Happy Hampi

Hampi was a bit of an enigma to me before we got here. I knew it was the ruins of the Vijayanagara Empire spread over a large area and was once one of the largest cities in the world. What I didn’t get was why people and guidebooks rave over it. Not to diss ruins, ‘cause I love me a good trip back in history, but India has a metric fucktonne of ruins and I have seen quite a few of them. What makes Hampi so special?

Well, the ruins are lovely. The Lotus Mahal and Elephant Stables are enchanting, as are all the temples. There is an underground Shiva temple, a couple of Ganesha temples, a Vishnu Narasimha (in his Man-Lion incarnation) and many others - all quite amazing.

But that’s not what charms people about Hampi. It’s so damn scenic, although photos can’t capture it. There are jingling bullocks pulling carts of freshly cut sugar cane past verdant paddies of rice and banana plantations after coconut plantations and all around are piles of boulders. Huge boulders balanced on top of smaller boulders, houses hunched beneath boulder outcroppings, rock structures that seem gravitationally impossible, stones the size of small apartment buildings cracked all the way through such that you can walk through them. They seem otherworldly in their shapes, sizes and the sheer amount of them.

They are so otherworldly that a self-important shaman we met was telling everyone they were from outer space. Mythology says that Hanuman’s monkey army threw them everywhere during the Ramayana. The geologist story is that they were once part of gigantic monoliths formed on an ancient stable chunk of Earth’s crust and, over an enormous amount of time, they cracked, split and some tumbled into heaps and shapes. The softer rock eroded leaving the harder granite behind to settle down firmly into itself. The current boulders are basically the skeletons of former mountains. 

Geologists call these formations inselburgs. I don’t like the term. It makes me think of a berg that wants to sink some woman who won’t sleep with it. 

We roamed all over the place with our intrepid rickshaw driver/karate master, Basha, in 37C temperatures. The first morning we swarmed rocks, temples, caves and buildings no one recognized until I burned my sassy brown bod to a crisp. The river was a shimmering shade of mermaid blue and it was divine to sit in a temple and dangle our feet in it. Locals cross it in coracles, which are round rush boats steered with a stick or paddle. Our afternoons tended to be temple visiting. 

Kieran, our wonderful guest house owner, also has a plantation in the family so we all went out there for an evening. We drank coconut water and ate banana flower curry with lemon rice and the best dal fry I have ever had. Watching sunset from a rock is a big deal in Hampi and we were lucky enough to have a private viewing from the top of a large boulder pile near the plantation house.

The next day we checked out the Royal Enclosure where we were the featured exhibit. There were more school kids on that one site then there are children in all of Canada and each one needed a selfie with us. Their teachers approached, we assumed to admonish them for harassing and surrounding the foreigners, but then the teachers demanded selfies. We had to flee.

When you eat at a restaurant called Kali Thali you can say you’ve been given fair notice. Kali Thali does not cater to foreigners. They have a Thali tray for 200 rupees (under $4 CDN) and the food is sitting in metal pots waiting to be spooned into your tray. My companions opted out and were able to get a la carte momos. I ate Kali’s fiery offerings with a glass of fresh muskmelon (with ice) and it was all delicious. How does a girl from New Brunswick have the digestive tract and heat tolerance of a South Indian? Just my karma, I guess. 

We hit Hampi hippie bazaar before returning to the guesthouse and I bought stickers. Because I am 12.  

G headed off for the next stage of her trip today 5 hours before K & me, but we had plans for our morning. We had Basha whisk us across the river to the base of the mountaintop Hanuman temple. It’s 575 steps to the top and it was swarmed with pilgrims on a Sunday. First you run a bazaar gauntlet with pretty much everything coloured Hanuman day-glo orange. It looks like someone sneezed a packet of KD powder all over the place. Then you climb around families and sweaty ladies in saris and older gents with sandalwood markings to do the 575 steps before the sun broils your brains. 

Just before step 200, my beloved travel Teva sandals gave up the ghost. I had the back straps repaired 5 times by shoe doctors in India. I never suspected it would be the pretty front straps that would bite it. We were together for 10 years and had stepped in many a cow pie together.

I took a photo of them on the stairs, moved them to the side and left them to the mountain. Of course, when we got down to Basha we told him the monkeys took them and he loved it. 

The view from the top is spectacular all around. We visited Hanuman’s temple itself and wandered the rocks, being pursued by selfie seekers and some little girls who were absolutely insisting we eat some of their watermelon. On the way down we tried to give a banana to the monkeys but they couldn’t give a monkey’s butt about our banana.  

On the way back, our rickshaw was stopped by a Hijra, clapping and singing. It’s one of the ways the transgender community makes money in India. If they crash your wedding or stop your vehicle, you give them money to pass and it is considered lucky. Basha wasn’t sure we would want to pay her, but we were clear we were happy to support the LGBT+ community in a tiny way and we need all the luck we can get. 

Then it was off to the airport. Less drama but not no drama. Our taxi driver was late, wouldn’t help with bags, didn’t have gas or money for gas so needed to go meet a guy first then got gas, and the car had no AC. It was a 3 hour drive on super dusty roads with the windows down. Blech. When we got to the airport we had to stand and wait for him to get off his phone to hit the car in the magic spot so we could retrieve our bags ourselves. Then he was insulted by our small tip. Here’s a tip buddy, be professional.

Security at the 3-gate Hubli airport was stringent but deeply incompetent. I had to remove my watch. My bra underwires confused them. I had electronics in my bag. Nope. Yes! Nope. She took everything apart, including my solid sunscreen in a cardboard tube. In the end she found a pocket mirror. A mirror! Why, I could smash it and slash someone’s artery! Or reflect an image of a gorgon at someone and turn them to stone! She let me keep it because she doesn’t actually give a fuck. The chase is the thing for her.