Hanging Out in Historic Hyderabad

One recent Friday night, John and I took an overnight train to Hyderabad, the capital of the state of Andhra Pradesh. The plan was for John to spend weekend and for me to stay an extra four days, visiting friends who were raised there, and their families. We stayed at a local Brahmin-owned hotel where I happened to notice that one of the rules posted on the door was that no meat products were allowed in the rooms. I chuckled about it then, but a few days later returned from a day of sightseeing with half my uneaten lunch, and had to prove that it was “veg” (a paneer, aka cheese, and vegetable kabob wrapped in a rhoti, or Indian flatbread) before they would stash it in the kitchen refrigerator.



With a population of ten million people, Hyderabad is one of India’s biggest cities and is plagued with the same infrastructure issues we are accustomed to in Bangalore. Like Bangalore, it is a center for IT companies (called Cyberabad) most of which are located outside the city center in an area called Hi-Tec City. The difference is that Hyderabad has a much richer cultural history than Bangalore, with some outstanding monuments, which had drawn us there.

Our first stop was the Charminar, its four graceful minarets making it the building most identified with the city. Muhammad Quli Qutab Shah, the fifth sultan of the Qutb Shahi dynasty of Golconda from which they fled water shortages, built the Charminar in 1591. The sultan modeled the well-planned city of Hyderabad on the city of Esfahan in Persia. (The enormous Golconda Fort eight kilometers away was the highlight of out trip, but more on that later.)

Near the Charminar in the historic Old City stand the Mecca Masjid (mosque,) the Charkaman (Four Arches,) and the Salar Jung Museum, all to the south of the River Musi. As impressive to me as the monuments were the twisting lanes and warrens that make up the bazaars.













The major products sold there are textiles (most of the vendors seemed to be primarily wholesalers who would also sell retail) and pearls. Pearls have in fact given Hyderabad one of its names: The City of Pearls. (The other name is the City of Nizams reflecting the dynasty that ruled Hyderabad from 1722 until Indian independence.)












We enjoyed the Salar Jung Museum that houses the largest one-man collection of antiques in the world. Salar Jung, a prime minister of the Nizam, amassed the eclectic collection. The work, which I wasn’t allowed to photograph, is diverse and includes art objects from the East and West. A small canteen-like cafeteria provided an economical lunch without to leave the building.
The next day we got a car and driver and set out for Golconda Fort, with its outermost wall’s circumference of about 7 kilometers, one of the most impressive monuments of its time that I have seen anywhere. Golconda was rebuilt for defense from invading Mughals from the north. Its builders designed a perfect acoustical system by which a hand clap sounded at the fort's main gates, the grand portico, could be heard at the top of the citadel, situated on a 300 foot (91 meter) high granite hill.

We found a small celebration going on at a Hindu temple tucked in the bowels of the fort. We spent most of an afternoon exploring the fort by day, and I returned a few days later for the impressive evening Sound and Light Show.










The tombs of the Qutb Shahi sultans lie about one kilometer north of Golconda's outer wall. These 82 structures are made of beautifully carved stonework, and surrounded by landscaped gardens. All but two kings of the dynasty are entombed there, plus relatives, dancers, singers, and doctors who served the kings.

After John left, my friends and I spent a day in an activity that was a complete departure from Hyderabad’s historic monuments: a visit to the Ramoji Film City, an integrated film studio cum theme park. Its nearly 3,000 acres earned a designation in the Guinness Book of World Records for being the largest film studio in the world. The shows, including a wild west stunt show, were professional, and the rides fun for the children I was with.










But the most interesting aspect was the bus tour through movie sets that represent locations throughout the world. These include a Japanese garden, artificial waterfalls, airport terminal, hospital, railway station, churches, mosques, temples, shopping plazas, palace interiors, chateaus, rural complexes, and urban dwellings. 80 films in several languages such as Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Marathi and Bangali have been produced there in the twelve years of its existence.









Other attractions I enjoyed in Hyderabad:

1. The boat ride that takes visitors across the lake in Lumbini Park to see a large Buddha on a small island.

2. Birla Mandir: a Hindu temple made of white marble located on top of a hill overlooking the city.

3. Birla Planetarium with shows that unveil the mysteries of the cosmos and the origins of the universe, in various languages.

Hindu Rituals at Baby Birthday Party

Last weekend we were invited to a birthday party for a one-year-old baby at our residence hotel. It was a lot of fun and really interesting. I’m not sure the birthday girl knew what was going on but she definitely knew she was the center of attention. She grinned from ear to ear whenever she saw one of the many still or video cameras.







The guests were mostly young families of India American software engineers who have recently been relocated from places like Sunnyvale, San Jose, and Sacramento by companies like Intel, Cisco, and IBM. Before that they had acquired advanced degrees at such universities as Michigan, Cal Berkeley, and Louisiana State. Many had done their undergraduate work at prestigious Indian universities like IIT, reputed to be even more selective than Harvard.
The conversation was about cashing out of houses in California with the tough real estate market there, waiting for sea freight to arrive in India, and struggling to get houses and apartments up graded and furnished while they reside in temporary housing here at the Halcyon. The big shock is that an equivalent house to what they sold would cost more than the California selling price (sometimes over a million U.S. dollars) in Whitefield’s luxury sub divisions like Palm Meadows or Ozone. (See my blog post, “Bangalore Lifestyles” from May 29, 2008 for photos of Ozone: http://maryaltier.blogspot.com/2008_05_01_archive.html)



Much of the party was familiar, with face painting, games for children of all ages (and even one for the adults,) decorations, party favors and a piñata! These are all things you would be likely to see at many kids’ party in California. The young woman hennaing hands offered we women a special treat. I got one of my hands painted beautifully, and it remains vivid today.

















The most interesting thing was a ritual that the baby’s grandmother and some of the other women performed. As one of the women sang a traditional song, the baby’s grandmother, who was holding a flame, moved the smoke toward the child, being held by her mother. Then many of the guests took their turn performing the same motion, one by one.

The grandmother also laid out some hand made sweets and held the baby’s feet over them as though the child were walking on them. I looked on line to see if these were traditional South Indian rituals and found the following account by a father about his son’s traditional birthday celebrations, which sounded very similar to what I had seen:

“My mother would conduct a little ceremony called the aarti, which requires the birthday boy to sit on a chair or a low stool while she holds an oil lamp before him. He would cup his hands at a safe distance over the flames to receive its warmth and energy and then join them in salute to the flame. Fire, as you might know, is symbolic of the sacred sun for Hindus, which in turn represents life. Therefore, Hindus do not snuff out the flame but keep it alive to symbolize longevity….. She would then complete the ceremony by wishing him life's sweetness with a piece of candy popped into his mouth.”

As I watched this baby being transferred from guest to guest, I realized that her family and friends adore this child. I had seen this same love projected by families in every strata of Indian society. Those who can’t afford a party like this one still find ways to make children feel valued and appreciated.

Here are some other photos I have taken of children with loving family members during my stay in South India.

Viewing Big Game at Two Indian National Parks

Bannerghatta National Park, less than 25 kilometers from Bangalore, has got to be one of the best attractions of that city. I went with my friends the Raos. It was a lot of fun to experience the joy in the faces of Ramya, 8 and Shreya, 4 as the two of them, their mother and myself, all enjoyed the exceptional animal viewing.


The part of Bannerghatta that is unexceptional is the zoo-like area, where animals live in cages. What sets the park, and the experience apart is how they have used the 25,000 acres of space to allow visitors to see animals in a natural setting.


For under $4 U.S. visitors climb on a specially modified bus for a nearly one hour safari tour of the park. The glass windows may be opened but are screened for safety, except for holes just big enough to point a camera lens through. Security is obviously not taken lightly.

These are among the wildlife we saw at close range without bars or fences:

Tigers
Himalayan Black Bears
White Tigers
Lions

Kazeranga National Park, which I visited a few months ago, is in the far northeast region of Assam on the banks of the Brahmaputra River. Kazeranga, with 430 square kilometers (166 square miles) is a World Heritage Site. It has two thirds of the world’s Great One-horned Rhinoceroses and the highest number of tigers in a protected area anywhere.











We weren’t lucky enough to see a tiger, but we did see many rhino at close range, both on a jeep safari the afternoon of our arrival, and an elephant safari early the next morning.

During the jeep safari we asked our guide to query our seasoned driver if a rhino had ever attacked his vehicle. He told us that he had been driving for 38 years and yes, it had happened once.
“When did that happen?” our guide asked.
“Yesterday,” the driver answered.
Our guide asked again to make sure he wasn’t misinterpreting the response, because the two men spoke different native languages. It turned out to be true, confirmed later by the manager of the wilderness camp we were staying in.



The rhino had attacked and turned over the vehicle (which was still in the shop for repairs as we were asking the hard questions) and had injured the occupants. The family of four tourists from another region of India had all ended up in the hospital with, thankfully, only minor injuries.