Marvellous, Magical Mysore

Mysuru, Monday, 13th May

We spent today exploring Mysuru, the local name I have preferred to use in my writings. That name can be seen everywhere, along with the still used Mysore. See below for a short name background (and a direct take from wiki) [and as a political aside, I read recently that Elon and the MAGA crowd hate wiki, which of course give me all the more reason to continue to support them financially]:

“The name Mysore is an anglicised form of Mahiṣūru, which means "the abode of Mahiṣa" in the vernacular Kannada. The common noun Mahiṣa, in Sanskrit, means buffalo; in this context, however, Mahiṣa refers to Mahishasura, a mythical daemon who could assume the form of either a human or a buffalo, and who, according to Hindu mythology, ruled the ancient parts of Mysore Kingdom, known in Sanskrit as Mahiṣaka, centred at Mahiṣapura. He was killed by the goddess Chamundeshwari, whose temple is situated atop the Chamundi Hill, after whom it is named. Mahishapura later became Mahisūru (a name which, even now, the royal family uses), and finally came to be rendered as Mysore by the British and Maisūru (Mysuru) in the vernacular Kannada language.”

During our earlier time in Bengaluru I had started to become aware of the Wadiyars (who have various spellings), the Maharaja of Mysore dynasty which started around the year 1399 and continued, with a couple of interruptions, until Indian independence in 1947 and the abolition of the “princely states” in the 1950s. Those interruptions were chiefly a period of Islamic rule from 1761- 1799 and of course the Brits from 1831 – 1881. The principal Islamic ruler was Tipu Sultan, who I mentioned a few days back; we visited his mausoleum just outside Mysuru this afternoon – more on that later.

The recent Wadiyars appear to have been quite benign dictators (if that is indeed a reasonable description), supporting all sorts of agricultural and community development projects. Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV, the 24h and second last of the formal Maharajas (1884 – 1940), would seem to have been a particularly wise ruler, widely revered (and immensely wealthy). See here. It was he (and his mother)who commissioned the construction of the current Mysore Palace, the previous one having burnt down in 1896.

The Wadiyar line continues today (albeit with some twists and turns). The 27th head of the Wadiyar dynasty is Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar. Born in 1992 and adopted into the Wadiyar family, he is an MP for Mysore, and as best as I can tell carries the ceremonial title of the Maharaja of Mysore, albeit with no formal administrative or governance responsibilities. He does, as I understand it, play an important part in the annual 10-day Mysore Dasara which takes places in Oct/Nov annually. The festival appears to date back to at least the 14th century, although its roots are hazy. We've been told about it several times, and it seems that it is central to the culture of Mysuru.

At the risk of jumping around a bit, and longer-term readers of my blogs will be aware of this interest of mine, I remain fascinated by the intersection of religions. The construction of the Mysore Palace was overseen by a Hindu maharaja, and yet has significant Islamic (and even some Christian) overtones. Some photos later.

Earlier we had visited St Philomena's cathedral in Mysuru (see photo below), a church which would seem on first glance to be more at home in Spain or France (I understand that it is modelled to some degree on the Cologne Cathedral). Built in 1936 it was seemingly constructed with the blessing of the then Maharaja. This seemingly wide-reaching religious tolerance is fascinating (and I guess a bit of a mirror to the world today).

So with those overview comments here's a bit of a photo journal of last night’s and today's wanderings:

Earlier in our little journey, Afridi, our driver/guide, had asked if we would like to have coffee with his family, who live in Mysuru. “Of course”, was the answer. We had arrived into Mysuru a bit after midday, and first stop was to the cathedral mentioned above, followed by a couple of visits to some Mysuru silk merchants (there is a significant silk industry here).

Then at 5pm Afridi picked us up from our hotel and took us to meet the family. Delightful people. Mum (Yasmin) is 43, and was our hostess. Afridi's wife Mizba spent an hour applying a couple of lovely henna patterns to Janet's hands. Yasmin's younger sister (Afridi's aunt, didn't catch her name) dropped in and there were photos all round. Much to our protest they also fed us (biriyani). Afridi's dad wasn’t present, as he was at work (I had misunderstood previously – he works in the same business as Afridi (as a guide/driver), and was in Ooty, where we had just arrived from). In an earlier post I mentioned Afridi's disabled brother. A quiet young man of 22, he contracted polio shortly after birth, and is physciially quite limited and unfortunately intellectually disabled as well. Such a shame for the whole family, and a reality check for those of us who live an extremely privileged Western life by comparison. [When he was taking us back to our hotel Afridi requesed that we not mention to the tour organisers (here is OK) that we had been to his house, as it is against company policy. Apparently for security reasons, not that I quite understood that. Which begs the question - why did he issue the invitation? Two reasons I think. One, we are a bit of a curiosity and he's never met any Aussies before (most of his clients are Indians from "up north" (Mumbai), so that's understandable, but two, I think moreso, we expressed a genuine interest in his family, and he wanted us/them to meet.]

Afridi dropped us back to the hotel a little before 7pm. Thanks to a useful hint from long time travel-buddy Alistair, we decided to walk around to the Palace to see it lit up at night. We negotiated all the street crossings bar one with confidence and aplomb. That one was when either of us saw a motor bike coming straight at us from completely the wrong direction (i.e. he was going completely against the traffic on the wrong side of the road) – luckily he missed us both by and inch or two, and so no harm done. The palace lit up at night is beautiful (we found out later that there's 97,000 globes).

Then back to the hotel (incident free).

Today started with a drive up to Chamundi Hill and a visit (outside only) to the Chamundeshwari Temple, dedicated to Sree Chamundeshwari Devi, who was the tutelary deity of the Wodeyar family. Hundreds (thousands?) of devotees were lining up to go inside the temple – we were happy to just look outside.

 Then it was partway down the hill to visit the 350-year old Nandi.

After that we had a small diversion to the Lalitha Mahal Palace, built by the 24th Maharaja in 1921 to host the then Governor-General of India. It's now owned by a hotel chain; albeit a little run down imo.

Perhaps the highlight of the day (maybe, it was a pretty special day all round), was the couple of hours spent at the Palace. Lots of photos:

Lastly, we visited Tipu Sultan's mausoleum at Gumbaz, some 12kms from central Mysuru.  He built it to house his parents bodies, although he too, along with many members of his family and army, are now interred there. Whilst he was killed in 1799 (by a member of his own bodyguard who had been bribed by or was otherwise under the influence of the Brits), Afridi advises that his descendants still live in the area, some 225 years on.

All round a pretty special day.

I'll finish this post with some "bits and pieces". Firstly the results of J's henna, then a couple of recent newspaper clippings. And next, that we are occasional curiosities. I think maybe Janet more than me, but in the final photo below this very friendly man wanted to take a picture of me and his toddler. The baby was bemused, and the wife looked on with smiley eyes. And an aside; I think I've seen more non-Indian people today (about 6) than I have in the previous 8 days in total.

I was interested to read, and can't find it now, that India is going to include questions about caste in its next census. Discriminatory decisions based on caste are officially banned (as, I think, is the system itself), but in truth the system is likely alive and well, so I was fascinated to see that the government is going to collect official data on the it.

Along with all my previous posts, this commentary and photos barely scratch the surface, but all the same I do hope that they give a bit of a sense of this amazing country.

This will be my last "travelogue" post for this trip. We're off to Bengaluru tomorrow (Tuesday) for an overnight before our flight home Wednesday. I'm planning a  wrap-up/commentary post, but that might take me a day or two to put together. Please feel free to check back over coming days to see if I've been successful.

Until then/next time, I hope that you've enjoyed the journey with us ...