Tharun and Smriti

Travelling from Bangalore to Mysore today, Good Friday. Tharun had been too kind, offering to pick me up and drive me to Bangalore.
He and his wife Smriti were travelling to Ooti, so Mysore is kind of on the way there. We'd planned to leave at 6am from the Radha Hometel,
so I was awake at 5am to make sure I was sorted to hit the road. I was checked out by 550 and sat in the lobby waiting to be picked
up. Tharun called at 6, to say that they hadn't left...another hour, at 7 Tharun calls reception to tell me they'd be there in 10 minutes.
Turns out they were up early preparing a breakfast and some South Indian Tea for the road. It is the first time I'd met Smriti and the
two of them seem well suited and talk like they'd been married for 6 years, instead of 6 months.

So, we hit the road at 7, by which time the traffic had thickened up as we headed south on a ring road, then west...missing a turnoff
to Mysore Road, then asking for directions from 2 or 3 people, all very helpful. The signage wasn't great to the roads and even when
we were going in the right direction, Tharun was asking anyone he could whether we were going towards Mysore. We ended up looking for
the NICE road, which I thought meant a nice road, but it's an acronym...for something...turns out it is a nice road! With a couple of
makeshift toll gates. There's quarries along the road just out of Bangalore, perfect for making roadbase I guess. The road ebbed and flowed
and we stopped over for breakfast of idly with coconut chutney and spicy sauce, which was so tasty...and so fresh, prepared that morning
and still hot, even after an hour's driving.

The ebbing and flowing was punctuated by check points for the elections that were going on, which mainly meant that the traffic slowed down
, I didn't see much checking going on. Then there were speed bumps, which it looked like the locals had arbitrarily put in - I think
they didn't like traffic moving through their part of the road so quick, so they put a speed bump in the road. Then there were buit up towns
on the main road as well, which meant people crossing and some cross roads.

All that meant that we reached Mysore about 11.30, so about 4 hours travelling for 180 kms from Bangalore to Mysore.

Banglaore seems to be drifting larger and larger, we went past a high rise development that was home to I think 400,000 people
or 4 lakh as Tharun said - a lakh being 100,000 and a crore being 10,000,000 or 100 lakh. There were offices of Honeywell, Accenture,
Intel and a lot of other IT/ Technology/ Offshoring companies along the way out.

The Green Hotel was reasonably easy to find...Tharun asked about 10 people where it was. It's a great method of finding the way...
first, we started with the suburb - Jayalakshmipuram, so people helped us in that direction, then we started asking for the Greens Hotel
and a few knew that, though the further away we were, the more complicated the directions were...so, we'd remember maybe 2 directions...
then ask the next person, until we were on the right road, within 200 metres and we were sorted.

I thanked Tharun and Smriti and said goodbye, left to settle into the Green Hotel for a few days.

I spent a bit of time settling in, then went and had a delicious vegetable curry, 2 roti, mango juice and south indian chai
for lunch, costing me about 9 dollars all up.

By then it was about 2.30 and, judging by my experience getting places in India so far, I decided to head to the Shala, to be
there by 16.30 to register. I took my first autorickshaw ride, with the help of the security guard at the gate. It was all of a
10 minute ride to the Shala in Gokulam...so, I was there waay early, by just before 3. Turns out the office was opening at
4, so I thought I'd have an hour to kill. There was a guy at the Shala who asked if I had accommodation, I'd planned to work
that out on the weekend, but it turned out to be a good opportunity, as Shiva lived about 3 doors up on the other side of the
road from the Shala. Shiva's business card says he is a Personal Assistant and can help organise Scootar, among a few other essentials
..including "Housing"...so I was introduced and introduced myself...said I was looking to spend about 10-15k rupee for 3 months...
Shiva closed his eyes, working through an inventory of accommodation he kept, in his head I guess. Told me about 2 places - 1 for 15k,
one for 6k, which are in the next street from the Shala. So we went round, checked out both places. The one for 15k has kitchen,
washing machine, internet, ups and a nice communal area...i checked the other one, a floor up in the same 3 storey building..
and decided on the place for 15k rupee, figuring that since I'd paid 10k for 3 nights in Bangalore, 15k for a month was pretty
good.

Shiva's offsider, I think his son, took me on the back of his scooter to an ATM, I took 20k, we went back to Shiva and went into
his office = garage and took care of business.

By then it was nearly 4, so I wandered back up to the shala...it was still a bit before, so I walked back towards the mainish
street and met Mane, another guy who organises stuff for yogis. A rickshaw driver and business man. Nice guy, who said there
weren't too many people round, most had left because of the heat...

I went back to the Shala and Prakash said that the office was nearly open...I waited 5...he told me to come in...my first
steps in the shala, through to the office to meet Saraswati...who asked whether I'd already sent a registration...i said yes,
in January...Saraswati didn't check, then had me fill in another, slightly different registration form, on the front was the same
stuff as the online form, on the back was a condition that you weren't to practise asana anywhere else but at the shala and,
that if you were stopped at a posture by a teacher, that's what you did. I got the underlying sense of strictness and discipline...
Saraswati told me to come on Sunday, at 5, then Monday to Thursday at 5.30, which Saraswati also wrote on my registration card
as I was giving my registration and first month's payment of 27,530 rupees and handing over a passport photo, of when I had a beard...
guess i better grow a beard :)

So, back to where I'd met Mane, who'd taken off, one of the other rickshaw guys took me back to Green Hotel, for 30 rupees -
about a dollar...then I went to find an adaptor...as my Indian one didn't fit the Mysore plugs...went back to the restaurant for
some water...darned parched...and some more South Indian Spiced Marsala...a few westerners were out and about and I met Leah,
an American medical student from Arizona, who'd been in India about the same length of time as me and taken the same route.
Leah's arrangement for some training at a hospital had fallen through somehow, so she was figuring how to travel round for a month.
I gave her some tips on Ooti and Kerala and got back to my room...and here I am!