To start with, there was the Ganesh festival. This we all knew would be happening and SIP was already warning us to stay out of the city (all the more reason to go in, right?). But seriously. The way the Ganesh festival works is it began on Sunday, when I was in Bombay, although every year it changes according to the lunar calendar. People worship Lord Ganesh/Ganesha/Gunpati (choose a language) for something like 11 days, and on the 11th day or one of the odd days thereafter is the big immersion. In Hyderabad, the Ganesh idol was about 40-50 ft tall; it was quite the sight to see. On the day of the immersion, everybody who's anybody brings their own little Ganesh statue, decorates it with flowers and other pooja items, and tosses it into the lake. The big one, however, begins to be moved at around 9 at night, it takes about 6 hours just to get it over to the lake where a crane is waiting to immerse it into the lake. It sounds harmless, and luckily the day of the immersion is both a holiday as well as a dry day throughout the city. The only issue with it is that since we do live in a city comprised of about half hindus half muslims there have been riots in the past. So there's Thursday for you.
On Wednesday, as you may or may not have heard, the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh went missing. So here's the added twist to the week. On Thursday, yes, the day of the immersion, we find out that he has died in a helicopter crash. Thursday was also the day that about 95% of the SIP students were leaving for separate travels over the weekend. We were told to leave about 3 hours earlier than we would normally because there could be road blockages, so we all did. I was planning to go to Bijapur and Becca to Bangalore, so we decided to take an auto to the train station together. No big deal, two white girls in an open rickshaw with tons of luggage. The first time we were stopped by motorcycles. There was a motorcycle gang with black flags and sticks driving around forcing all the shops along its path to close. The gang was mostly 20-30 year old men, volatile, immature and with a group mentality. One of the motorcyclists cornered the rickshaw into the median, but after some maneuvering our autowallah managed to get us out of there. Along the sides and in the middle of the roads there was who-knows-what burning. Finally we roll up to a gang of about 20 men, same age and maturity level, on foot and with sticks. When they saw the auto they came after it and started banging it with the sticks, yelling at the driver for working on a day of mourning, but then, ooh what's that, two white girls with tons of luggage. Hey there ladies, what are you up to. And here's where I felt the adrenaline rush through me. Twenty men, open rickshaw, nobody around to help. Luckily, we managed to make a big enough diversion that the group split in two and our autowallah surged forward out of the crowd. Very easily the scariest moment I've had so far in India.
Needless to say, between the CM's death and the Ganesh festival, there was an interesting balance and weird tensions running throughout the city. I met up with my travel group (thank god it was 3 other guys!) and we made it to the train station from which we were supposed to depart. But, we had wait listed tickets, pretty high on the list, but nonetheless wait list. We got to the station at about 3:45 and our train wasn't supposed to leave until 7:50 (apparently there were no blockages of the train tracks). The list of who made it off the wait list wasn't even up yet, so we walked around in search of dinner. Everything was closed though, or at least looked closed. We decided a hotel was our best bet for a restaurant to still be open, so we went into the Quality Inn (which is like a solid 4 star hotel here). Not only did it have a restaurant, it had a really sketchy bar. We got led down to the garage, through the kitchen up a flight of stairs, down a flight of stairs, through a few doors to finally get to the bar. We had to take that route because they couldn't open their front door to patrons because they were supposed to be closed. The food menu at this place was ridiculous. We ordered spring rolls, french fries, then cheese pineapple sticks and nuggets chilly. It was different to say the least.
When it got to be close enough to when our train was leaving, we went back and checked the list, but we weren't on it. Options: buy the general ticket and sit on cold hard seats for 10 hours over night or bail. We bailed.
Like I said before, I was traveling with three guys this weekend. So imagine, then, that you're at the sketchiest bar of your life, drinking cheap booze, having just lost your weekend plans. Where do you go? Vijayawada. What a great name. Really.
So Friday we all head out to the bus station. Friday has been declared a state holiday for mourning the death of YSR Reddy. I would like to take this chance to reinforce the fact that I live in the capital of Andhra Pradesh, a city of 9 million people, and also the city where YSR Reddy's body will be brought and remains kept. On the way to the bus station, yet again in a rickshaw, we see masses of people flooding in the same direction, and when I look a little farther ahead, I see rioting. Thankfully so does the autowallah and detours us. However, in our detour we come down a stretch of road lined for 3 city blocks with thousands of people and police. We drove right down the center, slowly but surely, and boy did we get some looks. It was another tense moment, but at least there weren't sticks and there were police. I'm pretty sure that was the way they were going to bring YSR's body later in the day.
We finally made it on the bus and out of the city. Lunch was on the bus and consisted of a bag of chips and soda. Six hours later we made it to Vijayawada. We checked into this dingy little hotel for Rps. 320 a room a night and went hunting for food. But wait, here's the kicker: State holiday, everything closed. When they say everything closed, they mean it. We walked for about 4 city blocks before we found a little bakery packed with people. So dinner was, yup, bread. We bought the bread, brought it back to the hotel, ate and played cards for about 6 hours.
Saturday showed up at last. We got some real food, and it was actually all of our first times eating indian food restaurant style. Dosas all around, eating with your hand despite everything being covered in dust including you. It was really good though. Afterwards we checked out some caves that ended up being really neat, check the pick of me standing next to the giant idol. There were some beautiful views from the top, too. Then we headed over to the Durga temple on top of the hill which was absolutely huge and even had one mini temple made entirely of gold. After lunch and a short rest, we went to the fort a couple of towns over. That was huge too, but the view was the most impressive I've seen yet. We had an unimpeded view of about 5 cities/towns. By the end we were exhausted, went back, got some dinner, played some cards, nothing special.
Sunday (today) we didn't have anything to do really so we wandered through the city. We went shopping for ridiculous guys' shirts. I need to take some pics of random men here just to show you guys the ridiculous shirts and pants they wear here. The guys are also really really small here, so after 3 stores and about 15 shirts we found one shirt that fit a guy in the group. There will at least be pictures of that one to come in the near future.
Just got home after an even longer bus ride and dinner and the most glorious shower of my life, so I think I'm heading to bed. But definitely a weird, weird week and weekend. I'll add pics tomorrow
Here are all of my 23 pics: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=154441&id=642705832&l=28c03862ae
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