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Published: February 13th 2008
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Rajasthan
Romantic India "wraped in gaudy robes" The Bird Flu and the Planes.
Knowing that your flight is cancelled at the very moment you are in the airport can be a crude start of a new country's experience. Maybe it was the terrible idea of being stocked in Bangkok that gave us the courage to think of changing our travel plans. Instead of going to Kolkatta in the west, we could get off in New Dehli and move north from here. So, we gave up the second flight and, in a matter of hours, we were surfing this chaos called New Dehli, driven by a suicidal taxi cab and guided by heaven-sent Joaquin, a Chilean who knows well the city and arranged us a good cheap hotel in the old bazaar area.
Added to being submerged noisy Muslim markets and impressive mosques, Dehli gave us the memorable surprise to meet my dear cousin's daughter Cinthya, and Carles, who just celebrated their marriage and were in India for their honeymoon. We still have fresh memories of that Nepali thali (Indian ready meal) we got together, only to be back to the hotel and get the news on the outbreak of bird flu in Kolkatta.
At the Edge
India's Largest Mosque
Gives confort to prayers. of the Desert.
Five hours and we're out of Dehli and arriving to the sacred city of Pushkar. The tale says that Brahma dropped a lotus flower on the desert and Pushkar floated to the surface. And you cannot do anything but remember that and keep your mouth closed before this exotic mix of sadhus (holy men) in front of you, mixing with pilgrims, merchants and cheaters, part of a world that runs parallel to the kingdom of monkeys living on every roof and in every temple.
The guesthouse we found was literally facing these two worlds, which implied to be awaken at 4 in the morning with a curious combination of Muslim ablusions and Hindu mantras difused by loudspeakers. It also implied to witness the daily territorial fights of the city inhabitants with combative monkeys.
From our base in Pushkar we travelled to Ajmer to visit one of the holiest 'dargahs' (tomb of a Muslim saint) in India, and witness the river of devotees re-burying the saint with flowers and offerings.
Off the Beaten Track.
Being the only whites in the bus can bring plenty of entertainment in a 10 hours trip through the desert of
Unmarked Territory
A glance of a daily routine in Pushkar. Rajasthan. So, entertained as we could we arrived to Bundi, a fort city that seems to be invited by Rudyard Kipling and seems a place out of boundaries for foreign travellers. This fact makes it hard to find a place and you end knocking different doors of guesthouses in order to get food.
Leaving Bundi and still in this adventure. The road from Bundi to Jodhpur is a full color catalogue of the most beautiful Adivasi (tribal) people, a lot of them seeing you as the first white in their lives. The painful hours of bus trip goes smooth among jokes made with the universal language of gestures and sounds, of women offering their jewels in exchange of your camera, of families buying fruit or candy for you, just to receive your smile in exchange.
The blue city of Jodhpur received us with its impressive fort crowning the pink plateau. and introduced us to the colourful world of the Rajput or the warrior cast, of maharajas and palaces, and of multicolour turbants.
In Jodhpur we were invited to be part of the filming of a TV commercial for Samsung mobile phone. Having heard Bollywood as a multimillion
Rows of Sacred Ghats
Front a mistically magnetic lake in Pushkar. dollars film industrie we couldn't believe this young indian in our restaurant was offering us a role in this project. We ended with a first experience of the Rajasthani desert, where the shooting was done, but also hotel and food paid for and an elegant taxi taking us to Jaisalmer as our payment.
In the great Tar Desert.
We are now some 200km far from the Pakastani border. Jaisalmer is a city that grows out of a golden fort. This seems to be the perfect base for a camel expediation into the desert, where we spend a night under the stars but also under a freezing rain that made us forget the pain in our rear ends and the echoes of camels farting.
And we thought we saw the craziest things! Wait to hear this. A temple an hour from Bikaner has the most strange guests: thousands of rats running around courtyards and walls, drinking milk from containers devotees put specially for them. Ina got the guts to get in, after being prevented not to step on a rat. If you do this -we were told- you must "reimburse" the temple with a silver rat. We were also
told we were going to have good luck if any of the rats ran over our feet, and I can only be proud to tell you I will get 3 times luckier!
Our Big Fat Indian Wedding
We didn’t know getting lucky meant to change our travel plans. The family where we were staying at Bikaner, who belong to the Sikh brotherhood, had a cousin getting married in Ganganagar, a city 5 hours far from here right on the border with Pakistan. So, we took the chance and traveled with our kind guides, just to be warmly received with all kind of Punjabi delicacies we kindly ate as much as we could. It was like a full day all you can eat journey, full of color and dancing Indian style.
Ganganagar is this place where you can feel a rock star! Practically every soul that could be at reach of the “gora” (something like gringo in Hindi) will end what he was doing to stare at us. The ones with a few English words will definitely practice them with us and most had to stop and rickshaw wallahs (drivers) stopped just to see us.
Here we finished
with the state of Rajasthan and we are moving on into the Punjab. Next stop: Amritsar, the holy city of the Sikh.
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Norman
non-member comment
Hey Guys, It is good to hear from you again. We were worried after you disappeared into India. I am enjoying the world through your eyes with every update. The pictures and descriptions are glorious. Post some pictures of the food as well. Keep your public informed. When does your Travel Channel series start? Norman