Tag: Srirangapatnam

MyCycle Tours begin again

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After soooooo long without leading tours, they are now coming thick and fast, recently with a tour each week and for good measure a short cycle ride with a little known girl.

Grabbing a dosa for breakfast on the island is becoming popular

Todays tour was for Tilley and Jessie friends from the UK who I know through a very good friend Emma. Also on the tour was someone who will remain ‘nameless’ for a little longer.

They are travelling throughout India and I’m exhausted hearing about it, but its sounds that its been fun and as with all of us learned so much from the wonderful experiences that INDIA provides to us all.

Spotting the sheep, flowers, goats, butterflies and birds, not to forget the general craziness, has always been a popular part of the tour, a new interest has become the dung beetles. They’ve also met Kaveri, or at least the goddess, and the mini version of her will join us for breakfast.

Today we had to contend with the guide running out of petrol en route to the island, a political demonstration and our route blocked by trees. Nothing is ever straightforward in India seems a slight understatement.

MyCycle Tours will be available again in September.

Dr Moonstone

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We were over half way into the Srirangaptnam cycle tour and after a brief visit to the bathing ghats stopped for a chai. This and the adjoining shops sold soaps, shampoos, jugs, Plastic loofah things for rubbing off old skin, towels, everything for pooja and even clothes.

Today the t shirts drew my attention.

In India many T shirts have slogans that are , possibly innocent and other down right weird. I expect that many who wear them have no idea what they mean. They can be hilarious.

Well at one of the stalls today was a T shirt with the word MOONSTONE emblazoned across the top. Know what that is? A semi precious gem stone found in many places, including India and Sri Lanka. The picture however was an image of the moon and a US Astronaut, a complete disconnect. Of course the designer had made an incongruous connection between the moon and the stone.

There is however another connection. What’s reputed to have been the first detective novel in the English language in the late 19th Century was also called Moonstone. Confusingly it’s referring to a fictitious diamond and not the gem.

The weirdest bit is the story is about An English army officer who steals the diamond and the consequences for him and his family. He gets the stone in the fourth war of Mysore, yes you’ve guessed it in Srirangaptnam.

Spooky eh?

a wedding ceremony

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a ceremony but where?

you already know, there was only one place to choose for our wedding and the formalities themselves were completed at the registry office 🙂

no it wasn’t in a glitzy bhavan with hall for reception (means a totally different thing out here – its the photo opportunity and gift giving session with the newlyweds seated on thrones on a stage) and another hall to feed hundreds, nor a band, althoug that would have been nice

instead, we decided on Srirangaptnam island, of course  …… my favourite place. As you may have seen already we chose a tree in a field

once we decorated the tree… all sounds a bit pagan 😉

we made final personal preparations at Satish’s house…

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there were around twenty guests: local friends and members of our team,

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Vasanth’s family (V was ill), Satish (project manager) and his family, Rakesh (mr energy), Lokesh, Babu, Vidya ( a good friend who transcribed Manjula’s recordings) Heechang and her friend and family (husband Justin was away picking Henna), Asha, my yoga teacher, her family and Suresh, (who arrived fashionably late so aren’t n this photo) and the friends from the UK: Mike and Sue, Tom and Amy. We’re sorry to say that Tanu, Vasanth and Vinay were indisposed with a heavy bug so they just had to watch the royal wedding ceremony on the TV (I’m joking, OK) and not together!

the ceremony itself

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we and the children used a traditional Mysorean Tonga (horse drawn taxi) to our next stop

20170304-DSC03432where we visited  one of the wonderful riverside locations on Srirangaptnam for a prayer  beside the Kaveri and to float our flowers

followed by lunch

and finally …. tea and cakes at Satish’s house

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here’s a link to the full set off photos of the wedding ceremony and here for the meal