More PHOTOS

alright, so here is the full album from hampi:

http://picasaweb.google.co.in/coffeewithkatie/IndiaHampiPart1 and
http://picasaweb.google.co.in/coffeewithkatie/IndiaHampiPart2

and just a few from bangalore. the markets were so colorful and beautiful here. and people were so excited to have their picture taken. and the fragrance of the flowers was so refreshing. it was truly a highlight for me to experience the bustling and crowded space and observe the culture of the people who work and shop there. i certainly cannot capture it with my words or photos, but i gave it a go anyway. here is the link:

http://picasaweb.google.com/coffeewithkatie/IndiaBangalore02?authkey=h8mCrQ6LYFM#

Is Humpy the same place as Hampi?

this was our concern when we bought our bus tickets, considering the possibility that we actually bought our tickets for a similar (but different) location. apparently it goes by both names, and i believe hampi and humpy have made my favorite places list. meg, tim, and i spent a week there, but i could have easily spent much more time. and many people do spend weeks to months there. it is difficult to fully capture its charm but it certainly involves the sense of community between both the locals and visitors. at sunny guesthouse, the place we initially crashed, was extremely friendly. by the first evening, we knew the names of the staff and they knew ours.

their kindness made it difficult to move on, but i was itching to check out the rocks. besides the vast ruins that are clustered in the main bazaar area and the temples taht pepper the surrounding areas, it is very well-known among the climbing community for its boulders. while i am certainly no pro, i was anxious to see what the talk was all about. so i headed to goan corner, a further removed guesthouse of huts and good food surrounded by rice fields and coconut trees and close to banana fields and the hot spots for bouldering. it is sort of the "camp 4" of hampi. charmilla, the owner, is a very savy, strong, confident woman with a great sense of humor, a good business sense. she makes the place what it is and draws in groups of climbers and other visitors who seem to grow roots there. this is where i met nick, a seasoned climber and outdoor educator from england, who introduced me to many others in the area. nick served as a great motivator and guide especially to us novices.

groups met every morning at 6:30 and every evening at 4p to avoid the heat of mid-day. this also meant catching some incredible sunrises and sunsets. and the middle of the day was filled with lazily reading in a hammock, strolling, visiting with other travellers or whatever. it felt fantastic to be out working the muscles i haven't used in several months. the first morning, meg and i went out on the rocks with nick. after a couple of hours, nick randomly asked if we had brought any money and if we wanted to buy a cake. it seemed an odd question considering our surroundings and the time of day. but just then, the "cake man" appeared around the corner of the rock we were working on and presented delicious cake options. his wife bakes them every morning and he walks miles each day delivering them to a welcoming audience. they have creatively found their niche in the climbers. we ate our banana chocolate cake with smiles on our faces. after a couple of days, my muscles and a beat-up hand ended that venture for a bit. but man, i think i fell in love with hampi! hahaha! and after a week, the group decision was to head back into india as hampi is a world of its own.

Between a Rock...

from the beaches of goa, we caught an eventful overnight bus to hampi. apparently in need of sleep, i had little problem curling into the shape of my seat and falling fast asleep. i awoke to a nearly empty bus to find that we happened upon a head-on collision b/w another tour bus and a goods carrier (dump truck). i felt guilty that i had slept through the first hour after stopping - assisting injured passengers, first aid. not that i could have been much help, but i guiltily felt some sense of responsibility.

anyway, the driver of the tour bus remained trapped by the crushed front end. with no cell reception, traffic not moving and in the middle of nowhere, the passersby were forced to take matters into their own hands. they tied a rope to the crushed metal at the front of the bus and a truck and after a couple of attempts succussfully freed the driver. so with no resources available (ambulance, emt's, police jaws of life, etc) at this location in the middle of the night, the man was carried to our bus to be taken to the nearest hospital (2.5 hrs away). 5 hrs after crushing his leg and merely 400mg ibuprofen later (he wanted no more), the man reached the modest hospital for professional care. thankfully, no one was critically injured. i sort of made an excuse to peek inside of the 5 room hospital (including icu) and was oh so thankful for the systems we have in place. i have been known to criticize our healthcare system, but i was immediately humbled...for our facilities, level of care, and availability. ours are not flawless, but our tax dollars do more than a decent job providing such necessary services.

and we made it to hampi (sort of middle south in the state of karnataka). our first day was slow after a long night, and our second day stifled by illness. but the past 2 days have treated us quite well. it is an incredible place of vast boulder fields larger than i have ever seen, and many of which are perched atop another mysteriously defying gravity. interspersed throughout these massive boulders are many many hindu temples and ruins dating back to the 1500s. and beyond that are banana fields, rice patties and small villages. the sunsets and sunrises (we did actually get up early enough to catch one) are out of this world. it is a beautiful landscape and is keeping us here longer than anywhere else we have been thus far.

the monkeys are showing themselves a bit more, and the mosquitoes are horrendous but the friendly locals and the views trump it all...and it is exceptionally cheap!