well now I know what the roads are like in the daytime:

..also crowded.

So we went into the city proper today, looking for a travel agent that can get Christoph and I tickets to where Mr. Rajaram decided we would probably like to go to instead of where our tentative plans were for (and we believe him .. apparently this one place near Mysore has everything that we had wanted to see that would've required separate trips had we gone into Kerala). However, after several false leads as to where and if this place actually existed, and then if they were open on saturday, and then if the hotel/lodge we wanted to book in the jungle can take reservations without us having a particular kind of bank account (?!?!), we gave up the fight for the day and had lunch at an old favorite place of Vishaka's and went to the beach where there was some kind of naval demonstration with a good 7 or 8 big, big navy ships being shown off.

Then we went home and collapsed. Christoph and I were as tired as possible, I think.

Then Vishaka woke us up to get our opinion on... the plans that her and her mother made for us! As in, what specific times to leave for the train, hotels, etc. We had no idea that's what they were up to, but apparently they put a lot of work into it for us - and we were too dead tired to realize it and so protest. We were so surprised! We were just thinking we'd go back to the places downtown when they were open on Monday, and maybe get out on the train a day or two later than we were thinking at first, but no big deal, right?

So now that we're awake, and, you know, FUNCTIONING, we need to be sure to not let that happen again - and how to make sure that they know how much we appreciate what they did, but they really don't need to go to such lengths for us!

They felt bad, apparently, because we couldn't really do anything productive all day even though we tried.

But to us, the car ride itself, not to mention seeing all over the city (even if it was just for a lost cause) was really very exciting and well worth the trip.

In any case. I have pictures online of the car adventure from yesterday, as well as a few more from Dubai, all in my Picasa galleries to the left.

I feel that this post does not do justice to even 10% of what I want to talk about - as it was really just a synopsis of what we did yesterday - but that's all I have time for right now.

Talk to you all later!