So on Thursday night myself, along with two other guys, decided to go into the town of Mysore to pick up some electronic equipment, shoes, and a watch.  While in town we stopped at a shoe store and were pleasantly surprised at the selection that we had to choose from.  The other two guys managed to find some shoes for around Rs. 500 each, while I bought a pair for Rs. 900.  One thing I learned quickly here is that the “suggested retail price” can be bargained down with some ease.  One was as easy as saying, “No, how about 500 instead of 550.”  By the way, right now Rs. 1000 is equivalent to $20.  The exchange rate is Rs. (Rupees) 45 to every $1.00.

After we bought some shoes we headed for the electronic section of town.  I say section because the part of town we were in is very segregated by the items for sale.  A whole street was “reserved” for shoes, while we found a cluster of streets with only electronics.  I will be honest in saying that I’ve never seen so many electronic stores in my life and yet still be disappointed.  These stores basically had the same of everything.  However, unlike the shoe stores, the prices were comprable to what we would pay in the U.S.  Needless to say, I didn’t go all out on anything here.  In fact my only purchase was Rs. 40 (An S-Video to Yellow RCA to output my laptop on my TV).

As far as finding a watch goes, we had some troubles.  We asked many people where we could find one and all told us to go to a place that was miles away.  However, we weren’t looking for that kind of milage.  While at the shoe store, a second time to get my shoes as the owner had to go buy my size from another store first, my new friend Z asked the guy where he could find a cheap watch.  The guy says “Just a moment”, walked around the corner and says a few words, and then comes back in saying right this way.  Just outside, right were we came in from, appeared a watch stand.  They were what Z asked for, real cheap watches.  But he was happy and bought one for Rs. 100.

After this we got our taxi back and headed to a place called Park Lane.  Upon entering we heard alot of laughter inside and found out that there were around 20 fellow Infoscions that had just arrived before us.  As we were sitting down with them, another group of 8 Infoscions arrived and we had ourselves a nice big Infosys family meal.  I’ll be honest in saying that I wussed out and ordered Chinese (Sweet & Sour chicken) while the rest ordered traditional Indian food.   It was, however, the best Sweet & Sour chicken I have ever had though.  I learned that the best Indian beer, or at least favorite, is called King Fishers.  It comes in a 650 ml bottle and tastes amazing.  It comes as either regular (5% alcohol) or strong (8% alcohol) and the strong has a more dark color and leaves a stronger after taste.

That pretty much wraps up my first night out on the town.  On the way there the taxi ride was more thrilling than the bus ride to Mysore (hard to believe, I know).  They get 3 vehicles wide in a space some Americans couldn’t even keep their one vehicle in.  None of the cars have dents or scratches and everyone utilizes the “honk get-out-of-my-way” move.  I will say that I am very impressed with their ability to drive in such conditions and not get in a wreck or hit pedestrians.  I have pictures and videos of this style of driving and will post as soon as our Internet condition is fixed here.

Oh, almost forgot, there is this four lane road, that is very busy, with a fence type of divider in the middle (it is about chest high) that had a calf tied to it.  Each car was within inches of hitting it, but it didn’t move a muscle.  It just stayed there laying in the road.