Mumbai fun

The last post in this series is here..

We went from Cochin to Mumbai and had two full days in Mumbai before our return flight to the US.

Having visited so many temples every day in Tamilnadu and Kerala, why stop. While San was busy trying to get blouses stitched urgently, MIL and me went out to visit local temples. We visited 3 that morning.

Later went with San to another local temple and visited what is probably the worlds best one stop beauty store. (you can see it in the video).. 

We managed to eat out a few times..

watch three movies in two days.. the movie theater is the building next to in-laws apartment. We can just walk down and go see movies!

Here are two lapata ladies at lapata ladies..

Then we spent an evening at Ambani center. It was a stark contrast to the other shopping we did. The stores and complex was grand but there were no people in the stores! 

We walked around, took pictures and drove back in time to get some rest before flying out the next morning.

A video highlight..

The return flight was not direct. It was Mumbai to B'lore and then to SFO. The airport in Bengaluru was nice. We actually enjoyed the two hour wait.

Then there was a disaster of a return trip where the tail section of the flight had no power! 

No way to charge phone/laptop, call the air hostess, or watch anything. It was a horrible 16 hours in a plane with a local power cut. They werent even apologetic. We were to get some money back as token compensation for this horrible trip and it has been 6 months plus and we still don't have anything from Air India. There has been 20 + emails back and forth and a check leaf was wasted. That was about it. They have bought all these used planes from Delta airlines and are flying it BLR to SFO. Ratan Tata must be sad now that he can see what is going on from wherever he is!

The trip on the whole though was a happy one. Checked all the items that were in the plan. Did so much in 10 days! 

Now that I have finally finished posting about the India trip in Feb/March, can get back to otehr things that have happened since!

Tanjavoor to Guruvayoor

The previous post in this series is here..

We boarded the train at Tanjavoor close to a 7PM and it was to reach Thrissur in Kerala at 4AM. The train was 40 minutes late. FIL had booked a hotel room right next to the train station just so we could go, take a shower, change to dhotis and get going. We did get okay rest in the train given people kept changing at every station and kept waking us up. 

We reached the hotel at 5 AM, had some dip tea, and all four of us got ready in record time and were at the Sree Vadakkumnathan Temple before sunrise. The sun was just coming up when we came out of the temple. 

Then we went to the Thiruvambady Krishna temple which was just 5 or 10 minutes away.

After this we had a long car ride to Guruvayoor. We stopped for a quick bite to eat.. idly sambar and vadai at a local place (this is not related to HSB.. but the food is better!)

There was a ticket for an appointment with Guruvayoorappan at 9AM. However there was an utsavam and we found out that we should not have been sold those tickets. The temple staff said sorry and told us we will get the money back! Money or not, we wanted to see the deity before leaving. So we stood in line for 2 hours almost and got to go only so far to see the deity from 20 feet away for a few seconds before being pushed out. 

It was an interesting experience. Kerala temple crowds are really agressive. Especially the old ladies! 

The lines to keep your cell phone and footwear s a mile long! We still had fun at this temple. There was a person singing who we mistook for Yesudas first before walking to the area (you can see in video clip).. the stores on either side were cute and the ladies bought Onam sarees! 

Then we went to a shiva vishnu temple in Mamiyoor which was the last stop. It is a beautiful temple!

There was a plan to visit Chottanikkarai baghavathy amman temple which was an hours drive from there, but given we saw baghavathi in Guruvayoor, we decided to skip.

My MIL's close friend stayed in Cochin on the way to the airport. So we went to visit Kamala aunty and her husband for an evening chai visit and then head to the airport.

We saw elephants on this day. At the temples and on the roads. A land with elephants is a happy land!

a land with bananas galore is definitely a happy land..

We stopped by a place for lunch. It was awesome!

It was great to talk to them and spend a few hours. As I write this, Uncle is no more. He passed away recently. An extremely nice person. We were all glad we got to spend time with him. 

A video highlight of the Kerala leg of the trip

Then we were off to Cochin airport and flew to Mumbai. 

We had almost two days in Mumbai before our return trip to the US. That last post later..

An evening in Tanjore

The last post in this series is here..

We were done with Trichy and were on our way to Tanjore via Kallanai.. Hindsight being 20/20 we could have skipped that as it was a detour. Still we went on the bridge across the empty Cauvery river and back and kept going.

We reached Tanjore and the Big temple was going to open at 4PM. Our train from Tanjore to Guruvayoor was at 6:30 or so. 

We spent a good hour in the Tanjore museum. The ladies were taking a nap in the car while I did the rounds with FIL. There were five sections to this complex. We spent most of the time in the museum with the bronze and stone statues. 

there were some interesting things about the Tamil letters and their evolution.

Then my trusted Bata chappal just ripped in two. Walked the last 20 minutes with that. Then we made it to the Big temple 15 minutes before it opened and were walking around and taking pictures.

The amazing giant Nandi (bull) at the big temple!

stray dogs asking for belly rubs (and they do get rubs from visitors!)

a slideshow of some of the temple pics..

As soon as we got to see Brigadeeswarar, we made it back to the car. There was a flying stop at a local Bata store to get a replica of the exact chappal and we still had 30 minutes. Had the yummiest Rava dosa in a restaurant just across the station area and we spent the last 1/2 hour at the train station, drinking tea, enjoying the sunset. 

This temple complex is mind boggling.

Built using elephants for labor and has stood a 1000 years. Now elephants are hardly there!

A video clip from this leg of the trip..

Our Guruvayoor area visits on the next post!