Day 8 - Mysore Adventure

Today we traveled to Mysore, the second largest city in Karnataka. It's big. Much bigger than I had imagined. We're staying at the President Hotel, which is much like any "normal" hotel one may have experienced in any big city ion the world. You know, the type with a nice reception area, chaps in nice uniforms to open the door for you, a dining room, lots of big comfy chair, conference rooms and a lift! We all though the driver had come to the wrong hotel. It was really central to the main things one would want to see in Mysore.

After we checked-in and dropped our bags we were back on the bus to visit the the Sri Chamundeshware Temple on a peak overlooking the city. It was from up here one got the best feel for how big the city is. The temple is an active temple. That is, it is still used for worship. Of course surrounding the temple were the ever-present little shops and "mobile" sellers of all sorts of merchandise from fruit to postcards to trinkets of all sorts. Kerry, and most of the girls, had a cotton band wrapped around their wrist bya chap doing a roaring trade. I'm not sure of it's significance. The visit inside the temple was under-whelming. The "icon" to whom all the Hindu were making offerings was way down the end of a narrow passage was, which could not be traversed by the visitors, only viewed from a distance. We saw that, got out of the way of the worshipers and that was that. Back down the hill we went to the hotel to rest for a short while before heading to the nearby Mysore Palace.

Kerry and Greg didn't get there! For the last couple of days my anxiety levels were through the roof. A lump near my sternum had appeared a few months back, a late impact of my fall from the ladder back in August 2021, I suspected. It hadn't ever giver me any grief at all until the last few days. Now I was feeling a constant uncomfortable pressure in that area. Being abroad and a long way from home my brain started to invent a whole bunch of really bad outcomes for me, including the lump putting undue pressure in my heart and dying of a heart attack over here! So, as the other were heading to the Palace, at Kerry's call she, Pooja and I hopped in a tuk-tuk and went to a nearby hospital for a check-up. Driven by Pooja's comment to the reception desk, "this man has chest pains", were immediately ushered into Emergency and attended to without delay. The Registrar did the usual preliminary tests – Pulse OK,  Blood pressure OK. Soon after came the on-duty doctor, who examined me and sent me off for a chest X-Ray. Back to Emergency and in came an ECG cart, That test was done promptly and the doctor came back to talk to me. All was fine in the vital signs front and with the ECG results. The X-ray showed that the lump was no where near my heart so there was no risk there. That was a real relief. Almost immediately my anxiety dissipated and my pulse was down from high eighties to low 70's where it normally is. All up, we were done in about an hour. My thanks to Kerry, Pooja and the Indian health care system for ensuring this holiday can be the best it can be.

I spent the afternoon relaxing and catching up on the blog while Kerry went for a visit to Saree store with some of the girls. They all tried on a saree and took plenty lots of photos to remember the fun afternoon they had. That evening we all visited the ope-air, rooftop restaurant of a nearby hotel for a lovely meal on a warm night. On the way back to the hotel we stopped to be amazed by a cow that was just standing in the middle of the road as if it were in the middle of a field, completely unfazed by the cars, scooters and buses whizzing by. Quintessential India!