A short stop in Hyderabad

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Hyderabad, a city that is rarely on the tourist trail - and today we discovered why. The main reason we were in Hyderabad was because it was a stopover on the way to our next major destination Aurangabad. Nevertheless, we thought we'd look around.

To our surprise, there was a really cool sounding place called Ramoji Film Studios - a pseudo Universal Studios except based around Bollywood (the Indian film industry). If you've never seen a Bollywood movie, then imagine lots of brightly clad Indians running around the screen singing and dancing to Indian music that has been remixed by wannabe Indian DJs. Many actually are supposedly of a very high standard, but the few that we've seen to date are just plain funny.

Ramoji was visually very impressive. There were numerous beautiful gardens and buildings. Unfortunately that was about it. In total there were only three shows for the day: an opening ceremony that for some reason had dancing chinese people (must be cheap labour), a pretty cool Indian dance show and a wild west show (it was funny to see Indian cowboys). In addition to the shows, we went on a bus tour through the backlot and saw a lot of buildings that obviously would have meant a lot if we were bollywood fans.

After Ramoji, we went to a massive hill top fort called Golconda fort. This was breathtaking - a huge and spectacular fortress constructed in the late 1500s. The coolest thing here was that the structures were built such that if you made a noise (eg. clapping or stomping) anywhere around the ramparts of the fortress, the echo would be transmitted all around the 7kms of walls. Thus, guards would be alerted to the presence of any intruders.

That night, we hopped on a long-distance train to travel to Aurangabad. This was surprisingly a rather pleasant experience. The seats folded down to make beds and using the provided pillows and bedsheets we were able to comfortably sleep throughout the 14 hour journey. Well, at least I was able to. Melenie had a cow sleeping next to her that kept mooing (okay it was an old lady, but her snoring sounded like a mooing cow). At one time I woke up in the night to find Melenie muttering to herself, singing a song about how she was going to flush the lady down the toilet (the mooer had kept her up for a good part of the night).

I also got into a conversation with a Muslim guy who I am convinced is a terrorist. He kept trying to tell me how the Taliban were good and America was bad, and how Americans and Australians hated Muslims etc. At first I tried not to contradict him in case he stabbed me in the middle of the night, but after 2 hours of his ramblings I got all patriotic and told him how Australia had raised so much money to help muslim nations such as Indonesian during the Tsunami relief. That shut him up.

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Photos

Fundustan
Entry way to the kids part of Ramoji Film Studio. Looks like the Genie from Alladin.

Why are these dancers chinese??
In hind sight we think perhaps they were Nepalese. Still what the heck we they doing here anyway.

Funky indian dancers
These guys were so skinny that they looked like girls. Very funny but entertaining too.

Flag dancers
For some reason waving bits of cloth or flags while dancing is very common in India. They do it in the movies too!

Evocative Golcanda Fort
Its like a stairway to heaven

Our guide had an itchy bottom
He kept itching the whole way through. Whats his problem!!

The tomb of some guy
Can't remember who. Obviously not important but he had a nice tomb.

Comments

[anonymous]

The beauty of hyderabad
It seems like you`ve missed a lot in hyderabad. Having stayed for 22 years in hyderabad and coming to the USA after that, I still feel hyderabad has a lot to see than many of the major cities in USA. If you search for you can find a lot in a city that is 550 years old, untouched by the british and ruled by the nawabs for centuries. Hyderabad is the best showcase of the nawabian culture. The charminar, built by one of the nawabs, is like the statue of liberty for NYC. The old city, which is the older part of hyderabad has the chudi bazaar, where you can find some of the best jewellery in the world, everything made with hand to perfection. The birla mandir, a temple midst of the city is a quiet place to spend an evening. Hyderabadi food is one of the best you can find in the world. Hyderabad biryani, pani puri, chole batura...to name a few are mouth watering hyderbadi dishes. I bet you would find hyderabad interesting if you dig deeper. You can contact me at [e-mail] if you want to know more. Murali - Murali

[anonymous]

Nightlife
Not only the beautifull history is worth the trouble the nightlife is very good also. It is dirty cheap and very much fun in the crowded and awesome designed places! - anonymous

[tom]

chinese people
I am surprised at ur lack of knowledge in regards to the presence of people from the northeast of india who have mongoloid features and not everyone in this world who has mongoloid features is chinese. the dance performnace that u saw in the film studio was from them and not the chinese

[I don't have guts for this]

comments
wtf, just cause they say Muslim.....I bet you made all the shit up about the whole conversation.....then again there are some "people" that are idiots like that, that think terriosim is good. As a muslim born and raised in Dallas,TX, most of the muslims are not like that. I can say however mainly the Middle East are like that. Of course Muslim does not equal terrorist! Peace

[Xian]

LOoser
You really need to do some background check before visiting a place. Infact there are quite many mongloid inidans in India. But ofcourse, you like most whites think that you are supereior and in reality just ignorant. So yeah they are indian...and go to HEll. Trust me you would do the world justice!!!

[kit t]

Mongoloid people
We actually did realise that there were mongoloid people in the north of india, however, the comment in this blog was a passing joke intended for friends and family that would understand. I'm sorry this offended you.

[Wang]

Taliban
Yeah...Anything that says Taliban is good is a terrorist. Btw, you can see a lot of people with Asiatic (or mongoloid ) features even in Poland , Slovakia and even in Greece. That is courtesy to Ghengis Khan. He paved his seeds till Eastern Europe.. :)