Pune

This morning we went to the mall to look around.  In general, the mall was much like a western mall, largely consisting of western clothing.  However, outside the walls of the mall, a group of children were playing street cricket, and they let us play with them for a bit - they were very friendly, even though none of them seemed to know more than a few words of english.

Cricket on a sidewalk, with bricks as wickets.

After the mall, we went to Chaturshringi Temple, a Hindu temple built 300 years ago to the Goddess Chaturshringi.  The temple is situated on a steep hill, and since it is holy ground we had to take off our shoes once we got past a certain point on the stairs.

Inside the temple itself we did not take any pictures, but it was decorated with silver, colorful pictures, and carved statues of various deities.  Past the temple was a trail up to the top of the hill, where there were more shrines, and a panoramic view of Pune.  On the way up I stopped to talk to some locals, and they asked to take a picture with me - Robert has a picture of them taking my picture, I'll try to get that from him.  Apparently blonde hair and white skin are not that common in India...

This was a test of the panoramic setting on my camera - it seems to work quite well

At the bottom of the hill there were several small shops selling flowers and silks for offerings to the temple, or so we surmised.

There was also a small ride for children - a train that went around in a circle.  Robert, Jose, and Ray decided to go for a ride.  When they hopped on, the Indians who had talked to me up on the hill passed by and said "you know, this train is not for big people..."

[I have a video, I'll upload it when I can.  Videos take a long time to upload] 

After visiting the temple, we went to see the University of Pune, one of India's premier universities and Ajay's alma mater - also known as the Oxford of the East.  The campus is huge, and seems almost like a forest with a few buildings scattered around.  At the center is the main building, which was once a British Governor's mansion.  As a symbol of colonialism, it fell into disrepair after the British left.  However, it is being renovated. 

After touring the University, we went to the gym to have our fitness test and register our membership.  This included measurements of height, weight, body fat percentage, and various other parameters that a computer used to assign us to various categories.  This computer was pretty blunt in its diagnosis - I am apparently of the "overweight - weak" category.  With this as motivation, we worked out for an hour.  On Monday the gym will have six-day workout plans for us, and hopefully over the next two months I can work my way out of that category into something more healthy...