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Published: November 10th 2012
The Pink City We caught the train from Agra to Jaipur at some unearthly hour in the morning. As is our way, we were sticking to our budget and travelling cattle class, which was, to put it mildly, rather packed. Fortunately we were on the train at the first stop, but providing us with some entertainment at subsequent stops when there were still a few seats available, were the crowds that would run alongside the train trying to identify empty seats and force plastic bags through the bars on the window of the moving train in order to reserve one. At later stops and with every bit of space occupied, it was each man for himself, with people hanging out of the open doors and climbing on top of each other to get breathing space. And that’s how it was for the next six hours or so until we reached Jaipur.
We’d picked somewhere out of our guidebook to stay that sounded quite nice and within budget, but on walking there from the train station, we found that they’d had a complete refurbishment and subsequently cost somewhat more than we had expected. Far from our usual trainspotting-chic, the décor
was matching, there was hot water, minimal wildlife, and we didn’t need to wear shoes in the bathroom. After a very short debate regarding cost (a whopping eleven pounds per night), we thought we’d splash out for a change and decided to stay there, and it was a really welcome break. The hotel staff were lovely too. Most of them actually spoke to Emma, who spent some time with one of the waiters exchanging Hindi lessons for Spanish.
Able to relax, watch television, and read in peace in our hotel room, we took things easy during our three days in Jaipur. Traditionally known as the Pink City owing to the colour of the city walls, old buildings and gateways, we attempted some leisurely walks around the streets and bazaars. I say attempted because it was rather tricky to do whilst dodging traffic, street sellers, cows, beggars and rickshaw-wallahs, which invariably made the experience slightly more stressful than we'd have liked. As just reward for our efforts walking round the city, we had daily visits to the ‘Lassi-wallah’, who made the most amazing thick creamy sweet lassis served in traditional terracotta cups. Dedicated to a balanced diet, we sampled a
wide range of local eateries as well, tasting all things sweet and savory. When we weren't eating, we did make it to Jaipur palace, an eighteenth century collection of buildings, a few of which still housing the royal family, with others given over to textile collections, art displays and an armoury. We also took a trip to Hawa Mahal, 'Palace of Winds', from which we got a great view out over the whole city, albeit whilst trying to dodge having our photo taken repeatedly by Indian tourists.
Jaipur is pretty good for shopping and Emma and Bob got a bit carried away at a pottery shop buying a few 'essential items', which we then took along to the post office to post home, along with some other bits and bobs. Similar to buying a train ticket, trips to the post office can indeed take many hours and involve being sent round in circles, having your package inspected by customs, wrapped, unwrapped, rewrapped, sewn up and waxed, before you are finally allowed to address it and then queue to debate about the cost of postage. Unfortunately on this occasion, the preamble to sending the parcel took so long (about 2
hours) that it meant we missed the last cheap airmail posting and not wanting to spend more on postage than the contents were worth, we then had to leave, package unposted with the prospect of having to unwrap it all and get it reinspected and rewrapped on another occasion. Grumpy words were subsequently exchanged and we left, annoyed, feeling the need for a trip to one of the hotel bars. Since drinks are rather expensive and licenced bars few and far between, we haven't been drinking very much and subsequently two bottle of Kingfisher (the only beer we've found here) lasted us a couple of hours, before we went back to our hotel for dinner. Unfortunately they have a nasty habit of mixing Indian beer with, what seems to be, equal amounts of glycerol, thereby guaranteeing a headache with every bottle. It may be that a dry few months might be good for us after all.
Train booking also remains a source of frustration with unnecessary hours spent playing musical counters whilst station staff refuse to sell us cheaper tickets and insist that we need to pay extra for 'tourist quota' tickets. This happens despite us checking on line
just before trying to book and seeing a huge number of tickets available. You think we might be able to overcome this by using the online booking facility, but unfortunately this is equally problematic and has become somewhat of an IT project for Chris who first started the process of trying to book train tickets on line 2 weeks ago, but has yet to actually achieve it. Obstacles so far have included not having an Indian Mobile phone number (now overcome) and not having an Indian Debit card (now overcome). Unfortunately, the final difficulty seems to be that the website works only at random hours (e.g. not between 8am and 12pm Monday to Friday) and that these hours haven't coincided with times when we've been able to use the internet. So, we've yet to book an e-ticket, but we live in hope that one day it may be possible.
Our sleeper train from Jaipur to Udaipur got off to a bad start since we boarded to find that our bunks were already occupied by a family who looked like they had settled down for the night. They knew they were in the wrong bunk, we knew they were in
the wrong bunk, but it still took the interest of several passers-by and a couple of hours before we could claim our spots and bed down for the night. Sleep however was not on the agenda since a group of men soon joined us in our carriage and proceeded to have a conversation at shouting volume through the small hours of the night. Arriving in Udaipur at six in the morning, we got a tuk tuk to a hostel to find no beds available until ten, whereby we had a go, along with several other sleeper train refugees, at trying to sleep on the rooftop, with varying amounts of success (Bob being most successful, Emma the least). Despite the loud building noise that prevented us from sleeping when we finally arrived in our room, the wait was worthwhile, because it was with great excitement that we discovered that we had a hybrid Asian-Western toilet (see picture); a new experience all round giving the bathroom user a whole new perspective!
The White City Udaipur was much smaller and less congested than any of the cities we’ve visited so far in India, but perhaps all the better for it. We're
not sure it's officially called the White City, but the name is appropriate. The city is set around a lake with several islands on which gleaming white palaces have been built, rising up out of the water like fairytale castles. The streets are old, narrow and winding, with ancient traditional havelis (Indian mansions) renovated into houses, museums and hostels with rooftop restaurants. The inside of the buildings seem to imitate the interesting but somewhat illogical layout of the town with a maze of narrow winding staircases and corridors. To reach our room in our hostel by the quickest route involved going up two flights along several corridors and down another flight of stairs, Emma had just about managed it without getting lost by the time we left!
As well as the obligatory trip to the beautifully ornate palace (complete with inbuilt labyrinth of rooms and galleries), we went for a trip around the lake, stopping at one of the ancient palaces in the middle which has now partly been converted into an astronomically priced hotel. Chris was also delighted to learn that the town had been the setting for the film Octopussy, and so in honour of this, we
went to a screening of the film on a roof top restaurant. Possibly even greater highlight than the palace however has to be the converted Bagore Ki Haveli, a wonderful old building now converted into a quirky museum, where we saw a whole range of Rajastani puppets and had our own private puppet show, saw a turban display which included the world’s biggest turban, and saw a selection of sculptures including the Taj Mahal and Eiffel Tower, all made out of polystyrene!
We struggled hard and unfortunately failed in our mission to find a decent lassi in Udaipur, but this was compensated for on discovering the new local specialty of ‘chocolate balls’, which tasted rather like Emma’s chocolate fudge icing rolled into a ball and covered in coconut. We also went for a slightly extravagant meal at one of the lakeside restaurants overlooking the palace where Emma finally got a glass of wine. It wasn’t cheap, and it didn’t stop at just one glass, but it was very much appreciated, and since it was produced in India, we decided it was helping the local economy as well (well, that's Emma's excuse anyway).
Feeling that we’d been on one
too many sleeper trains and rickety buses, we thought we’d splash out and book seats on one of the ‘deluxe buses’. Unfortunately, on arriving at the bus stop just outside of Udaipur, we found that we not only had the same seat numbers as other people, but that those seat numbers didn’t exist on the bus we were booked on. In displays of Indian hospitality which we’ve become accustomed to when trying to travel on public transport, attempts at trying to rectify this with the bus company resulted in a shrug, a ‘yes, yes’, and then the person walking off or ignoring us (irritatingly repeated by several bus people up until the time the bus was due to leave). Suffice to say, it was not rectified and the next seven hours were subsequently spent lying in a glorified luggage rack above the place our seats should have been, unable to sit up, and vowing to take the train again next time.
The Blue City We arrived in Jodhpur in the afternoon and found a nice guesthouse. Most of the guests staying there were there long term and working with a charity, the Sambhali Trust, to help disadvantaged women
from the Dalit (untouchable) caste to earn money through producing clothes and handicrafts. They didn't have any cheaper rooms when we got there so we booked into a suite, which at a stretch, was just about within our budget and very nice. Whatsmore, it came as welcome relief for Emma to finally be around more women than men and she finally got to have some conversations with local women rather than being stared at or ignored by men talking to Chris. The additional impromptu cooking lessons when we offered to help prepare dinner made for a really memorable stay. We've subsequently now invested in some mango powder and royal cumin seeds to make the perfect squash curry.
Unfortunately life outside the hostel wasn't always quite so easy and enjoyable since Jodhpur has to be the worst place we've been so far for hostile stares, lecherous men and people taking photos, particularly of Emma, who by the end of a day looking round the fort was a bit peeved by it all. Although on talking to other tourists it does seem that others had similar experiences and that Jodhpur unfortunately just has a bit of a reputation for this kind
of hassle.
Large groups of ogling men with camera phones aside, the fort was quite impressive, although was in the process of being done up for a big party to celebrate Naomi Campbell's husband's birthday and so the ancient walls were being plastered with drapes, patchworks and lanterns, which spoiled the ambience a little. The reasons for Jodhpur being known as the Blue City aren't immediately apparent when you first get there, however when you climb up to the fort and look out over the city, you appreciate that many of the small square residential houses are tinted with the overall impression of a cubist painting given a blue rinse.
In town, there was a pretty rustic market around the central clocktower selling anything and everything if you could get to the stalls through the herds of cows. We tried the local makhaniya lassi, an obscene combination of curd, butter, cream, sugar and cardomen all mixed together. Chris was a fan, but Emma still wistfully longs for the creamy lassis of Jaipur. Bob is resolutely sticking to whisky and coke at some expense.
The Golden City Leaving our little haven on the edge of Jodhpur, we
caught a night sleeper train to Jaisalmer, in the desert in the far west of Rajastan near the Pakistan border. The highlight of this train journey was the warm feet we both experienced thanks to the random people who chose to sit on them whilst we were asleep (we both had bottom bunks). The ticket inspectors seemed to think that that was par for the course and included in our ticket. So much for paying for your own bunk!
Jaisalmer was much more relaxed than Jodhpur. We stopped a couple of nights at a hotel on the outskirts run by and supporting the local nomadic caste of musicians and storytellers. Although we didn't have running water most of the time we were there (and when we did, there was no electricity), it was still a fun experience, and as the only people eating there one night, we had our own private concert by a group of visiting musicians who played on the rooftop while we ate and taught us to play the castanets, which Chris managed a lot better than Emma or Bob (albeit Bob having the excuse of not having opposable thumbs).
Appropriately dubbed the Golden City,
Jaisalmer is centred around a giant sand-coloured fort, palace and buildings rising out of the desert. It often felt more like a scene from Arabian Nights than a city in Rajasthan. Within the fort complex, if you could dodge the abundant shoe and anklet sellers, there were some lovely ornate Jain temples, which made a change to our usual Hindu and Buddhist wanderings. Also around town there were some traditional ancient havelis, home to thousands of bats, which would swoop down towards our heads whenever Chris woke them up (which he seemed to think was fun).
From Jaisalmer we visited a deserted town nearby, abandoned 180 years ago, showing traditional architecture in ruins, and then went on a camel trek into the desert, sleeping under the stars at the foot of sand dunes, before trekking back the next day, the peace and quiet only disturbed by the soft but regular sound of camels breaking wind!
As a final note, we actually thought we'd managed to book a train from Jaisalmer to Delhi on line. We had a confirmation email and everything. Then, on closer inspection, it turned out we had booked to go onto the waitlist for a
train and that there were 66 people infront of us in the queue for the same train. So near and yet so far. We did eventually manage to get a ticket, but with all sleeper services full, we were travelling to Delhi in the relative luxury of 3AC (or three tier bunks, air conditioned), essentially paying a fortune for the addition of air conditioning, which is not required because it can get very cold at night. However in a characteristic display of logic from Indian Railways, we will apparently get a blanket and pillow to compensate for any additional cold experienced.
Tallies Lassies consumed - 94 (Although the ones in Jaipur were the best by a mile and having had some decidedly substandard ones since, we fear we may have peaked too soon).
Different Indian sweets sampled - 24 (increasing daily)
Hours spent at post offices - 9
Hours spent booking trains (online and in person) - 15
Things we have learned travelling through Rajastan How to make an authentic Indian curry
Rolling around in a glorified luggage rack on a bus above seated passengers can apparently be described as 'deluxe reserved
seating'
The term 'sleeper' when applied to Indian train travel is a misnomer
The definition of Enlightmentment - One who has a developed a full and working knowledge of the Indian Railway System including the various ways in which tickets may be reserved. (Note - Enlightenment is only very rarely achieved).
Camels have terrible issues with flatulence (but if you dare to mention it, they invariably get the hump).
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The Travel Camel
Shane Dallas
A sheep on a camel
It is great to have a sheep blogging on the site! I have a question, did you enjoy your experience of riding a camel in India?