Day 25 - Jaipur

We are now in the capital of Rajistan, Jaipur. It is a big city, bit like Delhi, and quite hot. We arrived after catching yet another bus at about midday. We are staying in Diggi Palace - a hotel slightly removed from the chaos of Jaipur in a small, green boulevard. The staff all wonder around in blue shirts and berets - the whole place is strangely clean and unfriendly after cheerful, grotty Pushkar.

The whole city is called the pink city, because some time a long while ago someone important was visiting the city and the Maharajah ordered all the houses to be painted pink, the colour of welcome (at his expense of course). The pink is really a odd dirty salmon colour that doesn't hold up well to close inspection, but it looks nice from high up.

After a quick tour of the city (aargh - worst touts ever!) we levered our way onto a packed local bus for the 5R ride to the Amber Palace, where the Moghuls lived. Again, more fighting our way through touts trying to sell us paintings/models/postcards and wouldn't take no as an answer. We paid for a guide, and he showed us round the palace, pointed out the artwork and explained the ingenious air conditioning system in broken English. The fort was amazingly decorated, and the views beautiful. But we were in a hurry, so it was back down the steps, fight through the touts/beggers/crazy stoned indian ladies (yeah, the latter was a scary first experience).



In the evening we ate at an air conditioned restaurant with the most expensive, but worst food and surliest waiters to date. Oh dear! Still, it was Nicole's birthday so we had chocolate cake. Tomorrow we are going to see a bollywood movie - much fun!

Day 24 - Pushkar

It probably comes as no suprise to anyone that I did not manage to get up at 5am this morning to climb a huge hill. Instead I had a lie in, washed some clothes, ate masses of muesli and fruit salad for lunch and have spend most of the day pottering round the town and bumping into people laden down with purchases. I have been quite restrained - and have only bought a few little things (no need to sell the house yet ma - well within my daily budget).

The funny indian doctor popped in to the hostel today to see one of the delhi-belly guys, so I managed to grab him for a quick look at my bites. There is no such thing as prescription in India, everything can be bought over the counter - and the doctor just suggested antibiotic tablets. Hannah and I looked at each other then said "just creme, thankyou", so the doctor is bringing me some cream later on - all sorted for next to no price. And my poor nose - it looks as if I've been in a brawl! To be honest - i'll take a bruised nose and blisters over Delhi belly any day. I am slowly getting more exerimental in my food choices - today I risked a fresh smoothy from a juicebar - yum.

I will spend the rest of the day pottering around, trying to not spend all of my money! I may go to the Brahma temple, as it is the only one, and Brahma, the creator, is one of the three main hindu gods along with Vishnu, the preserver,and Shiva, the destroyer.

On a further note - I have discovered why it is the only one in the world: Apparently Brahma went down to the lake in Pushkar one morning for his puja (morning prayers). His wife attended puja with him every morning, but this particular morning she was running late. After waiting for her for a while, Brahma get very angry and married someone else (like you do) and took puja with his new wife instead. About an hour later his original wife turned up, she had been inadvertantly delayed. When she found Brahma with his new wife she was very annoyed and cursed her husband "you will only ever be worshipped here, in Pushkar" then went off to live a life of solitude in the mountains.
So now Brahma has no temples but the one here, and is not worshipped anywhere in the world but Pushkar. That's a true story :-)

Day 23 - Pushkar

Somewhere different again! Today we are in Pushkar after a jeep ride, two local buses, and a walk. We are staying in the Purple Garden hostel - frequented by chilled out staff who have drunk too many Bhang Lassis (bhang is a derivative of marijuana - they make them into deadly Lassi's, omelettes, everything. You see a "special" on the menu that is about 10 times the price of the other items, you know it's got bhang in it)

Pushkar is great for shopping - it also is a very holy town because it is the home of the only Brahma temple in the world. It has a beautiful lake, where we sat eating our dinner (pizza) and watched the sun go down to the music from the street entertainers.

Tomorrow morning some people are getting up at 5 to hike the hill behind the city, and watch the sun rise from the temple on the top. Not sure if I can wake that early - but will try!

Day 22 - Jojawar

Well, now I am in Jojawar - a village that is really in the middle of nowhere, staying in a Maharajas palace (well, big house really!) called Rawla Jojawar

Bit of a mission to get here though. Last night we had a birthday meal with cake and candles, then pancakes at the Rainbow rooftop cafe. We got to bed quite late, then had to wake early to catch a bus for the 4 hr journey to the town nearest to Jojawar, our next location. The maharajah and one of his lads picked us up in a couple of jeeps, and we were driven across bumpy, bad roads for about an hour before reaching his home. The maharajah was a baad driver (to much being driven around all his life I guess) and at one point he nearly spun the jeep after cutting by a lorry too fast. On the mountainous, jungly way to Jojawar we passed a wildlife reserve. We tried to spot the Grizzlies and wolves we were told were there, but all we say were tonnes of monkeys gazing at us with their furry,black faces as we whooshed by.

We arrived at the huge house and a little boy beat on the drum and the porters rushed out and took our bags. We were ushered into a marble room, and given cool clothes and glasses of pepsi - really was heaven. Me and Lisa shared a room, and it had air-conditioning, a balcony, and a huge marble shower room. Bit posher than we were used to! We met everyone for late lunch (buffet style) then raced to the pool (yes - pool) to claim the best sunloungers. The day was just relaxed - sunbathing and swimming - I got my henna tube out and henna'd some ankled (Murrey had "I love India", which has earned much interest - don't think Indians get irony). The boys brought us lassis and water, and in the evening we drank (very expensive) wine and were entertained by musicians before our delicious meal.

Unfortunately the day in paradise was not all sunshine and roses, several of us are suffering from Delhi belly. My stomach is just pootling along normally so, in a bid to even things out a bit, I managed to swim into the side of the marble pool (bruised nose, bump on head) and get eaten by something I seem to be fiercely allergic to (many many blisters - eech). All good fun!

Day 21 - Udaipur

Relaxing day today - I had a lie in, then after getting up I pottered down to the german bakery. I bumped into Kay on the way down - she had gone to have a swim, but there was loads of guys there so she chickened out.

After brekkie myself, Lisa, Kay and Eric wondered to the city palace - we had heard that for 125 rupees you could get a boat ride across the lake. Unfortunately we must have gone to the wrong place, because they tried to charge us about 3 times that amount. Kay and I decided to go in anyway, and we also bought tickets for the museum, and had a wonder round. We tried to find the lake, hoping that there would be a cheaper boat there, but didn't have much luck (more gates, more silly prices).

Afterward we wondered back, looking in the tiny shops. When we exited the palace we suddenly saw a painted elephant, with its handler sitting astride its neck, ambling up the steet toward us. Kay turned to me - "lets ask for a ride yeah". Eeek - this thing was huuuge. But it was her birthday - so I just nodded. We walked up and asked for a ride- "300 rupee, half hour" - sold. The elephant sat down, and we bothe scrambled up its backside and made ourself comfy in the little seat. When it satood up I really thought I would fall off, and gripped the seat with all my might. The walk of the elephant was extremely rolling, and occationally we had to duck under trees/power lines/banners, but it was great fun, and we had a good view from high up. The tourists all lauged, the shopkeepers all waved, and the kids all cheered and ran after us - much fun. We got someone to take a picture (below).



Tonight we are going to go to a culture show for Kay's birthday - and we have promised we will all drink beers and dance, so that should be fun. I've uploaded a few more pics of the Bishnoi villages and other bits and bobs from Kay's camera, and they are added to the entries below, but you can also see them on my Flickr album.

Day 20 - Udaipur

> See cooking class recipes

Finally - a lie in. I got up at 9.30 this morning and had the enjoyment of having to be any where at any time! Gave aaall my grotty, disgusting clothes to the Colonel for washing (despite excessive amount of rainfall here recently, it may not rain again for 48 years, so cannot waste water washing things in room - plus, of course, so much easier to let someone else do it :-)

I went off for a wander, put my films in for processing and just explored the streets and the wonderful shops. At 10.30 we met outside the spice box for our cookery class. There were 8 of us in total, and we were let up to a tiny room across the road and given a comfy seat and a wodge of recipes. For the next 3 hours we spent the time learning how to make chai, curries, and even chipatti (so incredibly easy - never realised). Our teacher had an excellent sense of humour, and kept us laughing whilst we took it in turns to cook. We ate huge amounts, drank huge amounts, and took huge amounts of notes as we went along. The food we produced was wonderful, and so different from the food in restaurants that it was worth it just to taste that. They really are so incredibly easy - Ma & Lynda, chipatti'd are like small wraps, I promise you'll never buy the packets again when you see how easy they are to make!! Anyway, we were allowed to keep the recipes, so may scan them in tomorrow so you at home can try them.

After the cooking I returned to my room for some chill out time. Then I got bored - yes, you guessed it - I went shopping! I bought a ganesh tshirt and some baggy trousers (aargh, awful, but I literally had nothing left to wear). Then I pottered along to the art shop I had visited the previous day. The owner was so friendly, he sat me down and gave me chai, and we chatted away for a bit. He is one of the 'master' artists of the gallery, and when I mentioned I wanted Henna handpainting, he offered to do it - for free, one of his hobbies apparently (think it was just a long, quiet day). For about an hour he drew the most elaborate patterns on my hand whilst I drank chai and looked at the artists work. Itis amazing stuff, they paint with squirrel hair brushes, and the strokes are so fine that you cannot even see them under a microscope. Well, feeling guilty I only went and bought a few pictures (the only thing that the amazing palmist got wrong about me was when he said I was good with money - that's a bloody laugh!). Anyway - I bought a picture of a elephant (good luck), a horse (power) and finally a really cute camel (the guy says "it means love"... quizzical expression from Katie... explanation: "it is the hardest thing to love a camel" - my backside still aches, so very true). Oh, and one for me too (whoops) - a beautiful picture of Krishna & one of his 489 girlfriends (what a player) - very bling and Indian, will look good with bedspread!

I then took an autorickshaw with a bunch of other guys up to the monsoon palace. It is high up on a hill over Udaipur - and the place where the Maharajah would go to avoid the monsoon craziness. The view was aaamazing, and there was monkeys everywhere with their cheeky black faces. We took lots of pictures, watched the sun set behind the mountains and then hopped back into the rickshaws and white-knuckled our way round the hairpin bends in the free-wheeling descent down the mountain.



Above left: Autorickshaw stops to cool down Above right:Sunset at monsoon palace



Above left: View thorough window of Monsoon Palace Above centre: View over Udaipur Above right: Cheeky monkey

For dinner we went to rainbows - sadly no octopussy showing, but food was yummy. Oh, and Murrey & Julie kindly showed us where to get the most perfect coffee and cake. Cafe Edelweiss for Brekkie tomorrow methinks. It is Kay's birthday tomorrow also - she has promised to go swimming in the lake ("gone swimming in the mekong - no worries"), so I shall go and cheer her on (and take amusing pictures - hoho)!

Day 19 - Jodhpur/Udaipur

Wow - no posts in a while! I've put in the backlog of posts from my journel, and also added a few pics from Lisas digital camera (what a star). There's some added on the entries as far back as Old Delhi, so maybe worth a look!

Today I hauled myself out of bed at 6am and gobbled down a bowl of porridge before packing my backpack and heading out of the hotel.

We were catching the 8am bus for the journey to Udaipur, in the East. Luckily the bus was far less crammed than before, and the journey passed in relative comfort. As we travelled I gazed out of the window, watching the scenery change from flat landscape to rocky, steep hills and green jungle. As we neared Udaipur we passed hundreds of marble stores, selling the wonderful marble that was used hundreds of years ago to build the Taj mahal.

At about 3 we arrived in the clean streets of Udaipur with their wonderful little shops and friendly people. We are staying at a hostel that I can't remember, but it is more like a b&b than a hotel, with the Colonel (30 years in the military, wonderful moustache) to provide a warm welcome and ensure we were settled down ok. Marble is everwhere in the hostel - I'm sharing with Lisa this time and our shower room is sheer luxury!

We met after dumping our bags, and Hannah showed us round the town. Udaipur is famous for its marble, and also the perfect minutures that take many weeks to complete. After our quick tour (sooo many nice shops - raah) I went with Hannah, Ajid and Anna to a little art shop, and we sipped chai and examined the beautiful paintings under a microscope - not a brushmark to be seen, the most perfect detail. One of the painters working away gave me a demonstration - he took my hand and in about a minute painted a perfect minuture portrait on one of my nails. We left with complimentry cards, and promised to come back tomorrow for henna hand painting.

Several of us also booked a cooking class the next day, and a ride up to the monsson palace in the hills. Very excited. Hannah also pointed the palace on the lake. It is now a hotel and one of the most luxurious places in the world, for 1800 rupees you can have a boat ride there, fireworks and a luxurious banquet. Bit out of my budget, but sounds wonderful. Incidently it is also where octopussy was filmed (we may be watching the film tomorrow night in on of the rooftop cafes by the lake).



Above Left: The Lake Palace Above right: A palace facade in Udaipur

In the evening we ate a meal beside the lake. The food was yummy, but we kept getting dive-bombed by hundreds of (non-biting thank god) mosquitos!