Saturday

We actually had something resembling a coherent plan for this day: a run by the City Market then a visit to Lalbagh Botanical Gardens.

Carli, her brother, Aneesa and Adam originally planned to visit a (in my opinion suspicious) water park that day, but Aneesa woke up with Nuclear Stomach and had to decline. So the others decided to meet up with us later. I was happy to hear this because in my opinion water parks and amusement parks in genera are more like elaborate, perverse forms of torture then actual fun. I do not why people are willing to pay exorbiant prices to be thrown in the air, terrified, soaked, and spun around until they barf but I am not falling for the trick. Well, I do like the California State Fair. But that's only because it has the World's Biggest Horse. And humongous turkey legs that can be used as weapons.

Where was I?

I had a sudden attack of deathly hunger and ran down to get lunch at the Breeze restaurant. To my suprise, their fish tikka (spiced grilled fish chunks) was incredibly delicious, and just about a perfect healthy meal when taken with a green salad. Indian green salads are composed of cucumber, tomato, and sliced carrot, and thus unlikely to make you ill, although of course you should never order one except in impeccably clean restaurants. (You may be suprised to find there are many impeccably clean restaurants in India, especially in Bangalore.)

I met up with the others and we rickshawed over to the City Market, which I had attempted to visit before on multiple occasions but had never actually been able to find. I wish I'd come sooner - it's the perfect Indian market, full of people and color and excitement. The people at the market were genuinely glad to see and curious about our home countries, and I loved having quick conversations with all manner of people passing through - mentioning I was from California to drooly young men always elicited a very positive response. Quite a few protective older folks made sure we weren't lost and guided us to where we needed to go as well - when lost in India, just find the nearest old person and look pathetic.

In any case, we walked by endless rows of vegetable sellers dealing lurid purple eggplants and giant, nobby daikon radishes - which gave way to eager fruit sellers, attempting to sell me pomegranates (yum), grapes (double yum) and durian (kill me now.) I did buy a 10 rupee pomegranate from a rather fetching fruit salesboy, who cheerily sliced it up for me and stuck it in a cleverly designed newspaper bag.

I munched on this as we walked up to the main market complex, a decripet four story open-air building full of people peddling most things you could posibly need - ranging from industrial strength metal cookery ware to banana leaves for southern-style dining events to lots and lots of bangles. There was a sort of gap between the outside market and the inside market into which the food sellers threw their excess product, and we were treated to the entertaining sight of a healthy herd of cows chewing on trashed watermelons in the half-darkness below us.

By far the highlight was the flower market, full of hordes of sellers pedalling gorgeous intricately woven flower garlands and bouquets, coiled up on each other like snakes on the cluttered salesroom floor - an arresting sight when viewed from one floor up. The salesmen had an utterly charming habit of giving me flowers as I passed by, and I amassed a collection of lovely roses and geraniums as I wandered through, which I put in my hair with enthusiam but little grace. (They kept on falling out.)

The others had begun to starve for lunch, so we took a rickshaw over to the botanical gardens. I decided to stay at the garden's enterance and recieve the others who were coming to meet us since I had already eaten. Unfortunately, this meant I signed up to be in the photos of quite a few Indian tourists - but what the hell, it doesn't hurt me any.

Adam came to find me and I hung out with the others for a bit as they ate big fluffy dosas and pakoras in the somewhat gungy vegetarian restaurant they'd selected. After the usual tortorous process of paying the bill, we went into the garden.

Lalbagh is a lovely oasis from the beeping horn and homocidal rickshaw infested expanse of greater Bangalore, and I enjoyed it very much. The others parked themselves on a nice stretch of grass to chat, but I wandered off to find a tree to (illegally) climb. I clambered around for a bit on a particularly impressive banyan, chasing the geckos that lurked in the roots and trying to ignore yet another gathering, mostly male fan club. (I did pose for a photo with a lovely girl in a brilliant blue sari.)

I climbed another tree but the friendly chaat salesman parked outside waved me down before the fuzz got me. I guess being tossed in Indian prison for tree climbing might be embarassing. I wandered through a few lovely bamboo groves, avoided some terrifying monkeys, and to my suprise found the lake reputed to be in the center of the garden that I had somehow managed to miss on previous visits. This was lovely and I decided to go back and get the others.

Upon meeting the others I found myself the new best buddy of yet another stray dog, who came over and curled up coquettishly in my arms after I scratched her behind the ears. She refused to leave and I was quite comfortable with the situation myself (she seemed to have only a few fleas), so I hung out with the dog for a bit, watching the purple sky go down, realizing that it's difficult to have hard feelings about the universe when a stray dog likes you and the weather is good. Angst can be difficult to maintain.

We walked all the way around the lake as the sun went down, then headed back to Thippasandra. We had yet another tasty meal at the Clay Pot - prawn curry, aloo gobi, butter chicken, vegetable curries - then headed back to the house.

The others decided to visit the Night Boozer, a deeply sketchy looking bar located on our street. I was incredulous but decided to go along anyway. It ended up being a hoot: a dark, smoky sort of place filled with Indian men slamming Kingfisher and whiskey and paying us palefaces little mind. I tried and mostly failed to learn to play Blackjack and drank my usual cheapo whiskey. A satisfying night all around.