th I met up with fellow adventurers Natalie and Russell and left from Chicago for the 15 hour flap to New Delhi. Landed around 8:00 PM on the 10th. Temperature in Delhi that day was 48 Celsius, which is 118 Fahrenheit! Stepping off the plane felt like getting dropped into a vat of smoggy sauna. Right out of the airport, I was shocked by the energy and movement around me: the number of people, the traffic, the cows. Checked into the Grand Sartaj Hotel and passed out...

June 11, 2007

Left Delhi for the desert town of Udaipur, a small little village community of 350,000 people. Checked into the Hilltop Palace Hotel which overlooks a lake called Fateh Sagar. There are two main islands in the lake. On one is Nehru Park, a popular spot for weddings. On the other is the Udaipur Solar Observatory, which we will visit tomorrow. The monsoon will reach this place in a few weeks, but for now it is very dry and hot.

Tonight we go to a memorial site for Maharana Pratap, a ruler of Western India during the mid-1500s. He is revered as the first to fight for Indian independence at a time when Mughal forces occupied much of North-West India.

June 12, 2007

We spent today at the Udaipur Solar Observatory starting with a boat ride out to the telescope. In contradiction to all expectations the vessel did a fine job of staying afloat.

In the afternoon we gave brief talks on our research to the Indian solar astronomers and then heard equally incomprehensible presentations of their work.

At the observatory I saw my first wild monkeys. There were two of them and I think that they were Hanuman langurs. It was weird seeing monkeys in such an arid environment without many large trees. Sadly we did not have any food with us, so our new primate friends quickly left in search of more fruitful relationships.

We ended this long day by stopping at Bhartiya Lok Kala Mandal, an institute for Rajasthani puppetry and dance. The puppet show had a strong Indian-clown vibe which was a bit creepy, but the dancing was impressive, especially when one dancer balanced 7 large pots on his head while undulating around the stage.

June 13, 2007

A long drive from Udaipur took us up to the much cooler area of Mt. Abu.

Along the way we stopped at the Ranakpur Jain Temple. Jainism is a fairly strict offshoot of Buddhism. We were not allowed to wear shoes in the temple, we had to cover our legs with long pants and all leather had to be left behind. The 600 year old temple is made almost entirely of marble with impressively intricate carvings.

June 14, 2007

Walked around Lake Nakki, a tourist spot in the Mt. Abu area.

Also went to the Dilwara Jain Temples. Unfortunately photography was not allowed. Again these were marble temples with even more intricate carvings than in Ranakpur. The temples themselves were designed to be quite plain on the exterior to discourage unknowing marauders from defacing the interiors.

In the afternoon we went up to Mt. Abu Infrared Observatory. Because the monsoon is coming the air is very hazy, but apparently during the clear winter months the visibility extends to Pakistan in the west and across the Indian desert in the east. There is a small village on a mountain pass below the observatory that just received electricity last year. I spent a while on the observatory balcony watching the sun sink into the haze and pondered a life spent in an Indian farming village.

June 15, 2007

Drove back from Mt. Abu to Udaipur.

After the drive we went to the Udaipur City Palace, which had been built up over the centuries by a long line of maharajas and is the largest palace in Rajasthan. The palace was impressive and colorful and gaudy and beautiful. And it seems that the Indians from 500 years ago must have been a bit vertically challenged; some of their doorways stand at about 5.5 feet.

We checked back into the Hilltop Palace Hotel and caught a great sunset.

June 16-23, 2007

This has been a crazy week. Flew from Udaipur to Bangalore. Got settled into our apartments, which are really nice. We have been warned to keep the balcony door closed when we are away so that the native monkeys are not tempted to come in and steal our clothes. At the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA) we met every person of any relevance to our stay here. I started work on my research project. And probably the most fun part of the week was the eight hours spent registering at the Police Commissioners office, a process that all foreigners have the pleasure of experiencing. An interesting fact that I did discover is that the Department of Permitting and Planning for the city and county of Honolulu and the Police Commissioner office for the municipality of Bangalore are actually in a dead heat, tied for the most incompetent, inefficient, confusing and @$#% infuriating bureaucracies on the planet.

I will eventually post more pictures covering every aspect of Bangalorian life, but for now I just have some shots from the street out in front of my building and the apartment.

June 30 - July 1, 2007

A weekend excursion to the village of Hampi. Hampi is to the north of Bangalore and has been declared a World Heritge Site for its large number of ancient buildings. Some of the temples date back to the 9th and 10th centuries, however most of the sites are relics of the Vijayanagar Empire dating from 1336 - 1565.

When the Vijayanagar Hindi empire fell to the Deccan Muslim sultanates from the North, many of the carvings and idols in the Hampi temples were broken and defaced. Tusks and trunks of elephants, the heads of gods, womens boobs and anything else that could be easily broken off typically suffered that fate. Even so, the temples are amazing. Think Machu Pichu meets Hinduism.

We left Bangalore Friday night on an over night train to Hampi. On the train we met up with a group of guys (Prasad, Jason, Rob and Nels) who work at Microsoft in Bangalore. They are friends of a friend of Natalie who she met at an ex-pat party that we went to last weekend (got that?). Prasad has been to Hampi many times and turned out to be an awesome tour guide.

We arrived early in the morning in Hampi and after checking in to an unremarkable guest house, began exploring the Virupaksha Temple. At the entrance was Lakshmi, the temple elephant who gave blessings in exchange for a rupee. Like the rest of town, Bonnet macaques were ubiquitous.

Next we went to the older (800-900 AD) Hemakutam Temples. These were once Jain temples and are now in various states of ruin. The cluster of temples, the massive boulders dotting the hilltop and the surrounding landscape of farmland and villages combine to give this place an eternal air that is at once awe inspiring and humbling. The overwhelming sense of history and the unimposing way in which human accomplishment counterpoints the natural environment truly blows my mind.

On the way down from Hemakuta Hill we stopped by two Ganesh idols.

We had lunch at a restaurant called the Mango Tree. Coincidentally they have a large mango tree that forms a canopy for the low benches and bamboo mats that serve as the dining area. The food here was as awesome as the view.

After lunch we moved on to the Achyutaraya temple and the Soolai bazaar. The bazaar served as the red light district for the Vijayanagarians. Then the Vitthala temple. Some of the granite columns here have been hollowed out so that they resonate at different frequencies. Pounding on the columns produces an impressive variety of notes, an activity which quickly led to impressively sore knuckles. Apparently these musical columns were played during festivals and ceremonies.

We finished our sight seeing with a coracle ride to the Hanuman temple. Coracles are the nautical equivalent of a papasan chair and could be coolest mode of transport on the planet. The Hanuman temple is said to be the place where the monkey god Hanuman came to life, or was born, or materialized or whatever it is that monkey gods do. There is a colony of Bonnet macaques that live near the temple and we got to feed them apple bananas as the sun set.

July 2, 2007

Second day in Hampi. We rented bikes and cruised around the Royal Complex which consists of a large number of buildings that existed solely for the royal family. These included the Queens Bath, the Lotus Mahal, a pool that looked like something out of an M.C. Escher and the elephant stables.

At one point today, as I was biking through a banana plantation and looking around at the amazing scenery I had one of those surreal I-cant-belive-I-am-here-in-India-and-how-the-hell-did-I-get-so-lucky moments. Hampi is an incredible place, I would love to come back someday to spend more time.

We ate again at the Mango Tree and then took off to catch our train home. On the way to the train station we happened to pass through some sort of festival that involved dressing up cows in colorful costumes and then running along side of them. Never found out what this was all about.

July 5, 2007

Day trip to Mysore, about a three hour drive south of Bangalore. Went with Russell and Loraine, a post doc from CfA. Passed a random archway in Bangalore. About 1.5 hours into the trip our car broke down, far from any town. On one side of the road were sugar cane fields, rice paddies, cows grazing beneath palm trees and a large colony of fruit bats. The other side of the road had a few huts belonging to local farmers.

As we waited on the side of the road for a mechanic to come from Mysore and a rescue car to come from Bangalore a crowd began to gather. It seems that whenever anything is out of the ordinary in India a crowd will materialize. Naturally three yanks waiting on the side of the road is a bit out of the ordinary. Thanks to our driver-translator we were able to talk a bit with some of the people who were standing around with us. One man in particular turned out to be very friendly, loved having his picture taken and eventually invited us into his home for coffee. We learned that his name was Siddappa. No surname, just Siddappa. His wife brought us some of the best coffee I have had since being here. We sat in his home, and drank our coffee as baby goats wobbled around outside.

After coffee we were taken to one of Siddhappas sugar cane fields and got to try fresh sugar cane. The car breaking down turned out to be a fantastically cool experience.

Once the new car arrived, we went to the island town of Srirangapatnam. This town had an old temple, a jail where British officers were once locked up and the most persistent peddlers I have ever come across. These guys followed us for over an hour running through the full extent of their English vocabulary: “I give good price. Sandlewood box. Two for 100 rupee.”

Stopped off at a few more places in and around Mysore: a large cathedral, Chaimundi hill where we followed a crowd into a temple and attempted unsuccessfully to blend in, the Maharaja Palace which was incredibly ornate on the inside but unfortunately photography was not allowed, and then finished the day at the Brindavan gardens where we saw a light/water fountain show set to well known Indian music.

July 8, 2007

Went to Cubbon Park in Bangalore to get some work-related reading done. This is a very nice park with beautiful lawns and lots of trees. I had a nice time reading on a bench; every once in a while somebody would walk by and start talking with me. Asking the standard suite of questions: What country am I from? Do I like India? Will I be going to the questioners home town?

July 15-16, 2007

Field trip! Went to Vainu Bappu Observatory, south-east of Bangalore in the neighboring state of Tamil Nadu. The observatory is set on 100 acres in the middle of a national forrest. The observatory grounds are beautiful, surrounded by sandalwood, eucalyptus, cashew nut, plumeria, monkeypod, tamarind and other exotic trees. It was a really chill place to hang out for two days and the trip was a nice departure from the chaos of Bangalore.

I recently read: The British are often credited with the invention of bureaucratic red tape, however Indians have figured out how to embroider with it. So far I have yet to find an exception to this statement. Two amusing anecdotes came up this weekend that are excellent examples. When the observatory was built about 30 years ago the cost for one night stay in the observers lodge was 15 rupees. Today the cost for staying in the observers lodge is 15 rupees (about 40 cents). When asked why the price has not been adjusted, I was told that the process to change this policy would be too difficult to accomplish, too much red tape to wade through. So the room rate has and will stay fixed into perpetuity.

Another room related anecdote: because the observatory is run by the government it is absolutely unacceptable to have non-governmental employees stay in rooms on the grounds. Fortunately, astronomers are smarter than the average bear and have found a way around this bureaucratic hurdle: the buildings that contain the visitors rooms are referred to as laboratories. So I stayed in Lab B room 11.

On the second day we went to a part of the national forrest called Beeman Falls. There has not been enough rain yet to make for much of a waterfall, but it was still a really nice area. We hiked around a bit before heading back for lunch at the observatory canteen. The chef that is in charge makes some awesome food. Over the course of our four meal stay we had curried plantains, idly, three different coconut dishes, tamarind soup, three kinds of dal, some curries and the usual complement of rice, roti and papad.

July 29, 2007

Russell, Sonnett and I headed south to Bannerghatta National Park today. This park has a zoo, a butterfly house, a bear rescue and rehabilitation center, tiger preserve, lion preserve and a herbivore area. Although many parts of the zoo were fairly depressing with very outdated enclosures, we were able to get close to some of the animals and actually got to greet one of the elephants with a shake of the trunk. The preserves were the complete opposite of the zoo, they were essentially large natural areas that we had to drive through to see the animals. Sort of like the San Diego Zoo safari. We saw lots of each type of animal, and it almost felt like seeing them in the wild. Overall a pretty cool experience, and true to form I took an entirely excessive number of pictures of every animal.

August, 2007

Well I am back in the states now, but unfortunately have not found the time to update this site. For the sake of getting photos online to satisfy my many fans I have put together a collection of Himalaya pictures. These span the entire 12 days that Lisa and I spent there. They are in chronological order, but span a wide range of villages, towns, mountains, passes, lakes and monasteries.