Our jaunt through Southern India begins in Mysore, home to a beautiful fruits and vegetables market,
as well as what appears to be Donkey Kong’s pantry.
The market was full of fragrant spices and literal piles of color,
although the surrounding streets were filled with literal piles of rubbish.
In India, cows are everywhere, from the middle of a busy sidewalk,
to a shrine on one of India’s holiest hills, Chamundi.
But you won’t find cows on your dinner table (unless they wander up and eat your bread): most of South India is vegetarian, so we took the opportunity to try a variety of vegetable curries.
From Mysore, we took a long car ride to the Kabini river, located between Bandipur National Park and Nagarhole Tiger Reserve. It was time for a safari.
South India is full of animals who like to walk away and then dramatically give you Blue Steel, such as the Spotted Deer.
And the Sambal.
The Gaur’s powdered wig and high socks make him the closest we are getting to seeing Hamilton on this trip.
We also saw the most successful hunter in all of India: that’s right, a pack of Dholes, or Adorable Indian Wild Dogs.
The national park is home to one of the world’s largest populations of wild Asian Elephants.
Including Mr. Kabini, easily recognizable by his crossed tusks. He is quite the celebrity around these parts.
And although we came to Nagarhole Tiger Reserve with hopes of seeing Mr. Tiger, like a typical cat he was probably sleeping in a cardboard box somewhere out of sight.
It was time to say goodbye to Kabini river,
and say hello to a 2nd class A/C overnight Indian train.
The train wasn’t so bad, as long as you don’t mind crying babies, loudly talking businessmen, dirt on every surface, the train blowing its horn all night at animals on the tracks, and your feet hanging off the end of the bed.
After a very relaxing 12 hours on the train, we arrived in Madurai searching for coffee.
Madurai is full of markets and clothing stores where you can get any custom clothing you want, as long as its bright, colorful, and a dress.
Most of the clothes are made for you right on the spot. Each one of these guys is an independent shopkeeper, busily sewing away unless they are shouting at you that their clothes are the best and cheapest.
Madurai is most famous for the massive Meenakshi Temple, which draws crowds of pilgrims from all over India.
The temple, with its colorful Gopura gates, dominates the city skyline.
Each Gopura is covered in intricate sculptures and colorful depictions of Hindu symbolism.
The temple is huge, and full of vast colorful hallways and countless buildings.
Around every corner, there was a different shrine, statue, golden pillar, or smaller temples that were off-limits to non-Hindus.
At one point we even came across an elephant making her way through the corridors.
We came across the same elephant (probably? this temple is really big) later, when she was blessing babies.
That probably sounds like one of our jokes, but seriously, people were lining up for the elephant to touch their children on the head. So naturally, Jessie got right in line. Her breath smelled like bananas!
We also found a cat in one of the temple corridors, but since we had no tuna, we got no blessing.
-Phil & Jessie
Katz 