Heading South
My bags are almost completely packed. I have to divide everything into two piles: one to leave in Pune for two and a half weeks, and the other to bring with me for the next step. We've been told to bring only what we need, leaving everything extra behind. This is going to include my computer. I'm due downstairs packed, checked out and ready to go in roughly an hour, so I'm going to keep this short so I can stow the laptop in time.
Here's what's going on. The University of Chicago Pune Civ Abroad program is going en masse to Pune's airport to catch an afternoon flight to Bangalore. From there, we go to Mysore where we are staying in a former palace that is now one of the most eco-friendly hotels in India. From there, for our third course, we are trekking across Karnataka with an anthropology prof from Chicago seeing ruins, field sites, and more along the way.
We're packing light with no expectations of free time; we'll be too busy seeing everything from the paleolithic era to the Vijayanagara empire to the Dehli sultanate and plenty more in between. This, more than almost anything else, is what I signed up for with this program. If it's everything it's cracked up to be, it's going to be nothing short of life-changing.
This does mean I probably won't be online to post blog entries or photos for some time. I might be able to do a bit the coming week but as time goes on it's going to be harder to do. I'll have plenty to say and show when I get back though, and you can expect to see some good footage of what we do out there; it'll all be in Episodes 7 and 8.
Anyway, I gotta jet. Until next time...
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