Jaipur

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Day...whatever, hot as always, had a very interesting, Indian for hair-raising, trip to the Pink city, with a wee stop on the way for a refreshing glass of grass juice. Crushed sugar cane to be exact, freshly cut from the fields put through a mangle basically, add some water and pink powder, absolutely amazing taste and looks like a pint of green Guinness settling. Jaipur is as hectic as Delhi and if anything dirtier, the only fat inhabitants here are the families of pigs gorging on the litter strewn everywhere. Fulfilled a childhood dream today by riding an elephant up to the Amber Fort. Boo is a very gentle female pachyderm and I wished the Mahoot hadn't had to use a metal pole to bash her on the head to turn, some of the older men could turn their rides with a twist of their toes in the rein. Visited the Maharaja's cenotaph which is an exquisite marble carving. There are many other family members with their own cenotaphs including one particularly poignant memorial which had 14 miniature ( 6ft high by 4ft square) memorials inside for each of the 14 children of the grand Maharaja taken by malaria in 1922. Visited the monkey temple on the way to Jaipur, like something out of Indiana Jones, classic! Seen cobra charming, a sitar player played for me while a beautiful Indian boy danced in full costume and ankle bells. Later had my palm read...I know....but it turned out to be a bit too close to the truth to repeat here. I asked a local rickshaw guy to pick me up the hotel again tonight, he calls it the Jaipur helicopter, and he is the helicopter wallah, he dropped me at a great restaurant and came back for me an hour later. He is so scrawny I feel like getting of to push especially after my big meal, still I gave him a big tip, and a drink of water. What else is there to do I may have to home early or maybe just head down to Goa and lie on the beach with 650ml bottles of ice cold beer at 80 rupees (1 pound) a pop. Diwali starts tomorrow, the fireworks are going off already, should get another good two hours of sleep tonight. See ya! K

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Comments

[anonymous]

Do give us more.....
you write funny...but every time i start to get involved in your story, it ends!!....consider writing more in each entry...i have read even upto ten times longer articles than you and those were not uninteresting...just a suggestion.