We haven’t been to a movie in a theater since we saw Inception on New Zealand’s IMAX in January. That was 5 months ago.

When Bhanu asked if we wanted to see Pirates 4 on the IMAX in Hyderabad, we were excited (even though we didn’t know the movie even existed until 3 days before).

Pirates 4 was awesome, and getting to see it with Bhanu was a great experience. Only downside was that the guy next to Carrie was translating the whole movie from English to Hindi for the guy next to him, but it made for an interesting experience.

After that, we went for a McVeggie Burger at McDonald’s.

Carrie then went shopping for some authentic Indian clothes at the mall while Bhanu and I went and played air hockey, basketball, and racing at the arcade upstairs.

I stunk at the motorcycle racing.
I won at air hockey (some experience there).
Bhanu wailed on me in the basketball.

Once Carrie had found what she was looking for, we headed off to see Charminar.

In Hindi,
Char = 4
Minar = towers

Bet you can guess what the building looks like.

But in case you can’t, here’s a picture.

I loved it at Charminar. Even though we arrived too late to go up in the towers (despite Bhanu and Keerthi’s best efforts to convince the gate security otherwise), the area around Charminar was fascinating. It’s everything you might expect in the middle of a crowded, loud, polluted city, and yet I loved it.

The mixture of traditional Indian, traditional Arab, and western dress, the markets for visiting tourists, the double takes from the multitudes noticing us (including one kid who kept staring at us while walking and smacked right into the person walking in front of him,) and the people all going about their daily lives in the midst of what can only be called a chaotic schmelzing of people was fantastic.

It also made for a great place to snap some unique photos.