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Published: April 2nd 2010
Posing with Palace guards
yes, they then ask for money.Welcome to our final Blog on the Indian leg of our journey. It’s with much sadness, happiness, relief and reflection that we’ll tell you all about the adventures and scams we encountered during our last two weeks there. Sit back, relax and enjoy…. (its a long one, sorry)
JAIPUR AND JODHPUR
We fled Varanasi in search of The Pink City of Jaipur in which we hoped to find some sense of calmness! The Old Town is actually painted pink, much to our surprise, because some Maharajah a few hundred years ago wanted to impress King George, we think. Our overnight train journey was shared with Rosie and Jim (imagine trying to resist singing the song at them!) some brand new travelers who asked us millions of questions and made us feel rather like we were bloody experts. You’ll note later that this is not the case. We stayed at Devi Newas Home stay where our friends were already waiting for us. The Lonely Planet recommends it so obviously this means it’s now shit and no longer cares whether guests have a good time. The graffiti plastering the walls depicts their demise rather well. Our favourite bit was
the one scrawled outside our room simply stating, ‘This place is a shit hole.’
Foolishly, our rickshaw driver on the way to the hotel forced us to read his Nice Comments Book, something they all produce now and then in order to get you to book them for tours. Somehow, we had managed to arrive without really looking at the map so thought three-pounds—fifty for the day was a good deal. It turns out Jaipur is tiny and the lucky bugger only drove about a mile all day!
We headed to what we expected to be a large telescope at Jantar Mantar but was actually a working observatory with about twenty instruments measuring everything from the time and Earth’s axis to horoscopes. Rather clever how all this was developed, especially considering the lack of tools to do it. Next we headed to The Royal Palace and, like all palaces, was a little bit disappointing but we did manage to take some comedy pictures which show us with large canon willies!
Thirdly, we headed out to the Monkey Temple which has a couple of thousand monkeys living there who can only be described as aggressive, cocky, unwelcoming little
shits. Needless to say we didn’t stay here long and went up to the Sun Temple for some rather amazing views over Jaipur. We make all this sound easy but the dry heat and dust is simply exhausting and just breathing brings on the desire to curl up and snooze… Finally, our tour ended with a visit of depression as we were again shown how women were tucked away and hidden from sight in the Hawa Mahal BUT they were given little slats to look through so it’s not all bad. The building was actually quite nice on a number of floors; shame the women only get to look at the inside really. After all this excitement, Mr Rick Shaw driver ‘kindly’ offered to take us to a block-printing factory and some other places where they make paper etc. The first place was enough. It was a tiny, dark factory where four men worked printing pattern on sarees. The men worked really long hours and he took great pride in telling us just how cheap his labour was. It was basically just for show and we were whipped in and our in under two minutes, complete with gold glittered dots
on our heads. Obviously, he then preceded to try and sell us lots of cloth and informed us that they actually had contracts with Topshop and Armani. We think not. Quite sad to see the conditions that ‘cheap’ Western clothes are made in. After this, we demanded the commission crazed Rick Shaw take us home.
The evening that followed sparked days of high drama and fear! It all began with one of our most shameful moments…we ate in McDonald’s. Nikki really enjoyed her chicken burger, fries and milkshake. Fatty. Whilst scoffing, we were joined by two Indian guys, Mark and Nickel, who invited us out for drinks with them after the cinema. Both of them were rich and offered to show us how the young and cool live in Jaipur. Now, we know what you’re all thinking but they were really lovely, genuine and we had no hesitancy in accepting. Infact, escaping the tourist and poverty trail to see how the other half live was quite appealing, especially as we’d been followed around by a naked child for most of the night asking us for money.
It turns out that we’re not as good at following Hindi films
Jantar Mantar
women are hidden inside! as we initially thought and sat for three hours in our diamond box seats staring at the shittest Bollywood ever made. So, as soon as we escaped we rang Mark arranging to meet. The only problem was that after more debates and discussions with Rick Shaws, we ended up with one who had no idea where the bar was so took us home instead. (Note One: neither Rick Shaw nor the group of young lads we stopped to ask had heard of this bar). Next day, Mark rang to see what had happened to us and we arranged to meet him for a tour around the White Temple. Our relief flooded when we saw that he had a know-it-all American girlfriend whom he met in Japan where he works as a fashion designer-told you he was rich. The Temple was simply stunning and one of the prettiest buildings we’ve seen in the whole of India. It’s also rather special as it’s made completely out of white marble and aims to bring all religions together under one roof. Unfortunately, this high was quickly subdued when Mark, Nickel, Gobby and us headed off for refreshments. We realized that somehow Mark knew everyone
The White Temple
Pictures really don't do it justice and we were sat in a café surrounded by Indian men who all behaved rather sheepishly when Gail asked them why they weren’t at work (Note Two: little uncomfortable). Anyway, we left them for the afternoon and set off exploring Jaipur on foot.
Our final night we decided to implement Nikki’s new favourite catchphrase, ‘Let’s throw some money at the situation!’ We headed off to an overpriced tandoori restaurant-mmm meat- and was rather amused when Nikki’s food arrived resembling four small penises on a plate. No garnish. Nice. Mark was being rather elusive about which bar (Note Three) we were to meet him at later so we headed off to posh Red Bar. It was pretentious and very expensive so we left. In the lift a massive, fat Canadian-Indian tried his best to persuade us to go with him in his car to a bar. Obviously, we politely declined. Following a text from Mark asking us to meet him at Raja Park outside a bank (Note Four - yes, we know it sounds silly now) we hopped in a rickshaw at the same time as Fat Man happened to pull out in his massive, blacked out four-by-four (they almost
crashed and Fat Man got angry). Our Rickshaw driver, Baba, then got half way there and his rickshaw broke down. ‘Luckily’ his ‘cousin’ Vishnu happened to be driving behind us in his rickshaw. We hopped in his and kindly asked him to not drink beer as he drove us. Anyway, we continued on and Vishnu was on the phone a lot getting all worked up about something. Following frantic discussions about where we were going, who we were meeting, who Mark was, how we knew him, and the fact that he said there were no bars in Raja Park (note five - shit! What are we doing?!) we realized that it was rather foolish to be going 5k out of town and meeting a man outside a bank. We decided it would be best to turn around and go back into town. Vishnu and his ‘cousins’ throughout their many phone calls, had managed to convince themselves that we were about to be either robbed or caught up in some ridiculous diamond scam. They had presumed that Fat Man in his big car was Mark and that we were going to meet him. Turns out Fat Man was a well known
gangster in Jaipur. We paid for Vishnu’s rickshaw with a beer (not cash) in a bar where more ‘cousins’ came to join us and where Gail had to pull her top up so the men’s eyes stopped popping out. It took a good half an hour to calm all the men down and explain that Fat Man was not our friend and that our friend Mark was actually really nice. (Note six -we know you’re all thinking Mark was going to rob us but, we are still convinced he was genuine. We do however recognize that he had asked us to meet him in a stupid place). And so… we never did see Mark again. What was supposed to be a drink turned into 5 hours of chaos and bewilderment.
We did however have a further run in with Baba and Vishnu. We’d agreed that Baba would take us up to the Amber Fort the next day. He unfortunately couldn’t make it and sent another ‘cousin’. Vishnu happened to be up at the Amber Fort too and found us, and asked for money for the rickshaw from the previous night. We explained that we would not be paying as
Baba had said the ride home was free and he had actually broken down and not taken us to our destination. He than proceeded to call us on the mobile constantly and so we ended up fleeing Jaipur on the run from Baba, the cousins and yet another gang of lads that we had got talking to.
Lessons learnt:
Don’t go to McDonald’s
Don’t drink and drive
Don’t get in a rickshaw to somewhere you have no idea about
Don’t give your real mobile number out to rickshaw drivers or to any other friendly men.
If you want an Indian boyfriend/lover/friend then head straight to Jaipur.
To lighten the mood, our final encounter with a man from Jaipur was an over friendly camp man on the train to Jodhpur. He was so excited to talk to us it was almost tiring. His three facts to note about the English were:
We all love Princess Diana and Charles.
All the girls fancy Prince Harry and Prince William.
We’re all stressed and unhappy as we work too much.
Erm, no, no and no.
And so we arrived in Jodhpur, known as the Blue City. Yes a lot of
buildings are blue.
To be honest, we’ve not got much to report from Jodhpur. It’s a cute little place but there isn’t that much to do, except visit another fort. We decided it was best for our sanity not to go there as we are forted out. We did have a wonder around the outside of the fort and stumbled upon a quiet, pretty little area with a lake. Obviously as this is India, the peace was disturbed by a strange old man called Gopellal who wanted to take us to his temple. We couldn’t be bothered to walk as the heat was just exhausting so politely declined. Before letting us go, he took the opportunity to read our palms. One thing of interest that he disclosed was that Nikki is to be married once and will die young, whilst Gail will marry twice and live on. Bitch.
Johdpur itself is worth a wonder around for the day and seems to be used as a stopping point for travelers before heading to the desert (west Rajastan) or to Mumbai. Nikki was fairly sick for the two days (poorly stomach again!) and so we didn’t really venture out of
the annoyingly cute guest house on the final day. It was called the Cosy Guest House, again in the LP and so hospitality has reached a low and arrogance has reached a high. They messed up our booking and so we ended up I the best room on the 1st night and a cupboard on the second (see picture). Not the best night’s sleep…
MUMBAI.
We were pretty apprehensive about arriving in Mumbai as we had no accommodation booked, been told everything is expensive and were arriving at a train station 13kn out of the centre. Everything went pretty smoothly and we grabbed a taxi on the meter when we got out of the station. The driver seemed really genuine and for the first time ever in India, the journey was on the meter! He showed us it was on zero before he placed the 'protective cover' back onto it which meant we couldn't actually see it. Then the driver gave us his card asking us to write down his cab number so we had no need to worry. This whole slimy and well-rehearsed routine was designed to relax us into a false sense of security.
He drove us to a hotel after stopping off 'for petrol'. When we finally arrived the meter was on 51, which converts on a chart to 960 rupees (14quid!). This is a massive amount of money but we’ve never caught a taxi in Mumbai before so didn’t know how much they should cost. With little choice, we reluctantly had to pay him and were rather gutted and annoyed that we didn't fix a price beforehand.
After we’d arrived, I handed him 2x500 notes to pay then picked my bag up off the floor. As soon as I stood up he said, 'You've only given me 2x100.' Well, Gail was fucking furious. She knew exactly how much was in the wallet and had folded the money in quarters before paying when still in the car. Somehow, the bastard had swapped them. Gail got really angry and was fighting about it in the street which obviously drew a crowd of spectators. Nikki wasn't looking when the notes were passed so couldn’t join in the argument. He kept saying, 'I am Indian. I not cheat,' to which Gail replied, 'I'm English; I don't lie!'
The argument continued and Gail made him
show us his pockets and empty them out. Nothing. Then, she threatened to call the police but knowing how fucking corrupt they are we would only end up getting charged with something so with only 3 days left in the country it wasn’t worth it. It’s interesting how much we take legal rights for granted as getting screwed in India means there’s nothing you can do about it.
Later after we finally managed to find a place with rooms, we checked the book which said that the taxi ride actually should have cost a mere 300rupees. After much analysis and hindsight we figure he took the car to 'get petrol' but they actually rigged the meter somehow by opening the bonnet to somehow twist the meter numbers higher whilst we remained in the back with the tinted windows up, as directed. Then, he must have swapped the 500 notes and hidden them somewhere on him. God knows how he fucking did it but he robbed us of 18quid which is a ton of money here. We’re so annoyed that we made it this far and then get scammed TWICE. We should have been paying more thought and attention to
everything as now it seems so obvious, yet after 17hours on a train you are pretty hot, tired and vulnerable which is what these people play on. Grr….!!!!
After checking into Hotel Volga (swiftly renamed Vulga) we went for a wonder around the Gateway to India and a nosey at The Taj Mahal Palace Hotel, where we were accosted by the most boring man in India and had to sit through a painful drink with him. Even Gail struggled to make conversation; again, Nikki looked at her own feet.
In other news, we keep getting stopped in the street and asked if we would like to be in a Bollywood movie. They're remaking Stepmom (Julia Roberts) Although we were tempted to earn seven-pounds for 13 hours work, it was too far out of the city and we didn’t have any spare days. Bollywood will just have to wait for next time.
Mumbai is rather cool, developed city which is suprising as 50% of the population live in slums. It’s probably the most Westernised place we’ve been as we’ve seen Indians exercising and jogging! We've done so much walking around and in the boiling heat. It’s so, so
hot; we’re on 3 showers a day! Our time here was spent visiting the Modern Art Gallery, and open top tour bus to see the architecture illuminated at night and many overpriced beers in the famous Leopold’s bar. We walked to Chowpatty Beach, visited the Hanging Gardens (didn’t see anything hanging) and searched out The Centre of the Universe, according to Hindu legend. It’s actually a wooden pole stuck in the middle of a green, scummy public bath. It turns out we haven’t learnt our lesson and went to see another Bollywood film. This one was more bearable although is seems Indian cinema is family orientated with no ratings, teenage humour and tame sex scenes which are blurred out! Strangely, there was a standing ovation for the National Anthem before the film began. Finally, we spent the day heading out by boat to Elephanta Island where we saw some exceptional cave carvings of Hindu Gods.
After three months in India, we would like to think that we have gained rather an informed idea of how the country works in relation to gender, relationships, religion, employment, etc. It appears that Mumbai is the capital of business. We were staying on
Colaba Causeway and witnessed the world of organized begging come alive at night. Young children are purposefully dressed in dirty, raggy clothes to attract sympathy; women use a board and castors to roll around begging - although if you catch her off-guard you’ll see her stand up to adjust her dress and stretch!; there are meetings held to decide which woman or child will carry the babies around to help gain extra sympathy; mutilated people are begging in abundance. But in a country where little is done to help the infirm, disabled, widowed or homeless they don’t have any choice. Sadly, it’s the people working the streets for business who are stealing the money from those who really need it. As a tourist, picking and choosing, deciding who is needy and who isn’t, who is genuine and who are businesses creates a disturbing choice to make.
Mumbai is similar to Varanisi for its extremes. The noise, traffic, begging and touts are relentless and draining. As accustomed as we became to Indian normality, we were actually looking forward to leaving. The last view from our plane after taking off from Mumbai airport was of the massive slums built around the
View of Chowpatty Beach
taken from the Hanging Gardens edge and children playing in piles of rubbish. When you look at India like this, it makes you literally want to cry and hate it; however, after being there for three months you learn that they all live there in harmony, completely welcoming to foreigners, are kind and helpful, generally honest and are happy within their own situations. It’s impossible to put your finger on what it is about India which is utterly captivating and enjoyable, but we both certainly fell for Mother India’s charms are excited about returning in the future as we’ve only discovered the tip of the iceberg. Coming here has taught us to appreciate what privileged lives we have as Westernised, educated, healthy women who have the luxury of opportunities and the freedom to make choices.
Indian Nikki & Indian Gail signing off. See you in sanitised Singapore!
AT THE MOMENT OUR CAMERAS AND MEMORY CARD HAVE VIRUSES! AH!! CAN'T PUT ANY PICTURES UP AS WE'RE NOT SURE HOW TO FIX IT. FINGERS CROSSED NOT LOST EVERYTHING...
xxx
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