So I spent the Saturday following the late night of beer drinking touring Hyderabad slowly at my own pace.... meaning I slept in and didn't do much of anything until about 1 in the afternoon. Yeah, that's right I'm in a foriegn country on the other side of the world being lazy and wasting time.... did you guys really expect anything different?.
Anyway. I started off my day with a trip KFC, India
style! I know I know I know. I didn't fly over9,000 miles just to eat fried chicken, but sometimes you just really need some good friend food. Anyway the check was good and greasy and delicious. I also saw some of the first white anglo saxon's I've seen in Hyderabad. That was fun.
After this gluttony, I decided I should start shopping for all you people back in the states. So, I headed across town to the big IMAX theater with attached shopping center. This place is really unique, it has three floors of stores, fast food restaurants, and even an arcade. Needless to say, I spent the next hour to hour and a half getting my video game on in the arcade. Turns out, I'm pretty good at House of the Dead 4. It's a really good game by the way... nothing like the movie in other words. Turns out that i didn't really want to buy you guys anything.... yet hahahaha ;-)
After my fun at the arcade, the sun was getting low in the sky so I decided to go over to Husain Sagar and visit the Buddha statue on the lake. It was pretty much sunset when I got there and I had to take this picture with a slow shutter speed in order to be able to see his face. That's why it looks like he is glowing.
I hung around on the little island for quite some time. got some good pictures of the sunset... sunsets are amazing here by the way. The sky lights up like fire. I have a couple more of a 
different night where it is more intense. The only thing i can't stand about this photo is the stupid billboard right under neath the sun. kind of dectracts from the whole thing. ehhh can't always be perfect right? hehehe
After this outing, I made a quick stop over to a "handicraft" store in hopes to get an idea of some of the merchandise to purchase. They have some really amazing stuff. Some of it is worth every penny, while others just make you say "huh?!?!?! you want how much for that hunk of wood". This place did have some amazing shawls.. there's another word for it, but I can't remember. lots and lots of hand stiching and embroidery. I actually saw one that cost 40,000 rupees.... that's about $1000 for those of you keeping track. It was simply amazing to look at. The stiching was superb and you could not see a loose thread anywhere.
Ok, I must bid you adeu for now to get some MUCH needed rest. I wish you well from India!
Out and About on My Own...
I'll have a beer please
I started out the weekend of the 27th going to a pub with Nitin and Venkatesh. We decided to go to a more restaurant style pub where we could sit, drink, and converse. This was my first taste of India beer. Apparently there are two main Indian beers: Royal Challenge, and Kingfisher. This night, we chose to drink Kingfisher... I think that may also be because they didn't serve Royal Challenge at the pub we went to. This place was very .... posh. It felt like a fancy American 
bar actually. Two large LCD tv's that were showing the Pakistan vs India cricket match. We had ... a couple pitchers, some chicken drumsticks (i think they were tandorri style), Apollo Fish, and some really great roasted cashews.
We had a fantastic conversation through the course of the evening, discussing topics such as the caste system, differences in communication styles between cultures, and even arranged marriages. It was an awesome evening. It wish it could have lasted longer, but simply put.... I was exhausted. So I headed home around 1 to catch some zzz's before my first day out in Hyderabad by myself. YIPEE!!!
Apollo Fish - This is my first fish dish and man was it good. It was the second spiciest dish I've had here in India. I wish I could describe the taste a bit better for you... It's basically fish which they batter then fry after which they stir fry with some spices and then serve it with curry leaves. It's delicious. I HIGHLY recomend trying it. Be prepared, it is spicy... about as spicy as really hot salsa.
The Charminar
You may be asking yourself "What's the Charminar?" Well, literally translated Charminar means "Four Spires". Fitting name huh?
The Charminar is actually pretty cool. It was build in 1591 by then sultan Muhammad Quli Qutub Shah (pronounced Cooly Ka-tube Sha... I think) to commemorate the eradication of plague that was devastating his kingdom. His kingdom was that of Golconda (see post titled "A little bigger taste of India"). He was the fourth sultan of the Qutb Shah dynasty and founded Hyderabad. The city was named after his favorite dancer who, according to legend, was his lover and eventually became his wife.
There is actually, or was rather, a secret tunnel from the Charminar to Golconda Fort some 10km away. Sorry folks, I would have walked it, but the tunnel has been blocked off for some time now. Oh well. You also can not go any higher than the first terrace level (where you see all the people). It is actually a lot higher up than it looks in this picture. Check out part of the spiral stairs we had to climb to get to the top. Say hello to everyone Dayakar. He is part of the QA team here in India and had the pleasure of taking me on a mini tour around Hyderabad that Sunday.
From the terrace you can see over top of all the surrounding buildings. If it hadn't been overcast, you can actually see the top of Golconda Fort (You could see it, but the picture I took doesn't look like much) and Birla Temple. There is also a really good view of one of the most famous mosques in Muslim faith; Mecca Masjid. It is named such because according to legend, some of the bricks used to construct its main arch were brought to Hyderabad from Mecca.
Construction of the mosque was started by the same ruler that built the Charminar, Sultan Muhammad Quli Qutub Shah in 1617. However, it wasn't completed until 1694 by the Mughals who had taken over Golconda. So, for those of you with poor math skills, the mosque took 77 years to build. It was a really inspiring place. Just stepping through the gate and standing next to the pond in front of the mosque, you feel as if you are standing on holy ground.
All around Charminar is a bizzaar filled with handicrafts. This area is actually very well known for it's pearls and bangles and pearl bangles hahaha. I'm actually planning to go back here to do some shopping. I wasn't able to go around very much to really explore all the buying possibilities while I was there. Partly because of how unbeleivably tired I was from travelling all around the previous two days, and partly because I was still adjusting to the new timezone, eating habits, and schedule. The third part was 
the traffic around Charminar. Because it is the most popular tourist spot in Hyderabad along with all the shops in every direction, the roads are PACKED with cars and "autos." Autos are the three wheeled yellow vehicles you see in this photo. As busy as this photo looks, just think.... I went on a holiday. On holidays, everyone heads home to be with their families, so this is light traffic since there are so few people in the city. I think Ryan saw it during regular busy times. As bad as it was, I can't imagine it being worse than this. I nearly got run over 15 times and I only crossed the road twice!
After the Charminar, Dayakar and I tried to go to the Salar Jung Musuem. We fought our way through all the traffic only to be denied entrance due to the musuem being closed for the holiday. DANGIT! It's ok though, we were able to go the next weekend WOOHOO! We also tried to go ride a camel on the Necklace RD, but were denied that as well... but guess what "we were able to go the next weekend WOOHOO!" hehehe You know you love me and my humor!
You know the best part about ending this post.... I finally finished writting about my first weekend in India WOOOOTAAAAAH!!! Go Matt!
Closest I've been to Hollywood...
Ok, I know this is really late, but i'm finally able to sit down and write up my activities from last saturday... yeah ... I mean 10/20/2007 hehehe.
I only had to travel 9,000 miles to finally make it Hollywood. HAHAHA. So I spent the day in Ramoji Film City. It was described to me to be similar to Universal Studios. At 1666 acres, it is the "largest integrated fim studio complex" in the world.
The setting was simply magnificent. It is about 25km(~16miles) outside Hyderabad to the South. However, I am staying in the North end of Hyderabad, so combining that distance and the traffic, the drive took about an hour and half. It didn't seem to take that long especially with Chanti, his wife, and her brother as company. 
On the way, we stopped at a fruit stand just outside the city since I had not eaten breakfast. We picked up a couple apples and an umma granite (see picture to the right). This was an amazingly interesting fruit. Each "cell" that you see can be pulled out whole and is filled with juice. The guy told us this one was seedless, but it clearly wasn't. Each of the little cell's also has a seed. They aren't super hard, taste a little like sunflower seeds. Not sure I can come up with a good comparison for the juice other than it was delicious.
Ramouji Film City is set in an area similar to the Hill Country in Texas. 
hehehe ok, now some real pictures of the gardens and backdrops
Like those better? Just after we went through some of the gardens we entered a mock cave where they had built a replica of several different caves around India, 
including one with a rather large statue of Buda (the snake picture was taken inside of this cave replica). Inside the cave they had employees wearing gray robes so they would blend in to the cave and not intrude on the guests experience. Lots of people found them scary and started screaming. YAY for 12 year olds!! When we exited the cave, it had started raining heavily so we ducked back inside the cave to stay dry. Imagine 100 people crammed into a 10x10 room and you'll know what it felt like. After the rain stopped, we caught the bus back to the main area of RFC only to find out we had missed the Western Stunt Show. Either that or it had been canceled, I'm not sure. So, we caught another bus out of the park and headed back to Hyderabad.
This was the same weekend as Vijayadashami (aka Dussehra). It is a celebration of good over evil when the Goddess Durga vanquishes the demon* Mahishasura. I was really lucky and Chanti took me to her temple to see the decorations and so they could briefly worship. It was an amazing thing to see. There were lights EVERYWHERE!!
Inside there were strings of flowers hanging from the ceiling and draped to the walls. Yellow and red were the main colors with smatterings of white here and there. In this photo you can see a young girl about the age of 6 or 7 dancing one of the classical dances to the diety. In the background you can see an example of the 
strings of flowers being draped through out the entire temple. I apologize for the exposure... it was near impossible to get good photos because of not using a flash and all the yellow and red flowers everywhere. We stayed and watched three dances and then left. It was an awesome experience and I'm really glad Chanti and his family were willing to take me to this temple and show me around and explain everything that was going on. The next day were the main festivities and the line to get in to the temple we visited extended around the temple and filled the quarter mile 4 lane road leading up to the temple (this temple is a very popular one for Durga). That night they set off several fireworks in different places around the city. I was not expecting this and started to get really nervous at the first couple "explosions". So I went up on the roof and saw that it was merely fireworks going off on the corner.
Next up: The Charminar
*demon merely means "evil not god" it does not have such a powerful negative conotation as the english meaning behind the word "demon"