Today began with a shorter than expected hour long drive to Bangalore University. At BU we got a tour of the Bangalore University Library. The library is a typical academic library in the sense that it has a large collections of books, an active periodical room and e-resources for the student to use. We are spoiled by the University of Maryland's libraries. Compared to UMD's system, Bangalore University's seemed very outdated.
We did learn that the student body population is 4,500 students & they are all served by only 3 librarians and their support staff. In our recent visit to TATA, we found out they have 150 on their staff. At BU, they are always struggling to stay on top of all the information needs of the students. Big corporations see the need for more librarians, maybe universities should too.
The staff was gracious enough to offer us some coffee as we sat & discussed BU in the head Librarian, Dr. Anjanappa's office. As we were leaving, Dr. Anjanappa offered to join us in our car for a full campus tour and then suggested we go someplace close for a special treat. After doing an auto tour of the campus, our driver was instructed to drive us to Dodda Alada Mara (THE BIG BANYAN TREE). This 400 year old banyan tree is a magnificent site to see. The banyan tree is a fantastic specimen of tree and also the Indian Banyan is the national tree of India.
Dodda Alada Mara is definitely an amazing site, but the thing that kept stealing our attention was all the monkeys that live there. From the time we got out of our car, there were monkeys on top of the school buses that brought a group of young students to see the banyan. We saw big monkeys & baby monkeys...some were playing, some were fighting and some were eating peanuts. But they all were incredibly entertaining.
Next the group decided to do lunch at the famous Indian restaurant, Dominos. We had been craving some American food & decided pizza in India was the way to go. Dominos in India has a slightly different menu, featuring things like Taco Indiana & Lebanese rolls. But we all settled on trying 3 medium pizzas; a spicy chicken pizza, a peppy paneer pizza and a spicy delight pizza. All in all, not a bad pizza experience. We loved the 2nd floor dining room and looking at the Dominos Pizza Delivery Motorcycles. 
On our 2nd day in India, Shobha from the Artis Academy recommended we see a play while we are in Bangalore. It just so happened there was an English language play at the Ranga Shankara theater. The Ranga Shankara was built in honor of a popular Karnataka actor & director, Shankar Nag, who died in a car accident in 1990. The theater was his dream and with his wife's commitment, the theater became a reality after years of struggle when Ranga Shankara finally opened its doors to the public in 2004. We had heard the play was based on Shakespeare's MacBeth. But we had no idea the play was going to be a madcap one man show entitled "The Tragedy of MadBeth." It was a great performance by Rupesh Tillu and a fun time was had by all. We are accompanied by Shobha and her two daughters to tonight's performance. If you remember she is married to a famous Indian actor & director and they are all mentioned in this Wikipedia post on her husband, Nagathihalli Chandrasekhar.
Since the play did not start until later in the evening, we had a chance to stop by & visit a Jain Temple before hand. Jainism is one of the many actively practiced religions in India. The temple was a beautiful structure made completely out of marble and amazing to behold. One member of our group is a member of the Jain religion, so we really wanted to make sure this was a stop on our world tour of Bangalore.
Tomorrow morning we will be leaving Bangalore & traveling to Mysore, India for the second leg of our India Class. Since tomorrow is a travel day....not sure how much I will be able to post. Will probably have to catch up on posts later in the week.
Random Pieces of Information for the Day
For our breakfasts & dinners at XIME, we have been eating in the same cafeteria as many of the students. Since the students are very young, they have a TV on playing music videos and movie trailers the whole time. I keep seeing this trailer for the movie HEARTLESS. For some reason the trailer grabs my attention every time it plays. Check out the trailer.
The majority of the people in India are vegetarians. In order to clarify if a pre-packaged item is "veg" or "non-veg", there is a mandatory marking system. The green dot means the food is vegetarian & the brown dot means it is not.
Even some of my bottled water has a green dot on it. When the food is already prepared the cooks or wait staff will inform you us which dishes are "veg" & which are "non veg."
Long before the Nazis stole the Swastika from other cultures to use as a symbol of hate, it had its origins in many religions including Jainism. Here is more information on the symbol.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastik
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