It’s hard to wrap my experience in India so far into a cohesive paragraph or even page. Suffice it to say it’s the most lively place I’ve ever been. It would be impossible to be lonely in India. Should you somehow manage to avoid human contact surely some stray animal would befriend you.
I’ve given up on telling the kids to avoid the stray dogs as if they all have rabies-I dare you not to pet a puppy who comes up to you. Cows! Cows don’t seem to like us. I’m not sure if it’s the fact we look different, or they can sense we’ve eaten a few of their friends but we’ve had several encounters where cows let us know they don’t like us. While walking down a narrow alleyway yesterday we encountered a bull who sent us scrambling after taking his picture and then there were the ones that ran us off the beach, pushed us into a wall, and so on.
For all my travels, I’d have to say I couldn’t have said I’d traveled until coming to a place like this. All pretense seems to have been thrown out the window here, there are rules, many of them deeply imbedded in custom and tradition, this is a place where 90% of all marriages are still arranged, the cast system while officially gone is still referenced and obviously observed. It’s not been hard to travel here, I mean it’s got its challenges for example I can count on one hand the number of actual hot showers I’ve had, most of those were in the form of a bucket but honestly it’s been easier than I imagined.
Jaipur and Jaisalmer.
We arrived to our homestay in Jaipur. Our homestay is an immaculate mansion run by an obviously wealthy Indian family. They have a daughter currently trying to get into a US medical residency. The retired couple turned their home into a BnB after their children were grown and they host mostly foreign travelers. They spoke perfect English and it felt more like a visit it to an American family, Mrs P actually had Trader Joe’s pancake mix and real syrup she’d brought back from her last visit to US that made the kids’ day.
We met our exuberant guide at a yogurt drink shop. He presented us with rose leis, they smelled like heaven and I had no issue wearing all the kids’ when they became too itchy. The yogurt drinks, like the leis, I would end up collecting from the kids and drinking as much as I could take before throwing the terra cotta cups it comes in into a trash bin.
We toured the Royal Palace with a guide. It was an expensive ticket-like $20 a person which meant we were basically the only people touring it. Which made it interesting. The current maharaja lives there and even uses the spaces. Framed pictures of Prince Charles from his last visit sit on side tables. The highlight was what in my mind amounted to a previous maharajas attempt at impressing the harem ladies. We were led into a room with tiny curved mirrors and jewels. Once in, the door was shut and we found ourselves in complete darkness. A guard lit a candle and began walking around the room. The light seemed to bounce like fireflies from mirror to mirror. It was indeed hypnotizing and delightful. Hey I might even join a harem with that trick.
We went to the Amber fort which has towering views of the area. We went to another “tourist” restaurant, basically having given up on these occasions getting street food. We were taken to a jewelry shop and a carpet and textile store. It’s a common practice in places for guides to take you to “factories” to see where they make local goods. It’s normally got a couple people making stuff and then an elaborate demonstration followed by them trying to get you to buy stuff. In Morocco we saw rugs in the same way. At the end of the day it’s a sales pitch, you didn’t know it but you’ve just found yourself with the best sales guy in town. It’s lighthearted normally and I’ve gotten better at saying no as the items they bring drop in place until out of desperation to get you to buy anything they finally bring out some tiny nicknack dust collector that was definitely not made by the hardworking craftsman you saw out front. At the last textile place they would make dress shirts in 2 hours and deliver it to your hotel for $30. Todd got a couple made. The next day we did nothing which was fantastic, we left in the afternoon to the train station for our next 12 hr overnight train. Indian trains are amazing. Where as last time we had monopolized a whole section now we were spread out a bit in the car we were in. The sleeper cars have small beds for each person. If you have a bottom bed it can be a seat. I was with the girls who had the top bunks (3 up) so they were basically invisible in their own world. My bed was seat level which meant if I was not taking up every inch of that bed someone would sit basically on me, and if I got up I would come back to 3-4 people there. People in the lower class cars will wander around looking for better seating options. Everyone will eventually move when you ask and I kept the girls on the bed and we all played cards and watched the Indian countryside roll by. One thing I love about the rest of the world is that it’s not idiot proof. For example in the US there would be about 50 steps to opening a moving train’s door requiring likely 2 people and keys. On Indian trains you’ll likely find the door open on a train flying down the tracks at 60mph, you want to stick your head out? No problem, no sign to even warn you that it may be a bad idea because hey, that should be obvious, proceed with caution.
But it’s one of the highlights of train travel, so ya I let my kids hang off the sides of trains. There are people at every stop. Eager faces look up and often smile or say hi. Sleeping on a train is shockingly easy. I feel like it’s like going back to our time in our mother’s womb. Something about the gentle rocking that seems to help you drift off. I woke once to find us at a train station that clearly was in a town experiencing a power outage, small dim lights could be made out in the town but the station was completely black, dark figures illuminated by the train lights only run up and down the platforms. I snuggled up to my pillow made up of my bag with our passports, the only thing I really don’t want to lose, and drifted back off to sleep. At 4 am we were in Jaisalmer. The hotel actually looked like a small hotel(that’s new for us). Again food is available in the hotel so we basically wandered through the cute small village and Christmas shopped and let the kids eat. Kids took turns ordering food. Once again finding that things may not be what you think. For example the girls ordered a “Banana split” to be served a banana split in half and fried. :) I made them eat it as that’s the new rule, you order it, you eat it.
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