I will begin this post with a classic Ang story. In my last post I talked about the amazing doctors I’ve seen since I’ve been in India, but I did not discuss the magical ora of Dr. Raj, they physiotherapist. To say the least, all the girls find him groovy, in the most Kindergarten crush kind of way. The last appointment I had with him, the power went out so we had half of our appointment by a combination of mobile phone light and candle light. The power was still out when I was about to leave so Dr. Raj offered me a lift back on his motor bike. I accepted, considering that I had seen 3 snakes since I’ve been in India and I did not have my torch with me. On the ride we had a nice chat about my research paper and how a full moon affects the human body (Think how if affects the tide of the ocean, our bodies our mostly water…). When he dropped me off, there was still no power, it was very dark out. I stepped off of the motor bike and fell into a ditch. He was like, “Oh my gosh! Are you alright?!” I climbed out of that ditch so fast, said I was fine, thanked him, and then ran into my villa in a mortified manner with a scraped hand and leg.
With a bit of a bruised ego and bruised body, I made it to the end of my program. Stephen literally completed his nearly 30 hours of travel just in time to make it to my graduation Pooja. It was really nice to have him there.
After two days of beach bumming, Stephen and I headed 7 hours East to Hampi. Hampi is known for it’s amazing rock formations and historical ruins built between 1300-1500. Our first day in Hampi, while waiting for the boat to cross the river, an Indian family placed all of their 5 children in front of us and proceeded to take pictures. We just went with it. The photos didn’t stop there. Throughout the next three days, I posed for around a dozen photos with several school groups. Stephen was never asked again after the family photo. I'm not quite sure why they wanted photos with me. I'm funny looking?
Our Hampi visit would not have been complete without Stephen and I getting slightly lost on one of our excursions in 90 plus degree weather. We rode some shitty bikes with no gears over 10k up and down not very well paved rolling hills. We did eventually find the lake we were looking for and took a dip. Of course we couldn't stop there. After the lake, we rode to the "Monkey Temple," and climbed over 500 steps to get to the top.
Wearing our selves out was the best thing we could have done. That night we had reservations for a 12 hour train ride to Mysore. Getting to the train station itself was something I have not yet experienced in my travels. I have definitely experienced some very uncomfortable and scary modes of transportation, but nothing like this. I don't even know how to describe this rickshaw ride other then when we arrived at the train station I felt as though all my organs had switched places and all of my muscles were soar.
Thank God we splurged and paid a few bucks extra for first class train tickets, we got "beds!" At the train station, Stephen spotted Indian Ang, I made some more dog buddies, I prepared for my train ride with what else but the "Darjeeling Limited" soundtrack. The outside of the train definitely looked like the train in the movie. The inside, not so much.
Presently, we are in Mysore. Yesterday we saw the Mysore Palace which is unreal! Google it. The next few days I'm hoping to take some yoga classes with BNS Iyengar, who is my yoga teacher's teacher. BNS Iyengar studied under Sri T. Krishnamacharya. My teacher told me that I just need to tell the school that he sent me and I should be able to get into a class. Eeeek, I'm scared! Stephen's a bit under the weather today so we're chillin in a nicer hotel watching The Hobbit and drinking tea. This nice hotel only allows us 4 hours of internet on one device per day so I can't upload any pictures off of my phone quite yet.
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