Past and Present in Geographic Location

November 2, 2010

Mysore in a Nutshell

Mike – It seems to be a trend for us lately to depart and arrive in rain. It rained the entire bus ride to Mysore, and continued the downpour whence arriving. The wet weather may have slowed us down, but it definitely didn’t slow down the haggling rickshaw drivers.

The center of Mysore isn’t very big. Within two square kilometres you can find the palace (the main attraction), the government silk and sandalwood shops (a Mysore specialty), and many nice hotels and restaurants. In other words, there was no need to get a ride anywhere. But, those drivers don’t understand the concept of “walking”.

They’ll tell you anything to get you in that damn rickshaw.

We had a string of rickshaws following us around until we finally reached a hotel. Even after I had gone up to our room, had a shower, and came out to look for an Internet cafe; one guy was still waiting for us to take us on a tour of Mysore (in the pouring rain). They never give up. I both resent and admire their persistence.

The Mysore Palace was pretty incredible. It’s architecture was quite stunning, and extremely lavish. I couldn’t believe that people were living there until as late as 1947. It gained influence from a variety of sources; Hindu and Muslim art, and interestingly enough, was designed by a British architect in the late 1800’s. The fact that you could see so clearly where the architect got his inspiration was probably the most interesting part for me.

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Photography inside the palace was strictly forbidden, but from the pictures you can only imagine the splendor of the interior.

Elephants played a large part in the history of the castle. The King would ride through the city on one in his gold encrusted carrier, and they were featured quite extensively in the designs and carvings within the castle. Sure enough, we had our first elephant spotting while there also, but unfortunately, it left a very sour taste in my mouth. I don’t want to spoil the place by describing to you how these creatures were treated, but let’s just say it was very inhumane and really tarnished the whole experience, for me anyways.

Teg- As I do agree with Mike about the very poor treatment these elephants were induced to, I couldn't help but initially be excited for the chance to touch and sit up on one of them. After seeing the chains and scars however, the once excitement and smiles shifted to sympathy and sadness.

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I was actually quite surprised and impressed (yet sad) at how domesticated these elephants were, and from the facts we learned through wandering through the palace, how domesticated elephants have been for quite some time now. We had to give donations at the end of our little meet time with the elephant, so we handed bill after bill to the elephant’s trunk, where it then gave it right to the rider on its back. With all the different commands these men were giving it and it in turn doing, I almost categorized it with dogs, expecting it to soon lay and roll over!haha

So the palace grounds were incredible. Lush gardens, old beautiful temples, awesome bronze sculpted tigers, and well, at the center of it all, the massive Palace. The Palace itself was amazing. Lots of people and almost just as much security. Shoes off was mandatory, and it was kinda funny seeing all the security guards shoeless as well. I dunno why but I couldn’t help but think of some shoeless chase through palace haha.

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After removing our shoes, going through a metal detector and picking up our audio guides, we finally were inside, walking barefoot on the most lush tiled floors (I’ve yet) to walk on. Walking barefoot through the palace really made it easy for me to imagine it as my own haha. In between my trances of floor staring, I would get caught up in the unbelievable doorways, massive columned hallways and sky-high ceilings, all of which were elaborately carved. It’s funny because at times I would be in such a trance staring at a door, I would completely tune out the sections’ audio track. It was really a mesmerizing place.

Unfortunately, we had to give up our cameras before entering the palace, so you must take our word since we have no real proof of the Palace’s splendour.

OH! So I must briefly mention the Silk factory/store. IT was amazing. We walk in and the place is relatively empty, and there were probably 20 sales-men all sitting and standing around. We weren’t initially bothered, but as soon as I inquired about one item, I had myself a small following. I asked about this one beautiful sari which was on the sole mannequin in the store. Immediately after this it was being pulled off and handed to one of the few female workers who then pulled me into the change-room, I mean managers office lol, where I then got fitted. I didn’t see this, but Mike said that as soon as the mannequin was nude, there was a frantic attempt to find shawls to cover her up.

We left Mysore that night, our first night bus. We were on a deluxe bus which is a bus that is in-between the high and low-end bus categories. We were both exhausted from the few hours of late-night backpack walking around the city so we were both anticipating a great sleep on the night deluxer. Turns out, the better the bus, the higher the hopes for a good nights’ sleep on a rocky, pot-hole filled highway. Regardless of bus standards, bad roads always win. We both got maybe an hours’ sleep max. The deluxe had us fooled lol!

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http://picasaweb.google.com/mproud3/Mysore#

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