One month in India already. I certainly feel more acclimatised to this new world, where the whole breadth of human life, from its most basic to its most opulent are on constant display. I feel that my perspective of things here has certainly changed over the course of the month. I feel less somewhat less 'awed' by the amazing menial daily things that I see around me- desensitised a little, which is kind of normal I suppose. I no longer turn my head to look at the cow stuck in the middle of the road causing a traffic jam, I no longer feel claustrophobic on walking narrow alleyways jammed with people, motorbikes, cycles and animals all trying to fray a way through. I suppose I am gradually becoming more 'Indian' in my attitudes to these things too.
My trip to Mysore was a stark reminder of the rich past this country had in its previous regional Kingdoms. The Mysore Palace of the Wadiyar rulers is one of the most amazing visual display of opulence that I have yet seen here. The city itself was cooler and offered more space to breathe than most other places I have been to in India, its borad avenues lines with giant century-old trees and the city itself dotted with green areas. The skyline viewed from the top of the Jaganmohan Palace (now an art museum) offers one that romantic, fairytale image of India that attracts so many.
At Srirangapatnam, the place where Tippu Sultan built his stronghold that eventually gave in to British forces that he was valiantly resisting in the South, one can again palpate the grand historical backdrop and its associated achievements and tragedies.
At the glamorously named "Hotel Ritz' where I was staying, in one of these turns of fate, I met 2 guys from Cambridge- Jo was in the same year as me in Medicine (at Jesus College) and Simon in the year below. Simon was going to work in a village hospital in rural Kerala and Jo was just killing time waiting for her job to start at Tommies in London. They were on their way down the West coast on motorbike- a great way indeed to view India, but they seemed to have had more than their fair share of 'mechanical failures' recently! It was nice to have them as company and I was somewhat sad to leave Mysore behind- I literally ran from the Palace that was brightly illuminated with thousands of lightbulbs at 7pm to catch my train at 7.45! It was well worth the sweat!