India - Pushkar to Jaipur

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DAY 18 26th January 2011 REPUBLIC DAY
I am sat on the roof terrace after a hectic and jam packed day, watching the sun go down and waiting for Chris to untangle kite strings so he can fly a kite he found! As its Republic day and a National Holiday in India there are hundreds of kites in the skies again!
The day started early as we had decided to get up at 07.00 ( actually that’s our normal time of getting up!!) and have a wander around the hotel gardens and take a look at the views from the roof. 360* views all round although we couldn’t actually work out which was the largest sand dune so took pictures of them all!!
Awtarsing and the guide arrived at 09.00 and we drove down the lane, past a monkey who was eating his morning roti (!!) and onto Pushkar where our guide was very keen to show us a Brahma temple, which he said was the only one in the world ( our book says there are a few, but we didn’t like to say anything!!) Pushkar, apparently, is one of the holiest places in India, more holy than Varanasi, but we only knew it as a place where a famous Camel fair takes place every October. We had to leave our bags and shoes in a locker as the place was prone to pickpockets and we were unable to take photographs in the temple. The temple itself was just a shrine with Brahma ( A God who had four faces) and lots of names engraved in the marble in remembrance of people who had died. Queen Mary had also visited Pushkar and given the temple some silver, either crown or half crowns, which had also been inlaid into the marble, but were now worn away to the point they looked more like bottle tops! Went up to a viewing point where we also saw the little rooms where the priests lived and washed their clothes. For those who are interested in Hindu Gods, Brahma was cursed by his first wife Savrita, when, in her absence, he invited Gayatri, a tribal girl, to take her place in an important ritual! Gayatri then had to pass through the stomach of a cow to be absolved and then became his wife! (I’m not sure how we are supposed to believe all this stuff but the guide who explained it all to us certainly did and was very passionate about it!!!)
After retrieving our bags and shoes we then strolled through the streets of Pushkar with its shops and stalls and bought a few more bits and bobs. Walked down a side street and came to a lake with all the ghats and people doing their ritual bathing and washing. We then visited the nearby Sikh temple – which is where our driver stayed last night (free bed and meal!) and looked at the allotments where they grow all the food etc. All in all, Pushkar was a very pleasant relaxing place and surrounded by small hills ( not really big enough to be called mountains!!) with desert in the middle, it was somewhere where I felt I would like to visit again.......
However, onward to a quick lunch stop and a short drive to Jaipur ( only 2 hours!!) Reached the hotel about 14.30ish which was another deluxe Haveli hotel ( Mandawa Haveli) – our room being like a small suite again....very nice! We decided to have a wander into the old city and braved the crowds, rickshaws, bikes, camels, cows, dogs etc..... There was a procession down the main street with an elephant, two camels, two horses and a few decorated carts with, we think, holy men inside. A couple of bands and a lot of followers ensured that the traffic nearly came to a stand still but with a lot of horn blowing, everybody managed to keep on the move! It’s just so chaotic with so much going on all the time but we did actually negotiate our way down to the observatory tower and also to cross over at a large roundabout!!! After about an hour or so we had, had enough ( well I had!!!) and we went back to the hotel to sit on the roof terrace and have a civilised, well earned cup of tea!!!
Will eat in the restaurant tonight and have early night ready for the grand tour of Jaipur tomorrow. Time to go in off of the roof now as its 6.00 and the mosque has just started........!!! Will leave Chris up here as he has now engaged the help of one of the room boys to help him fly the kite! I think he must have missed out on his childhood somehow!!

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Comments

[Laura Holbrook]

Hope the festival was interesting and boys will always love toys and kites - big or little!