India Imps

Bangalore escapade today. We took a rickshaw towards the bus station, knowing 4 sentences about Nandi Hills from LonelyPlanet: 2 hours away, busy on weekends, beautiful views and two Chola temples. The last bus had of couse left earlier in the day, but we were lucky enough to learn about a different bus leaving towards a different town, that would eventually land us on Nandi Hills. So we took it, high-fiving each other for our gumption and resourcefulness. One and a half hours later, we changed buses and found ourselves waiting inside the bus, next to a street market. As we were never really sure what buses to take, whether our english was being understood and whether we were being ripped off or not, we asked the guy in front of us for reassurance that this would indeed head towards Nandi H. The guy seemed like he had his cheeks puffed up by something, but he smiled effusively and nodded, and repeated --Nandi! Nandi! HaA-- He then started pointing at the sky, then gesturing at his mouth as if eating food, and intermittently taking his finger to his lips in gesture of silence and gesturing toward his forehead (a sign of prayer or reverence). We started getting annoyed at the frequency of his gestures, not knowing how their sequence was supposed to connect to one another. We came to the temporary conclusion that we might have to make some food offerings once we arrived at Nandi Hills, and that perhaps some sacred being overlooked them (perhaps something with the Cholas). Soon we started ignoring him, looking back at us every 5 minutes, intermittently frowning and smiling, pointing at the scenery (which was getting increasingly better as we wound up the hill) and telling our silent crowd to keep quiet. Half an hour later, I started getting uneasy at his stares, his ear pressed to his seat, peeking at us through the seat cracks. Yoshi didn't think there was a need to worry, Kat was getting annoyed with him as well, Phu was lost in conversation with an Indian man in the back. Our gawking fellow changed seats to have a better look, started gesturing at his forehead while looking at me, and bobbing his head side to side. I would sometimes smile, sometimes frown to smile, I would look away and ignore him... everything and anything, but his eyes wouldn't get off. I started to think he might be a little crazy or drugged, but repented of my annoyance once we got to the Nandi Hills store (the only one in sight) SWARMING with monkeys that would wait by the store and charge at you at any sign of food. It turned out that I bought a bag of fried snacks and a few bananas, and I had barely put the fried goods in my backpack and was peeling the skin of the banana when the unblinking monkey charged at me with an open mouth, unnerved by my -No! ing and -Shhht!! s.  Out of nowhere our stalking bus-fellow came to my rescue and scared the monkey away, only to disappear a few seconds after up the stairs to the Nandi Hill entrance. OK then: he rescued me from the monkey, I need to calm down and chill. We waited in line for 5 minutes, payed our Nandi H. entrance, and were beginning to walk up the stairs to the archway, when the crazy shit comes at me with yell, eyes wide open, all ten fingertips pointing directly at me, jumping off the railway where I'd seen him sitting. I screamed in surprise, and he kind of laughed his crazy laugh and pretended to come at me again before Yoshi, who was also startled, said to cool it. I walked through the arch with my brain buzzing in adrenaline, laughing nervously and promising myself to take my intuitions more seriously. We walked around the trails for a little bit, saw an inverted pyramid construction with a pool at the bottom, and were starting to head up towards the top of the Hill, when I noticed two boys running toward the backpack which was now being thrown about by a monkey. Smiling at the image, so commonly heard of in bear and monkey stories, I took my fried snack bag out of my packpack (fool that I was!) and was beginning to drool at the variety of seeds inside, when I catch a monkey charging at me a few meters away. I quickly began putting the fries inside my bag, yelling at the monkey -No! to scare him off, when the bastard jumps right into my arms, strongly holding on to each of my wrists, its unblinking eyes fixed on mine, opening and closing its jaws. I screamed again, this time as one continuous stream, holding on to my bag with fries, wallet, credit card and agenda, not knowing what to do but hold on and not give up. It lasted for about 15 seconds, time in which an Indian tourist mob noticed my monkeyed condition and ran up to us, making the monkey hop off empty handed. Feeling jinxed, guarding my head from tree-jumping imps, we continued up to the top, when I noticed that my period had arrived.