A Taste of Rajasthan in JAIPUR & PUSHKAR

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Namaste once again.

LESSON FOR TRAVELLERS IN INDIA: learn patience, tolerance, more patience and tolerance; learn to be okay with the smell of garbage and animal feces on the streets, and to accept the fact that you are going to be taken advantage off, no doubt about it (unless Shiva is realy watching over you, I guess). Once you come to terms with these facts, than, and only than, you can enjoy all the nice things India has to offer.... and there are inumerous things to enjoy.

Sorry, but there is no other way to start this entry other than by complaining about Raju, the nightmare driver. He pulled the same "let's look at my hotel first" line, again stating "your hotel choice is out of town", despite the fact i had a map. Anyways, without a choice, looked at his dreadful hotel choice, declined it only to finally heara him blow a loud "you don't understand. I need my commission". We ended up arguing, he is now even more unfriendly, but we ended up at the hotel I chose. From there I called the agent in delhi and requested to terminate the trip with raju. To make a long, annoying story short, many phone calls later, we were still stuck with the ' %$#$^", you know what I mean, Raju. So... investigate, interview the driver before hand, and do not do the stupid thing I did: pay in full in advance.

Back to Jaipur, we ended up at a somewhat fancy restaurant, since we couldn't find our way around the dirty city. It turned out to be very nice, despite the loss of electrical power a couple of times, with the waiters pleased to help us select the food, drinks, etc.

The next morning we went to the train station to try to get a train to Amirstsar, and ditch raju, but there were no spots. So, to PUSHKAR we went.

The little town wasn't as special as the Lonely Planet describes it, but again we saw another part of India. Tons of beggers and cows + their dropplings, very dirty places to eat, few people on the ghats. Looking back, the bazaar was actually nice, although at the time we thought there were nicer ones to come. We wandered for about 3 hours and drove back to super busy and dusty Jaipur.

tchau again
patricia

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Photos

Pink in Jaipur
Hawa Mahal was built so that the royal women could watch the outer world.

Peaceful Royal Gaitor
Outside Jaipur, we found this quiet site.

Amanda at the marble "cenotaph"...
whatever this word means exactly, it as pure beauty.

Amanda & I
It was soooo peaceful here. A nice relaxing place after intense Jaipur

Pushkar village at distance
women picking flowers

Sacred cow claims street in Pushkar
...as many others do.

Pushkar
First viiew

Comments

[vikas jain]

thanks
hi...patricia....... you have judged very well about Jaipur and India in your own way just based only on "raju the guide". but u didn't feel the heart of that poor people in rajasthan....who suffered poverty for long life duration and never exposed the educated society....no opportunity for them to be familiar with other communities and culture. you know that hygiene doesn't mean for those who have not food for a single time in a day..... but still i appreciate who well u describe these worse condition in sweet taste.......hope u will like to do some work to improve conditions , not just to publish pics for commenting ..... and thankful..if u could send ur link to any indian govt sector....so that they can awake.......ciao