Guidance

I arrived in Bundi about midnight on the Marwar Express from Udaipur. I hadnt booked a seat, just paid for a general class ticket when i got to the station, and it was less than 2 dollars. This entitled me to a seat in the crammed non AC non sleeper carriages so I squeezed on board expecting a pretty hard trip but it ended up lots of fun because a group of 6 young men immediately insisted i sit with them and we had a great time, the 10 or 12 of us altogether crammed packed into that cubicle.

 First of course they all insisted on having their photo taken with my hat on, and then they wanted to scroll through all the pics in the camera, then they wanted to look at my little book of NZ photos and then they wanted to know all about me and my wife and children - which I will have to confess was, as it always is over here a somewhat simplified - shall we say- version of the truth. (apologies to various relatives and the like) And we talked cricket and one of then rang his brother  at intervals to get the ODI Score - India was playing Australia and did very well but was beaten by an even more impressive India , so the carriage was very thrilled about that. We even tried arm wrestling, and at a couple of stops bought fresh cooked food and chai through the train window from hawkers walking up and down outside. The trip had gone quickly but the seat was hard and my backside ached. Towards the end I started to get a bit worried about them as they were planning to get off at Bundi with me and share my hotel room and make sure I had a good time, but in the end they shoved me off at the right place as they carried on to Kota, which is where i will go tomorrow, and perhaps meet up with one or two of them before I get the night train to Agra.  Yes, Agra and the mighty Taj Mahal just around the corner. I had enjoyed my stay at Udaipur.

The view from my room, Kasera heritage, Bundi

From Bundi station I took an autorickshaw to Kisera Paradise Haveli, who were expecting me. I had a minor issue with the driver who wanted 80Rupees once we got there, having agreed to 50 at the station when the competitive pressure of the cluster of drivers wanting my fare led to his bid getting my custom. I always clearly state and repeat the agreed price and the agreed place before getting in. He wouldnt take  the 50 from me so I said "Ok if you dont want it...." and I walked off, but a few steps up the road he relented and came and got it. ....well it was midnight and I was worn out, and as I said to him "A deals a deal..." The stupid thing is that 30 rupees is about 80 cents so you might ask well whats the point of getting shitty?  and its a good question - I remember once watching a tourist carefully picking over some bananas and eventually picking two or three and then when the guy wanted 10 rupees more that she reckoned she should pay, she walked off - no bananas! And all that for 25cents....so sometimes its clearly dumb to go without the bananas for a trivial amount. I still regret not paying a tiny amount more that a guy wanted for a wooden statue of the Buddha in Bali many years ago so I have learned that lesson I think. But what happens after a while as a tourist here is that you develop an appreciation for what things are worth here, in this place to these people, and you start to resent the guy who quotes a price  perhaps three times what you know everyone agrees is a fair one, you start to recognise which guys are for real and which ones are having you on. Usually I laugh a lot and joke with these guys but sometimes I get sick of the hassling and I dont feel like laughing.

A Temple on the Bundi Hillside

So today I woke to almost complete silence for a change, and pushing open the shutters looked out and up at the fort high above and down at the street below which slowly filled with traffic but it was never heavy or terribly noisy. I read the Times of India and had my breakfast in my room because  I couldn't stand listening to the two unfriendly american women at the rooftop restaurant who were loudly gossiping about their friends back home ..." and I'm like wow, I mean I'd rather work at  Starbucks than do nothing like she is" said one! I try to be friendly to other travellers - me being all alone and everything - but most dont even return a smile - mind you because of the hat I'm wearing they probably think I'm an Australian.  Actually I had a long chat one time to an Aussie woman travelling alone who has had enough and is heading back home - she complained to the guards on a train about a guy who wouldnt stop bugging her - nothing too serious but it needed to stop - and when the train arrived, "Cops" were there to take the guy away and a few days later someone showed her his photo and an article in the paper about what happened to her....and then a few days after that the Australian Embassy called her on her mobile and were most concerned and offered all sorts of support.

The Way  up to the Palace



A Step Well and one monkey

 

Crumbling ruins of former glory

After breakfast - "milk coffee" fresh juice and a banana pancake - I walked up to the City Place and the fort towering over this town. It was drenchingly hot, and for once I took a guide to show me the palace, a really nice excitable old chap - said he was 65. This palace and fort are different from the others Ive seen because this one is empty and not being preserved - its just crumbling away, and some parts are too dangerous to visit but much is still intact, including many murals and painted ceilings and doorways. My guide would have taken the shortcut from the entrance to the exit if I had let him, but whenever I asked him something he responded with all sorts of interesting stuff.

I asked him to tell me the story about this crumbling mural and he explained how it showed Krishna - who is always depicted playing a flute and in the company of lovely women - hes the blue guy - demonstrating how powerful he is holding up the world by the very tip of his little finger and standing on only one leg! (You might need to click on the image to expand it to a decent size to see the detail) Above the world are various other Gods such as Shiva - who is usually depicted wearing not much and draped by snakes - which denote his virilty as the Creator - and also Hanuman the monkey-god - mostly showering stars and flowers and blessings on Krishna, but the guy on the seven trunked elephant - whose name I forget - is the god of rain and is trying to spoil things and whip up a giant storm. At the bottom you see him off the elephant and bowing to Krishna, having seen the mighty ease which all his efforts were defeated by him.The guide really told a great story - could have stayed there for hours except for the heat. Eventually he went back down from the palace and i trudged up much higher to the fort.

At the top I came across several massive "step wells" called baoris. They are huge water storage constructions with extraordinary stairways going down to the water. These ones of course are abandoned but still collect water. At one I spent ages watching dozens of monkeys drinking and even diving in from quite a height and swimming around - they disappeared when I first arrived but gradually crept back.

I didnt see a single human being up there as I walked through rusting gates and up and down crumbling stairways and along silent halls and battlements - it was quite eerie.

Royal Enfield "Bullit" 350cc Single cylinder

The motorbike ride was  really good though a bit scary at the start as I tried to find my way out of the crazy city streets and alleys. There are maps  of course but the concept of a map hasn’t fully expressed itself here, the maps being a bit more like lines showing which towns area connected to which but not accurately displaying every road or exactly where turnoffs are and so on. Thus it was a bit hit and miss, the first challenge being to find the petrol station before the  tiny  amount of petrol the last hirer left in the tank ran out. After that  I headed for the hills  my usually good sense of direction being less than reliable because the sun is in the wrong place in the Northern Hemisphere. Effectively I had no idea where I was most of the day but I turned up interesting side roads and often was bumping along really rough village tracks past rough little homes and poor villages. Several times I stopped and had communication of a sort with kids and grown ups who came by, and I bought food and drink at roadside stalls. Ive  worked out I ended up about 40km from the city and I made it back just before dark.

Nice  lakes, nobody there

Classic Rajasthani look

Poor kid probably has to lug water like this every day

Camel train  going by

Time to slow down

Today I havent done much but  arranged my travel from here tomorrow and my  accomodation to Bundi, a much smaller place, a place the LP says is the ideal place to stay and write that novel - however I wont be doing that this time. Ive been reading a really interesting Penguin book called "Being Indian" It  gives great insight into the mind of the average Hindu and the way their religion interacts with their lifestyle.  The authors view is that the Hindu religion in practise, somewhat ironically is thoroughly materialistic  and indeed encourages the quest for worldy wealth and pleasure, this being "artha" one of the four purusharthas, the four fundamental goals of life. The others are Dharma, Karma and Moksha. His view is that religion is practised not so much for ethical and spiritual values but for worldly ones. He paints quite a ruthless picture of the average Hindu.

Reading the  Times of India is really interesting as well, for the Indian view of the world and for whats happening and being reported in India. Gruesome rapes and murders and even honour type killings are  frequently reported, and named defendents are always described as  "alleged" which is italicized for emphasis. Lately there has been lots of reporting about illegal mines and the completely irresponsible way in which the  hills are being mined and left in ruins.Theres lots of  editorialising about corruption, and there are always  funny quirks of expression that make me laugh - like talking about someone being at the ":fag end" of their appointment, and referring often to "cops"  There are several pages of sports, lots of ads but not a great deal of detail about international happenings, though in todays paper there were two seperate mentions of the worlds largest cake having been made the other day in New Zealand.

The other thing I wanted to comment on is the noise. Its incessant and unbelievable - there seem always to be religious  things going on with trumpets and drums and  stuff, and also massive bangs from huge crackers you can buy everywhere, plus chantng and loudspeaker broadcast religious music, then of course all the hooting horns, and tonight   when  everything else  stopped momentarily I could hear the Octopussy soundtrack from at least two places...speaking of which I managed to watch it last night after dinner, and it was really fun, and streets scenes and the palaces of Udaipur are easily identified.

The View from my room at Night

Spot the Cow

I have trouble remembering what day it is, and what the date is - and thats  because I'm on holiday not for other reasons thanks! And  today - to further stretch the doubts about my senility -  I did what I had intended to do yesterday. What happened was that yesterday after I set off across town to look for the Boat Ride, I sort of got lost and then had the most urgent stomach cramps which led me to grab the nearest Autorickshaw back to the Hotel where I stayed the rest of the day. Actually I did  venture out later and got lost again but ultimately came out where I hoped I would and got back for sunset.

 That night was the last night of a nine day festival of some sort and was interrupted by the most – well to me it was an - unholy racket that most closely resembled trying to sleep by a rail crossing as a train takes 40 minutes to go past – there was the ding ding ding of some sort of Bell, a loud bashing drum and someone blowing on a bugle, a single long and often repeated hoot. It just went on and on at about 4 in the morning. So today feeling fine I set off for the boat trip out past the fabled Octopussy Lake Palace Hotel – you only get to land if youre a guest or you have a booking for dinner at the restaurant - and to land at another island in this shallow lake, where a much less sumptuos  converted summer house is an expensive hotel but you can la nd and wlak round the gardens. I took my book thinking I would lounge round on the grass under the trees in  the lake breeze but alas there were Keep Off the Grass signs everywhere and no seats except in a concrete courtyard beside the restaurant  where Coke was about 5 times its usual price and I notied NZ Cloudy Bay Suavignon Blanc for 8000 Rupees a bottle ( thats about $AU200 and it sells in Oz for around 40 I think) Needless to say I drank my water, and waitied for the ferry to return and take me back to shore.



Looking back at the City Palace



Nice Gardens but Please Dont Touch



I  had lunch at a moderately expensive restaurant outside the front gate to the City Palace - it was shady and cool in the breeze  and a nice place to watch people coming and going. A couple of french women sat nearby accompanied  by  their driver, and watching their body language I was once again glad I hadnt opted to do the Personalised Tour with own Private driver that was so temptingly offered at the beginning. I remembered a short tour I once did before, in Borneo with a driver and it really becomes maddening to have the helpful driver intruding on everything that happens, destroying any chance for privacy or personal reflection on anything when the guys in earshot, inevitably affecting every decision and impression you get about everyhwhere you go - these women looked like they wished he would disappear!  In Jodhpur 

one morning, very early when I was already at the rooftop restaurant , two women who had checked in late the night before appeared, took a few quick pics and then said goodbye as the Driver was waiting. Definitely not my cup of tea!



My View



My Rooftop Restaurant   - my window is top left

I seem to be having trouble leaving Udaipur – its very picturesque and  Dream Heaven is a nice place to stay. I am not desperate to inspect every fort and palace in Rajasthan so will linger here a little longer I think and then eventually make a fairly fast trip to Varanassi – but I still have three weeks so there’s plenty of time. Tomorrow I am going to hire a motorbike and head for the hills.  

Dream Heaven

The Bus to Udaipur left at 7 so I had ordered - and paid for - an early breakfast but when I went to the rooftop restaurant the guys were still sleeping so I left without disturbing them. I later remembered I should have booked on an Express Bus but I hadn’t, so it was an all stops journey that took about 8 hours, firstly  back through the flat and dry and uninteresting  eastern edges of  the desert  and then through interesting hills that were thickly wooded in parts. Where the bus ground slowly up the winding    hills   I saw monkeys in the trees and once in a deep pool several buffalo cooling off - I  must write about the animals here- they are something that always  makes me smile -  In one town I saw an elephant waiting to pull a cart  getting filled with rubble and at another   merchants yards stacked with massive marble blocks and  stacked  slabs  waiting to be sold.

We drove past yard after yard of these places, for at least half an hour   -  so many places selling marble and  granite, almost all of it white, the occasional grey or green and less often red. The bus was never empty and often there were people – ie women – sitting squashed on the floor, and at many brief stops  men would walk up and down outside  selling food and drinks .   Arriving at Udaipur I had a headache because my side of the bus was facing the sun all day and I was in the window seat.

 I checked into the Jagat Niwas hotel I had  picked from LP -  it was a very elegant quiet place, all white and shiny marble – now I know where they got it from – but the room, for 2000rupees  was tiny and didn’t have a  window, and there was barely enough space to walk round the bed. I took three Nurofen- plus, drank a litre of water and went to sleep.  Later I  discovered that the  hinged grill above the mirror in the bathroom  could be unlatched and folded down to give me a tiny  secret view of the lake if I stood on a chair but  after some food I  checked other accommodation nearby and decided to move in the morning. This place was too civilized for me . And I do love a bargain - which this wasnt.

The games are over and no one was killed! The Indian TV news shows  are reporting it as huge success, ridiculing the people  who were so critical at the beginning and now asking  “Is India ready to host the Olympics?” They are very happy they  came second in the Gold Medal count – their best ever -  after Australia and just in front of   - England?  They, and the papers are also in raptures about Sachin Tendulkar   and India’s series win against Australia. Its widely said that Indians are fanatical about cricket  and they often mention Hadlee and Martin Crowe and sometimes other famous Kiwi Cricketers when I tell them I am a Kiwi, but when the test was on and I asked them the score, nobody seemed to know. I  was really pleased about Geoff Huegills win – what a comeback!

Udaipur is   set round some lovely lakes, and out in the middle of one is a famous palace that takes up a small island. A James Bond movie – well part of Octopussy, apparently- was filmed there and so  everywhere round the touristy  parts cheap hotels  advertise nightly screenings of the film. I might go see it - I mean who remembers Octopussy? Was it Roger Moores ?  Its amazing how  movie making can bring fame to a place – I have seen the same sort of promotion in Morocco where parts of Gladiator were filmed, and in Thailand where a forgettable movie with Leonardo di Caprio was filmed -  “The Beach” and there were also tours advertised elsewhere in Thailand to :James Bond Island – not sure which movie that related to.

I  moved to Dream Heaven Palace Hotel after a leisurely – and expensive   breakfast at Jagat Niwas this morning. I sat in a cushioned alcove directly above the water with a fabulous view across the lake and had several coffees while I finished my latest book – Farewell to Arms by Earnest Hemingway. I really enjoyed it but wasn’t expecting such a sad ending. The few bookshops   run into have the same but quite wide and interesting collection of books. My new room is way up high, very unsophisticated, but quite wonderful with paintings on the walls and a great view for 800 rupees. This afternoon I shall tour the City Palace, and get a new book to read.

Walking in the Park

A slow start today - waking to the chanting of a group of elderly women walking the narrow alleyways below and ending up at a little temple nearby. I laughed when I saw one of them tap her tambourine on the rump of  a cow getting in the way. I was going to go on a tour to a nearby village but they wont do it for one person - even if you would pay double, so in the end I went for a walk down past the famous clocktower.

I bought two cotton shirts and some food and eventually decided, as it was a particularly hot day, to go to the Mandore Gardens, 11km away -terraced gardens, fountains and pools were described surrounding ancient temples from when the capital was Marwar, just before Jodhpur superceded it in the 16th century. The rickshaw cost 80 rupees, I had my book and some  extra food and water and I decided I would just rest there for the afternoon - faint hope!  Firstly the place was really filthy - I mean the pools were littered with plastic bottles and rubbish, as were the gardens and the lawns, and even the cenotaphs and ancient temples were neglected, covered in pigeon shit and rubbish and falling apart.

All in all it was rather sad as the ancient monuments were quite fantastic. And when I found a shady patch of grass to sit on, I became a magnet for beggars and kids and people playing music wanting money. The monkeys were interesting and there were squirrels everywhere but the heat was stifling. I fell asleep at one point, lying on the dirty rubbish strewn grass but the next round of beggars soon woke me! I got the bus back - Fare 7 rupees - about 20 cents - after looking through the adjacent museum. The Bus driver was a lovly talkative chap, telling me he gets 300rupees per day and he works 30 days a month. He wants to go and live in Canada or New Zealand or America so he can do better. I noticed how patient a driver he was, like it seems to me all Indians are, certainly on the roads where there seems to be no rules, there are very few traffic lights and everyone just seems toweave in and arond everyone else to get where they want with hardly any agro. theres lots of horn tooting but its not done angrily like it would be in NZ and Australia but is just signalling that there is a vehicle squeezing by from behind. I wonder if the presence of cows everywhere is a calming influence? They seem to be everywhere, just watching us! 

Tomorrow I  get the Bus to Udaipur. I've decided not to go to Jaisalmeer though it apparently has a wonderful fort, but there are more forts for me to see round Udaipur and north of there.

Jodhpur : the Blue City

Sometimes when I wake up my first thought is "Oh my God, I'm still in India" This is supposed to be a holiday but its really hard work - everyday you have to try and decide where and what you will eat and what risks you are going to take with it, what you are going to do for the day, how youre going to cope with the heat and the dust, and the people that hassle you all the time, the people who are going to try and rip you off, the language difficulties, and then start planning your next move, which place and by which means will you get there,counting your money, hiding it...all that. I probably should have stayed in Pushkar a bit longer - it was really quirky and fun there. But then once I get outside its fantastic and I love the life and the colour and the noise and the action, the people, the surprises almost at every turn.

 The Temple at the Fort

This guy made me fresh Sugar Cane juice..lovely

Jodphur is an horrendously crowded noisy and dusty city of over a million and I am staying in the Shahi Guest House in Old Jodphur right up under the shadow of the massive fortress, Mehangheer. The Guest House is an "Haveli" a converted old style home and you would really need to be a mountian goat to live in one. The rooms are quite large but piled on top of each other with almost verticle steps running up to the rooftop where people sleep and where in this case their rooftop restaurant is. All these places are squashed together in a maze of congested streets and alleyways, and a few main thoroughfares lined with tiny cramped shops, swimming in rubbish and dust, motorbikes and autorickshaws and masses of people. Its more crowded than Old Delhi because the streets are much narrower for one thing, and there are a couple of differences Ive noticed in particular - firstly there doesn't seem to be any beggars here, and secondly kids, and I thought surprisingly, girls as well,  are really friendly and they often approach me and ask me my name - so I tell them, ask them theirs and then I shake their hands and say "Nice to meet you Kamoosh" or whatever it is. But the wonderful cows are here aplenty, and donkeys and a camel train squeezed by this morning through the narrow lane near the Hotel. There are also dogs and heaps of pigeons. And muslims which were rare in Pushkar - so no crackly loudspeaker calls to prayer at sunrise...grrrr. 

The real problem with this Blog is I that am trying to convey something, an experience, which is just too overwhelming a lot of the time. Take the Fort I went to today - you've seen a picture up above that I took from the roof of the Haveli last night. But you cant feel the heat, you cant hear the racket or hear horns tooting or the call from the Mosque or a kid laughing down below, you don't have dust on your feet and you cant get a sense of the way that thing looms over  and above, an aura of  massiveness and impregnability. And then when you go there and walk up the avenue towards an enormous gate between the massive walls and look up at those lattice windows and balconies and ramparts way up with flocks of swallows swooping across in loops, its just indescribable. LP advised for once getting the Audio Guide and it was so worth it - the narrator an Indian with a deep gravelly voice spoke with a beautiful english accent, and there was a background of traditional sitar music making the whole experience quite dramatic. People you will just have to get here and see and experience it for yourselves - I am telling you, you wont be disappointed.

Speaking of disappointment, I took an autorickshaw to the Umaid Bhawan Palace after the Fort where I had been wandering all morning. From a distance this place looks impressive - and actually it is - but most of it has been converted into a very expensive Hotel - like $1000 per night for a cheaper suite. I watched  as a limo pulled up and a beautifully costumed doorman - Rajput style - sprang forth and opened the door to - a child! And the bags were carried in as the kid disappeared with attendant inside.

 Another significant chunk of the place is still the residence of the son of the Mhrajah who built the place only 70 years ago, so its quite new - and the bit we are allowed to pay 50 rupees to enter is essentially what I found to be a nauseating tribute to the many wonders of the Maharajah Umaid Singh a guy I thought in some portraits looked a bit like Dr Evil, but with a moustache, a Turban and a tan! He built this massive place of 365 rooms to help the poor people during a drought apparently - this fact is repeated breathlessly everywhere - but I wondered why they didn't explain how his massive collection of clocks, cars, art and aeroplanes helped them. 

Spiritual Highs and Lows

Captions Please...

Room 7 : Not the Honeymoon Suite

Scenes from a Procession that went noisily by at the Bazaar

Today was my last in Pushkar and I didnt get up early this time. Instead I  had a nice leisurely breakfast of muesli with honey and yoghurt as well as coffee and fresh juice - pineaple and mint, and finished "Eat Pray Love" - I found it even worse than I had at first thought it to be - this womans trip to India consisted of getting a taxi from the airport that landed her here to the Ashram, and staying there for a few weeks with an assortment of equally self absorbed europeans and americans, the Guru she had come to learn from was actually in New York!!  - and most of her learning she got from a Texan in his 60's.-such as it was - but she did get to the point where she understood perfectly how the entire universe worked - wish I could have asked her about quarks and bosons and dark matter - but after that she went to Bali and eventually hooked up with a Brazilian guy, and I think thats probably when she got over the divorce - she had been told she wouldn't get over her ex until she got under someone else. This was how deep it got. God help America is all I can say if this is what they think is great autobiography. Actually I thought it was so typical of American evangelical religions obscene preoccupation with personal salvation and self gratification - she actually wrote a lot more about pleasuring herself than she did about the poor indian women smashing rocks on the road outside the Ashram - she just didnt get it. I see Margaret gave the movie 2 stars -  maybe the scenery was nice!

I circled the lake after breakfast and saw a snake charmer with a cobra, was offered Hash, and resisted another charmer, a self described Gypsy who liked my hat and invited me back to her camp outside the town.

I wasnt going to say anymore about that because i thought it would be obvious I didnt go.!Later I went with a guide for a walk round the town and we went into the nearby hills to a temple where I met a really interesting Saddhu at a small temple up a ravine full of monkeys.

 The Saddu seemed wonderfully happy and talkative - he told a story about a guy at a movie for the first time who attacked a tiger on the  screen with his knife.He was quite amazing actually.

 He showed me pictures of his previous life as a completely naked Saddhu for a few years.He has been at this little temple for 4 years and stays there all day long - people bring him stuff - he never goes to town.Mind you it was beautifully quiet there and he had a nice view across trees  to the town in the distance and there was a permanent spring of fresh water.But poor Saddhu - my guide exlained he had "never touched a woman" but the Temple was actually dedicated to a female God and there was a very interesting stylised vulva as part of the altar region - or whatever they call that bit where the incense and flowers go.