Republic Day in Mysore

Early Saturday morning, my family and I went to a city called Mysore. Mysore used to be the capitol of Karnataka which is a state in India. Now the capitol is Bangalore. It took us 3 hours to get there. The taxi ride was a little insane! It was sort of like being in a car racing video game where you have to swerve in and out of cars, cows, bikes, people, and lots of pot holes going at top speed. Luckily we got to see monkeys sliding down ropes and it looked like they were sliding down a fire pole.


Some of the things we saw were: Tippu Sultan's grave site (Tippu was the king that Brits defeated, see picture to the far right), the Mysore Palace, the Cathedral of Philomena that was built in 1959 (right), the Mysore Zoo where we saw tigers, snakes, elephants, baboons, birds, etc..., the Lalitha Mahal Palace built in 1930 where we had lunch, a bull temple and the main temple on Chamundi Hill (see pictures below), and the Brindavan Gardens.

We were bombarded by people trying to sell us stuff. I bought a violin made out of half of a coconut and some wood and wire. We paid way too much for it - 100RS ($2.50). Our driver later told us that it should have only cost about 30RS. Since Saturday was Republic Day (a day India celebrates its Independence) they lit the Mysore Palace after dark (see pictures at the bottom). Normally, they only light the palace on Sunday evenings. After we saw the lights, we drove to Brindavan Gardens to see the fountains lit-up. It was packed with people. We didn't get home until 11:30 p.m. I threw up in the hallway of our apartment complex due to car sickness. Luckily I didn't get sick in the taxi! It was a long day but we had a great time in Mysore.