21 hours and a 2 month old baby peeing on my lap later, we made it to Hampi. 1 train, 2 buses and 1 rickshaw rides later... Most definitely on worth it!
Hampi is not like any other place I had seen before.
A mix of rice fields, ginormous boulders, ancient fortress ruins, coconut and banana plantations, and gorgeous temples, all this set up in a hot hilly region crossed crossed by rivers. Gorgeous sunrises and sunsets. And beautiful bike trails all over. It is said that throughout history, a lot of ancient temples got destroyed by either invaders and later on by the government. (I still have some research to do about this topic) but the whole landscape rather gives the impression that once upon a time, this whole place was under water.
But like Bagan, 2 to 3 days in such a place is plenty, as despite its beauty of nature, it is filled with tourism, and to some degree lacks cultural identity and authenticity. Furthermore, the presence of so much tourism also prevents you from being in total peaceful and quiet sync with the natural environ!sent around you.
However, like any place in the world, my previous statement is probably no longer accurate once you spend a longer period of time in a place, as then, you can manage to find your marks and zone out the surrounding mass of tourists around you.
When we ventured on the bike paths to visit some of the temples, we got so amazed at how bises of local tourists or even small groups of local tourists would smile at us, and sow so much cultural curiosity towards us. Buss loads of kids would gather around us to chat and take photos. Smile at us and hold our hands. Retired couples would approach us to practice their English and demonstrate the or knowledge of the world. I consider Hampi as our first point of entry into the south of India, and wow people are so warm, open, smiling, and welcoming.
I find very interesting how both north and south of India are so similar in their cultural warmth compared to the rest of India. It doesn't have to be all about business and money, but rather about people interaction and making people's souls smile.
My post is perhaps short but this is only because the length of my stay in Hampi was equally short, and also because I believe that my photos will do much better and truer justice to the beauty of the site than any word I could write.
A photo is worth a thousand words, so why limit myself to 500 when I could simply show you the photos?! Lol
A Final thing to conclude this post: on one of the temple ruin grounds, a small group of christian Indians asked us what was our religion. Their English was quite good, and they sounded very well educated. When we replied to them that we didn't have any religion, they looked so stunned. Their next question thus was: so what God do you pray to then?!
These were college students, not kids from the slums.
I found their reaction and cluelessness so fascinating. It is so strange that some people assume that one must have a religion, and that life cannot be possible without religion.
The other interesting part of their reaction and questions though showed great religious inclusion. Had I said I believed in any religion the world has, they would have been more satisfied than telling them I didn't have any religion.
Though I accept people of all faiths, I am still finding it so strange that most people on this planet prefer to believe in an abstract and virtual deity rather than in the most concrete reality of human nature and the capabilities of oneself.
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