Mysore Weekend

We just heard about the crazy elephant rampage in Mysore, but we weren't there, thankfully.  Just a week and a half ago we did a weekend trip to Mysore and let me tell you, my rear was SORE, hence the name? We took a long country road dodging large pot holes, cows and sheep, slow moving tractors, and rice...yes, I

Sheep along the country road to Mysore

 said rice.  Piles of stocks where on the road and I thought a truck load had fallen out.  Our driver went full speed ahead over the piles and I held my breath as it banged and clanged under the car.  It made quite a commotion and was very bumpy.  "What in the world happend back there?" I asked the driver who was completely unphased.  He explained that the villagers use the passing autos to remove the chaff  (the hard shell) and later they come back to collect the grain.  They expertly get out of the way as cars and trucks drive over their grain and then scurry back again to shovel grain into bags. That's so resourceful... but a little disgusting at the same time.  So their rice has tire tread and maybe a few splatters of engine oil?

Cocoon Market where our driver got the cocoons

Our driver made a quick stop at a cocoon factory, told us to stay in the car, and a few minutes later brought back little surprises for each of the children...silk worm cocoons! It was a little creepy when  one of them started quivering.  I imagined a big moth-like creature emerging and flying around the room in the middle of the night so I gently placed it on the balcony outside our hotel room.  It was still quivering the next day but I have no idea what happened after we left.  It's (dead) brothers and sisters came back home with us to Bangalore.

A couple of the silk worm cocoons.  They are so big!

The drive should not be have been long judging by the kilometers, maybe three hours, but we left by 8:30 in the morning and didn't get to the hotel until 2p.m.  Needless to say, the kids couldn't "hold it" and I was dreading a potty stop at a local roadside shanty.  Just at the right time, in the middle of nowhere, our driver pulls over to a coffee shop, almost Starbucks style.  Yay! Clean toilets never looked so good.   

Found a coffee shop along the roadside for a coffee and most important, clean toilets!

  

Long country road from Bangalore to Mysore...

We are admireing the detailed carvings, notice we had to remove our shoes even in a temple that isn't active.

Intricate carvings on every inch of this temple thousands of years old.

This is what the entrance looks like.  It's really beautiful architecture.

After the coffee we detoured a little to hit our first destination, Keshava temple.  It's not an active temple but it's got amazing stone carvings and details after so many centuries.  It was built in early 1200 A.D. and it's in remarkable shape, check out this link on wikipedia: Keshava Temple

After the temple we headed into Mysore where we stayed at the Lalitha Mahal Palace hotel.  It's in need of a facelift since it's feeling pretty tired but if you like historical places and palaces then this was a good place to stay. The Maharja built the palace to host a VIP guest back in the 1930's.  Mysore used to be the capital of the state of Karnataka before it was moved to Bangalore.  That being said, it seems to be the last connection the Indian's have to royalty so the city and it's palaces are pretty popular places to visit.

Mysore Palace view from left corner.
 It's not the Taj, but second most visited location in all of India.

After a refreshing lunch we headed to the famous Mysore Palace, the second most visited place in India.  The Taj Mahal is the first.

The crowd alone was surprising.  Apparently it was the last weekend before kids went back to school so everyone was doing last minute vacationing.  Thousands of Indians must have been there!  Now imagine standing in line to get tickets and then finally arriving at the entrance only to find out you have to remove your shoes.  Ugh!  That pretty much takes the fun out of it right there.

The one good thing we did was hire a "tour guide" for about $10 and it was well worth it simply because he got us through the lines faster, lifting those guide ropes and sweet talking the guards into letting us pass.  The palace tour itself was a disappointment and had very little to see but at least I can say we've  been there, done that.

The highlight of the trip was after a full day and an evening of shopping we drove by the palace grounds one last time to see what we always saw in pictures.  On the weekends the palace lights up more lights than I've ever seen apart from the "Parade of Lights" at Disney World.  I suppose the trip was worth it for that.

Home Sweet Home

Family at the Leela Palace Hotel for our weekly tradition for Sunday breakfast.

 Sorry for that long dry spell...waiting for Internet service from the government took too long so we got ourselves hooked up on a smaller private carrier.  Being disconnected from the "world" was almost painful.  I didn't realize how dependent I had become on the internet.

We have finally moved in to our long term home in the Palm Meadows neighborhood of Whitefield - a suburb of Bangalore. (check back soon for pictures) We've pretty much done all our home goods shopping and the house is set up as well as its going to be for the rest of our stay.  Let's just say that after trying to set up a house in India, I have a new appreciation for Target and Walmart. 

Palm Meadows was the first of it's kind in Bangalore.  It actually feels a lot like a Southern Florida community. There is a hotel inside the development with a full service clubhouse attached, 24 hour restaraunt, full spa and salon services, squash courts, fully equipped exercise room, yoga and tennis class, an english pub, you get my drift.  It's been such a success that a new neighborhood, Palm Retreat, has been recently opened.   It has a similar style but the homes have bigger floor plans and of course, they're newer.  We didn't move in there because the club house and pool are not completed and with little kids this becomes the number one priority in a hot climate.  They say the Palm Retreat clubhouse is planned to be even nicer than Palm Meadows, but its hard to believe because Palm Meadows is like a resort.  We are really enjoying the pool and all the clubhouse has to offer.

Recently, our family was taking a leisurely night time stroll and I looked up at the night sky.  Suddenly I realized I had not been able to see stars at all for the first month we were in Bangalore.  The city lights were too bright.   Now that we are in the outskirts of the city the moon and stars shine brightly.  I reminded everyone that this was Bangalore, India and not some suburb back in the US.  The kids responded like, "no duh, mom" but I was so thrilled I almost had to be pinched to make sure I wasn't dreaming.  

 

  



We've done a lot in the six weeks we've been here but we have not left Bangalore yet.  We hope to do that this weekend since our anniversary weekend is coming up.  We are planning to take a weekend trip to Mysore, one of the main cities closer to Bangalore.  Its only a ~3 hour drive, which makes it a great option for a weekend adventure.  We are on driver number four (long story). Before we go anywhere long distance we have to get a good feel for the new driver.  You have to be able to trust the person who is driving around your family.  Being foreigners in an unfamiliar city makes the driver the most important person we know since we depend on him for everything.

Our first driver took us to the Government Museum.  It is one of the oldest museums in India with a lot of relics dating back 5000 years.

The life-like, moving spinosauras was the main attraction at the science museum.

We spotted white bengal tigers at the Bannerghatta National Park...

and monkeys on the roadside.





In contrast to the driver drama, we've had great luck with our cook, Gayathri.  She was looking for full time work and a place to stay, so she lives with us six days a week and cooks 3 meals a day.  This is great for me since there is no oven for baking and I don't know even know how to brew coffee without my instant coffee maker. Chicken nuggets are pretty much all I know how to cook back home, but they actually need to be deep fried the old fashioned way over here. Oh, and I can make mac and cheese.  She makes mostly traditional Indian food but she surprises us sometimes with a delicious quiche or like this morning's yummy crepes with bananas and nutella (dessert for breakfast, I love her!).

So you might think it's a little awkward to have the help living 24 hours with you, but there is a seperate servants quarters attached to this villa which is pretty common here. It was a little weird at first to have a "servant" and I've learned a lot from other expats and local Indians how to interact with the "domestic help" (as I like to call it).  I've been schooled that Americans often get taken advantage of because we tend to treat the help kindly and spoil them. The other day I was picking up some scattered trash from the front yard and a local Indian stopped to tell me the help should pick it up.  She said that if the servants see me doing work they will quickly lose respect for me, assume I should continue to do work, and get lazy.  I told her I didn't mind cleaning up my own yard and I didn't want my cook (who cooks my food) to be picking up trash.  Gayathri has turned out to be a real blessing to our family and she's a hard worker so spoiling her a little comes easily.

Our home has become a comfortable haven in the craziness of Bangalore.  It's nice to come home to such a lovely place and to some wonderful food.  After all these weeks, I can finally say "HOME SWEET HOME".








Hello, Bangalore!

So we've finally made it!  I can't believe we've been in Bangalore for almost three weeks already.  I didn't have easy access to the internet for a while because my computer had been damaged on the flight over from Frankfurt.  Bangalore, being the tech haven of India, had a special store just for my brand of netbook,  so they ordered the part and had it fixed in two days. 

Friday April 15th: 
We arrived in Bangalore at 2 a.m. Friday morning.  They boast a new airport which they are proud of.  I was impressed with how efficient and clean it was.  To my relief, Steve had coordinated with the hotel in advance to provide us with two cars to shuttle us back to the hotel so there wasn't the taxi mayhem that I was expecting to see.  If you've seen the movie "Outsourced" then you know what I was expecting.  I think arriving in the middle of the night into a new city half way around the world makes the transition easier.

There wasn't much to see at that time of night driving to the hotel.  A few stray dogs, which I expected, but the thing that I forgot to expect were the mosquitos.  The hotel lobby, elevator and hotel room had mosquitos.  How do mosquitos get into a 4th floor room? 

The airport was about an hour drive from our hotel,  Royal Orchid Hotel.  This was to be our new home for the first seven days.  Again, this was a nice transition.  We were really spoiled there.  The staff really loved Owen and someone told him he was famous in the hotel.  All the staff knew him and during slow times the restaurant staff would gather around him to watch him perform some half made up magic trick.  Owen was loving the attention.

Each morning there is a complimentary breakfast that has a selection for every taste.  Of course I wasn't yet brave enough to eat the raw fruits or vegetables, but they had lots of hot options and fresh pastries including croissants which were so addictive. If you've ever had a fresh, made from scratch croissant then you know what I mean.  They also served a delicious version of south Indian coffee which is basically a latte, hot milk infused with a splash of espresso.

It's a business hotel so there were lots of business folks staying and working in the area for Dell, IBM, Volvo, etc., people from all over the globe.  We even met a couple from Japan who moved to Bangalore to wait out the disaster in Japan.  There was a guy from Houston, TX here for Microsoft, and one from Sweden, another from Milano, Italy who worked for Accenture (the company Steve is working for).  I met a lady who was so happy to hear American accents and see my children.  She was orignally from California but had permanently moved to Mumbai for the shipping company DHL.  It was just amazing the range of foreigners we met here on business.  That's the life and breath of Bangalore.

Just over a week ago we moved into a serviced apartment that is also spoiling us because of the sheer size of the rooms and the view we have. It's a "penthouse" two floor apartment with a view overlooking a central park and pools.  There is a grove of coconut trees that shades the park below us.  Every morning there's complimentary breakfast as well, but I'm missing my fresh croissants. 

Back at the Royal Orchid we enjoyed a late afternoon swim on their rooftop pool when the sun wasn't so intense.  Here at the Diamond District apartments, the pool is broken but it is in a beautiful garden setting and huge.  It would've been amazing if it was working.  I'm kind of glad it's not working, actually, because the kids and I would not have wanted to leave this spacious place.

The days are getting warmer and now we can look forward to moving into our new home in Palm Meadows neighborhood in just a couple of days.  The clubhouse pool at Palm Meadows is incredible, like a resort.  It has an attached restaurant, pub, spa, and gym.  I may not want to leave.