One day in Hyderabad

I went on a day-long tour with Robyn, a friend of an Asmita funder who was in town visiting.

Robyn

The tour guide was really funny - though, apparently, only to me and Robyn. He kept yelling "Challo! Ayie!" ("Let's go! Please come!") every five minutes.

The White Temple was built in the 1970's. You take off your shoes to enter and get to enjoy walking barefoot on the smooth cold white Marble.

Photos at the white temple, including one I took at night when I was there with my roommates

Women selling coconuts for Pooja purposes outside the Temple; school kids waiting to go in the Temple.

Cell phones and cameras are strictly forbidden inside the white temple. When you walk in the locker room, you can hear a handful of cell phones ringing at once from these shelves.

We drove around the Charminar but didn't get out. I took this photo another time when I went there with my roommates.

The Nizam Museum

Reason there are no photos from inside the Nizam museum (Rs50 = $1.25 per photo)

Lots of places in India charge extra above the ticket price for cameras and video cameras. Also many sites charge tourists ten times more than Indians. I made my case for paying Indian prices - I work and live in India - and everywhere but Golkonda let me in at Indian ticket price.

Nizam Palace


We stopped for a much-needed lunch at a restaurant with a veg buffet. I was eating with my hands (as is the tradition in South India) and felt something in the baigan bartha that didn't feel like eggplant. I brought it up to the counter and asked them what it was. "It's Brinjal ('eggplant' in India English), ma'am." "No," I said. "This is meat." About five other workers came over and began to examine the hunk of flesh on my plate, and finally came to the conclusion that it's mutton (lamb). Another worker made a new plate from the buffet for me and tried to hand it to me, but I refused to take it. I had almost finished eating anyway, and could easily make myself another plate if I had wanted (after all, that's how I got the first two plates, isn't it). As I am used to complaining at restaurants both because I work in one and because I was vegan for five years and got used to sending about 50% of food ordered at restaurants back for alterations, I went on. "There was mutton in my brinjal! This is a veg buffet!" I said. "This is India! You can't do this here!" As if I had said the magic words, a worker refunded my buffet money (to Robyn, who had paid) and gave both me and Robyn mango ice cream with carmalized apricot (mmmmm). Seriously though... who does that in India.

Golkonda Fort

Golkonda is beautiful. There are around 350 stairs to get to the top. The Temple is on the way up, the pavilion building structures are at the top, and has giant Andhra rocks everywhere. There were a handful of teenage boys trying to take out photo or trying to take photos with us (we refused, but allowed some girls to take photos with us). There were many young couples here, and at the other sites we visited, seemingly hiding in a tourist venue where no one they know would find out about their secret trysts.