My Way Is The Highway

Hampi Photography Trip – Sun on the Rocks

Vitthala Temple Courtyard, Hampi

I have been to Hampi twice - in 2000 and 2008, before I was bitten, respectively, by the travel and the photography bug. The two trips could not have been more different. Not knowing what to expect, on my first visit I was introduced to the evocative ruins of the erstwhile Vijayanagara kingdom, perpetually lighting a spark in me that led to the second, for which I came prepared with a long list of things I had to see. It led to a mad dash through rocks and ruins under a blazing April sun.

Since then, I have been to other places in the world. At first, at a hurried, frantic, fast pace. But eventually, I learned to travel slow. Few flights, fewer hotels, two or three cities in a trip, experiencing more of a place than more places… 

That is when I am not on a photography trip. The sole purpose of a photography trip is to come home with beautiful photos. Relaxation and fun is not on the agenda. In fact, my chances of returning with “keepers” is extremely bleak if by the end of the trip, I am not sleep deprived, fatigued and cranky.

This third trip to Hampi was decidedly a photography trip right from the beginning.

Hampi Bazaar...

 

The sky was still on fire, like the muscles in my legs, as we climbed down Matanga

We entered the Hampi Bazaar - dark and deserted. I shot one reflex frame. I knew the light was too low. I knew I should atleast stop walking while grabbing that frame. I knew it would look grainy later on. I cared less. I knew the TZ1 could not capture what the eye of my mind saw.

500 years ago, this must have been what Champs-Élysées was just before the French revolution or the Sunset Boulevard in LA today is. Rows of bright wicker lamps burning animal fat lighting the place up. A shop in every stall. Fresh vegetables selling next to Sri Lankan pearls. Finest goat ribs next to sharpest swords. Men and women on horse back, buying from 6 feet tall stalls (and one would think America invented drive-thru). A hawker shooing away a truant. An unshod child scattering a chicken flock. A widow in white hurrying towards the Vitthala temple. A nervous boy eyeing a pretty girl in a bright duppatta across the street. A royalty strolling under a gold laced umbrella.

Hubbub. Chaos. Aroma. Dust. Every sensory organ invaded.

I did not look at the LCD screen to see what I had captured. I would rather live in the present. 500 years ago.

Matanga Hill, Hampi

 

Beer or sunset ?

The prevalent debate as we walk through the 500 year old Hampi Bazaar - once famed for selling diamonds and rubies in the open - today being reused, quite pragmatically, as a police station, a travel agent, a grocer and such.

Actually, I thought it is quite a non-debate.

After a long, tiring day in 110 degree F will a dull consistent ache in every perceivable muscle and with ruin-fatigue starting to setting in,  there was no doubt in my mind that we should be climbing the 200 steep steps up Matanga hill, that would take us 110m above terra firma, to catch the sunset. 

The call was right. After all, we still guzzled gallon of ice cold amber later.

The sequence could not have been reversed.