Mysore Palace, Snake Charmers, Chamundi Hill, Open Markets

Chamundi Temple

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Boys dressed up to take photos for money

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We hired a guide to give us a tour of Mysore. His name was Joseph and he took us to the Mysore Palace. This tourist attraction had a lot of people lined up to visit. We had to pay an entrance fee and we were only allowed to take pictures of the outside of the building. We had to take our shoes off to go inside, which I found odd since it wasn’t a temple. The palace was hundreds of years old with lots of carved soapstone and wooden doors. The ceilings were also painted with carvings unique to each ceiling panel. There is an annual procession in September that has been happening there since the 1300’s. There were so many people inside that it got very warm and I kept getting bumped into. I expected India to be like this everywhere, but I’m glad it is not this bad everywhere. As we were leaving we saw two snake charmers. One was holding a monkey while playing an instrument. They asked for money if you watched them at all.

After the palace we drove to Chamundi Temple. It is another tourist attraction with a lot of market stores by the entrance. We also saw monkeys hanging around, which was the first time we saw them up close. There was a huge line to get in the temple so we walked to a smaller Shiva temple. We drove down the hill a bit to see another Nandi temple. There were three young boys that were all dressed up with make-up. They posed then asked for money.

Next we went to the tallest church in south Asia. It was a huge Catholic church, I was surprised at how many churches we saw in India. I also shopped at a government-run store. You have to ask an employee to hand you clothes. I had to go into an office room to change, and the female employee came in with me. I don’t know if it was for service or if they are afraid of things being stolen. It was uncomfortable, but I really liked the shirt and wanted to try it on.

After the store we went to an open market. It was kind of crowded and had brightly colored paints, cookware, vegetables, bangles, oils and more. People kept asking where we were from and for some reason people start playing the Titanic song on the recorder when they see us.

Huge Catholic church

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At the open market

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