Advertisement
Published: February 18th 2006
Edit Blog Post
Camping indoors on a cellphone
Rahul trying on Keif's camping gear while enjoying talking on a cell phone and sitting infront of a small fire...indoors! Hey Folks,
It's Blythe bringing you the much anticipated update from the rest of our journey through Rajasthan.
Udaipur was fantastic - staying with the Mehta's, one of the SERVAS families, really gave us a taste of what living in India is like. Mr. Mehta is from a long line of SERVAS members and his grandfather is one of India's esteemed Freedom Fighters who worked hard alongside the likes of Mahatma Gandhi to bring Independence to India. He is also one of the first SERVAS members in India. Mrs. Mehta has studied and lectured on subjects of Indian art and architecture and taught us so much about both!
Their sons, Rajah 20 and Rahul 8 also did their part to educate us about India. Rajah took us to a very old Jain temple on a hill overlooking town and told us all about the latest Hindi music. He also made us a fantastic CD. We think that Rahul must be one of the best top spinners in India because he soundly beat me every time we played and I believe was undefeated when playing Keif also! He and Keif became very good friends during our stay!
Some of the highlights from
The Castle on the Hill
The HUGE fort on the hill in Jodhpur. our stay with the Mehta family:
Visiting a very old (and old by India standards, not by American standards!) Jain temple outside of Udaipur.
Eating delicious Indian food with them - they taught us all about channa, jalebi, pakora, and Mrs. Mehta made us wonderful keech! Keech is eaten for the harvest festival in January and even though we missed the festival, she was sweet enough to make some so we could try it!
Learning about Indian culture as we sat around a fire in their yard (Rahul wore all of Keif's camping gear - see picture!).
So, our stay in Udaipur was one of our most incredible experiences in India and we hope to be able to repay their generosity when they come to visit in the US!
After Udaipur, we visited Jodhpur, Rajasthan's blue city and the home of the Mehenghar fort. The fort was incredible - very well maintained (thanks to a grant from the Getty Foundation based out of LA) and had a neat audio guide which was quite informative. One of the interesting details of the fort are the red handprints along the side of one of the gates. The handprints belong to the wives
The last hand print.
The last hand prints before the widows took their last steps through out the gates. of one of the Maharana's killed in battle - they left their handprints as they left the fort on their way to committing sati (a tradition in which widows will burn themselves on their husbands funeral pyre). The architecture of the fort and detail of the carvings was beautiful as well.
In Jodhpur we met some folks who had done some volunteer work and wanted to do a camel trek so we joined them - Nancy from US, Peace from South Korea, Joy from S. India. We went to Jaisalmer - a huge fort on the edge of the desert and booked a camel trek.
The trek was great - with our aformentioned friends and Simon from Hong Kong, Gerald and Deborah from California, and two folks from Australia, we set out to meet the Camel Men and our camels.
Keif and I rode Sonu and Papu - they were either closely related or very good friends. We rode the first day, stopping for chapati and sabzi and a little ciesta at lunchtime, then made it to large sand dunes around sunset. The camel men were great - constantly asking "Madame, how are you sitting?"
The highlight of the trip
The stone screens
A view of the intricately carved stone screens was definately listening to the camel men sing songs around the campfire that night as we ate. One of their sons, probably about 9, joined us and it was great to see him singing along with the other men - you could tell how proud he was to know the songs and it was nice to see the continuation of such a beautiful tradition.
Up early the next morning the camel men let us take the camels for a run which would have been great if we had known how to make them stop!
Keif has a real talent for camel riding and kept making his camel run very fast putting the rest of us to shame! The only problem was, because our camels were close friends and where Sonu went Papu would follow, I ended up on a runaway camel. I cannot describe to you how bumpy it was. Let me just say that for the next couple of days I had trouble sitting.
After the camel trek we took a 20 hour train ride back to Delhi to prepare for my internship and heading north.
We are currently in Dehra Dun and I will soon write to update
Sunrise on the dunes
Starting out the next morning after sleeping on the dunes. you about my first week of clinical rotations with Child Family Health International.
A preview...I learn how to listen for heart murmers (while thinking "Should I have some sort of medical training for this?") and get a crash course in anatomy and physiology, cardiology, etc.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.069s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 8; qc: 47; dbt: 0.0396s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Joel
non-member comment
Wowza!
Totally awesome guys!!! The camel trek looked amazing. Glad to hear your having great experiences and that keif is feeling better. Good luck with the interning Blythe!! Try not to fall in love with your camel keif....I know its tough but its better this way- you'll avoid a broken heart in the desert. All the best!!