Cows, Chais, and Pervy Guys!

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February 11th 2008

Published: March 20th 2008

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Andy and Christine

Udaipur

Monsoon Palace perched high on the right, overlooking the city

We got onto the overnight train to Udaipur on Jan. 26th, without having any idea what to expect. It was great; we left at 10:30 in the evening, climbed into our bunks, which also included sheets and blankets, since we were travelling on the two tiered a/c section, and fell asleep. A perfect way to travel, you wake up in a new place, ready to go.

A short and simple pre-paid rickshaw ride took us to our hotel. Since it was early, we waited on the rooftop restaurant and enjoyed some breakfast and chai while our room was cleaned. The sights from the roof were fantastic; it had a 360 degree view of the city, and was close to the lake front where many of the best views are. There was the Jagdish Temple and the City Palace on one side and the Lake Palace 'Jag Niwas', Lake Pichola and the ghats on the other. Incredible!

The streets were more narrow and winding than others that we had already seen in India, and were filled with cows, some with their horns painted. There were the usual people trying to get us into their store, to look at their silver,

Udaipur

Have you dressed your camel today? This guy has!

textiles, paintings and leather work. It was really nice to get out of the hustle and bustle of the big cities and to breathe some 'fresher' air (not quite as many diesel fumes). We had decided to take another little tour around town like the one in Jaipur, but since they wanted a minimum 15 people, we were out of luck. We would have to show ourselves around.

A main sight that we wanted to see was the City Palace. Only a five minute walk from our hotel, we bought our tickets and then ran into a girl wanting to know if we could share a guided tour of the place, since it would be cheaper if there were more people. We agreed, and that's when we met Hilary, a lovely fellow Canadian, from Toronto. She was travelling India on her own for six months, which seemed like an amazing feat in itself, especially to us rookies.

Despite a super rushed tour, where our guide waited impatiently while we stalled our way through the palace, we were still amazed by the grandeur and opulence. One of the main items of interest we saw was the royal toilet, featuring

Udaipur

A beautiful view of Lake Pichola at sunset, from the rooftop of our hotel

a padded leather seat and armrests, and a strange ledge that protruded at the front. We managed to convince our guide to tell us what it was, and found that it was a 'rest' for the King's parts! Talk about luxury! We joked with Hilary for a while after our palace visit, then decided to meet up later for dinner.

It was funny, many of the guesthouses and restaurants in Udaipur had nightly showings of the James Bond flick 'Octopussy', because parts of it were filmed there years earlier. How boring it would be for the staff, seeing the same movie night after night, but maybe a good way to learn English. After having dinner with Hilary, we decided to go down to the lake ghats to relax and chat.

As usual, people would come up and talk to us with curiosity. Mostly younger guys trying to flirt with Christine and Hilary. A couple of guys, Vicky and Sanjay, were going to a wedding reception down the road and asked us to come along. After a couple minutes of negotiations, since we didn't want to go on their motorbikes, and they didn't want to walk, we agreed, and

Udaipur

The cows own the road in Udaipur

set off on foot to the wedding party.

We had no idea what to expect. Either a warm welcome of curious people, asking the foreigners questions with the utmost interest, or us walking into the place and being able to hear a pin drop, while everyone looked at us as their jaws hit the ground. When we arrived, it was actually neither. First, we were introduced to a couple of people, who seemed mildly interested. Then we were escorted onto a light stage, where we were introduced to the seated bride and groom, dressed in unbelievably beautiful traditional clothing and jewelry. We posed uncomfortably while our photo was taken with them, then happily stepped into the shadows.

We were brought upstairs by our two new pals, who insisted that we all take large plates of food, including some delicious sweets. They then told us that it was tradition to feed each other Indian sweets to show that we were friends. A bit suspicious, maybe these guys just liked tourists feeding them, we weren't sure, but it was still funny.

After eating and chatting, we decided that since it was getting late, we would head back to our

Udaipur

Street scene

hotels. The guys walked back with us, which led to an impromptu dance party in the streets with some other tourists along the way. Finally, we reached the bridge to our side of the water, and the guys began to insist on meeting up the next night. Suddenly they began spouting tales of dinner and wine along the water, with dancing after! Hmm, sounded a bit strange, more like a romantic date, and mostly they really wanted to hang out with Hilary and Christine, but were a little too pushy about it. In the end we said we would possibly meet up, then set off to bed.

We made plans with Hilary to meet up the next morning and walk to the Monsoon Palace. After a quick breakfast, the three of us set off on foot. It was a 9 km walk that took us through an interesting area that most tourists missed, since they would get a rickshaw or a taxi. Again, celebrity status kicked in as we walked along, people were waving, calling 'Namaste', kids were chatting to us, and occasionally asking for 'one pen', 'one photo', 'one euro', or a few rupees.

The walk wasn't

City Palace, Udaipur

Colourful mural at the entrance

so bad, except for the long, hot hill at the end, but once we arrived at the top, the view made the trek worth it. It was great to be able to look out of the palace and think to ourselves 'Wow, I can't believe we walked that far'. The palace itself wasn't much to see, mostly an empty stone building, but after climbing some stairs, we were treated to an amazing view of the surrounding lakes and foothills, which was gorgeous.

Finally we decided to make our way back, and set out on the hot 9 km trek back. About half way down the hill, we passed two young guys sitting on a tractor. We said 'namaste' as we passed, and they indicated that we should get onto their tractor and they would give us a ride. The scary part was that the guy driving started the tractor, but once we got going, he turned it off and we coasted in neutral down the hill, going a little too fast, to say the least. But what a fun trip; we waved and thanked them as we hopped off at the bottom of the hill. The rest of the

City Palace, Udaipur

View of the city from the palace

walk flew by, helped along with a stop for masala tea at one of the many chai stalls. In the end, we were too tired and didn't feel like meeting up with our Indian pals from the night before. We just hoped that we wouldn't run into them and have to come up with an excuse.

The next day, us three amigos set off to catch the local bus to the village of Ranakpur. It was a four hour ride, and the bus sped around, honking at everything, including cows and monkeys that would sometimes get in its way. We met a school teacher that took great pleasure in telling us all how brave we were to take the bus, since it was such a dangerous road. He said that many people pray before setting out because vehicles often go over the edge of the narrow, winding cliff section just before Ranakpur! Just what we wanted to hear, of course. In the end, the man hyped it up so much that we were all a little disappointed. Even though the narrow road had some great scenery overlooking steep canyons, our driver was actually very good, and the bus slowly

Udaipur

Andy's brother from another mother

inched ahead past sections where we're sure there were still cars crashed below.

We got off the bus in Ranakpur and walked a short way to see the main attraction, the beautiful Jain temple. Made of white marble, every single surface has deeply and intricately carved designs. It is supported by 1444 pillars, each of which is supposed to have a different design, although with so many to see, who could tell! The temple is about 700 years old and rumour is that the stone carvers were paid the equivalent weigh in gold as the marble dust that they removed, hence the deep and detailed work. We both felt that the temple was one of the most amazing sights we'd ever seen. Hilary bought some flowers at the door and made a beautiful, decorative offering on one of the carved elephants. The trip was definitely worth the long hours on the bus and the crazy road!

On the bus ride back, the three of us got to sit with the driver up front, with Andy and Hil up on the dash and Christine in the stairwell, since the bus was packed full when we got on. Talk about

Udaipur

Reflection in the water

front row seating, we had an amazing view down into the canyons below. We chatted with the driver, comparing prices of things in Canada versus India. Andy almost made the driver go off the road when he told him that a cup of chai, which costs about 5 rupees in India, would cost about 165 rupees in Canada.

Back in Udaipur, we walked down to a great textiles and handicraft market called the Tibetan Market, which was where the locals would buy saris and shawls, along with other types of clothing, also some great Michael Jackson thriller style jackets! The prices were marked, so it was great not having to haggle to get a fair price. There were dozens of monkeys there, causing trouble by banging on the tin roofs of the buildings and mating in a public place, which the Indian kids found hilarious. There were also whole coconuts and chai to quench our thirst while shopping.

We went for dinner with Hil and a couple other Canadians she had met on the train. It was cool to hang out with a group of Canadians, and talk about Canadian things like hockey, beer, snow, Tim Hortons, Canadian

Udaipur

Christine and her new shawl from the Tibetan Market

Tire, and where we got our touques. Sometimes it's so much easier not to explain what a zamboni is.

After a few days, it seemed that everyone in Udaipur was recognizing us. One rickshaw driver kept pointing at his eyes whenever he saw Andy. He told us that Andy's eyes were too white and he wanted to make them red. Other guys wanted to have their photos taken with us, to hang out, or buy us a chai. We ran into one of the guys from the wedding, who pulled up on his motorbike and tried to get Christine to take off with him. Completely ignoring Andy, he kept saying 'Come' and pointing at the seat!

By now, we knew that we had been in Udaipur for too long, and it was time to get moving. We said our goodbyes to Hilary, who had been a fantastic fellow adventurer for getting off the beaten track. We were to set off towards our different destinations, and for us that meant catching the bus the following morning to Jodhpur, the 'Blue City'.

When we got to the bus station, we heard someone call our names. It was the two

Udaipur

Some great tile work, en route to the Monsoon Palace

Canadians we had previously met, who we had no idea were taking the same bus. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but this ride would rank among our fastest and scariest bus rides ever. The driver constantly had his hand on the horn for the whole ride. We almost got into a head on accident at least three times, including once with a school bus full of kids. We were very happy to be off the bus seven hours later, even though we had to deal with many touts trying to get us to their guesthouses.

Ignoring them all, we took a rickshaw, whose driver first got lost, then tried to drop us off at a different hotel, which we refused. Luckily, our hotel was only a minute walk away. It was a mellow guesthouse, with a nice, friendly family. We rested up after the nail biting ride, then met up with fellow Canadians Cheri and Dave at the clock tower in the center of town for dinner. We had an elegant meal in a beautiful hotel, during which the power went out, so we dined by lamplight, looking up at the incredible Mehrangarh Fort which

Udaipur

Us and our Canadian buddy Hilary, halfway up the hill to the Monsoon Palace

loomed on the hill over the city.

The next day we climbed up to Mehrangarh Fort and took in the great views of the crazy city. We were given an audio tour headset and it was so great to take a tour at our own pace, and not have some guy rushing us through it. The view from the hill top was great; we could see why they call Jodhpur the 'Blue City'. Hundreds of the houses and buildings below were painted blue, a very pretty effect from above, and only visible from way up there. The fort contained rich silver elephant saddles, a guy giving an opium smoking demo, rooms only fit for a king, and loads of school kids that were overly excited to have their pictures taken with us strange folk.

We tried the first of many saffron lassis, which are drinks made by blending saffron with yogurt and sugar, and were famous there in Jodhpur. There was a really great lassi shop near the clock tower, as well as the famous Omelette Shop, which supposedly cracked around a thousand eggs a day, feeding the masses. We both loved their masala omelette with cheese, which

Udaipur

View from the Monsoon Palace

we would eat in the streets while sitting on crates, as bikes, cows and people all buzzed around us.

On our last day in Jodhpur, we had two errands to run; buy train tickets and send a package of goodies home. We set off early in the morning, and so were able to see the streets empty, except for a few people setting up shop, as well as dog packs, and cows eating the previous nights leftovers.

After buying our tickets, we went to the post office, and learned that we had to get our parcel stitched and sealed. We took it to a man nearby who put our stuff into a box, wrapped it in linen, then stitched it up with thread. He then melted red wax and stamped it along the seam at intervals to seal it. During the entire process, we sat there drinking chai and watching, totally fascinated. The whole process took a couple of hours, and hopefully our pretty package full of Indian gifts and gadgets will eventually make it home.

In the evening, we boarded the train for another overnight ride, this time to Jaisalmer, where we planned to head off