I had a voucher for it and had paid for it, but there must have been some kind of mistake down the line. I sent Himalayan Travel a fax with all the information to have them tell Imaginative Traveller's London office tell their office in Goa to issue the ticket. The fax cost 200 Rs. I was worried now that even if I had to pay for the ticket again that there might not be any seats available. Rachel told me not to worry.
Lisa's face was pretty scabbed, but it looked like it would heal just fine. I sat with Claudia on the left side of the bus. We stopped by the Palace of Winds (or Hawa Mahal). Hawa Mahal was beautiful, but it also seemed to be covered in bamboo scaffolding. Our next stop was the Amber Fort 11km north of Jaipur. Construction on the Amber Fort began in 1592 in the ancient capital of Amber by Raja Man Singh. I took a few panoramic pictures when we got off the bus. It was quite a site. We rode elephants up the hill to the palace. It was my first time on an elephant. There were four people plus the driver per elephant. Antje sat on my left. Jerry was behind me. The driver made a point of making sure we didn't hold onto the bar that held us in because if we dislodged it, it was quite a way down. The elephants were quite big and ornately painted (or possibly tattooed). The trip was very leisurely. Just like in tourist attractions back home, there were people with cameras that would take your picture on the elephant and later give it to you for a fee when you got off the elephant. I had someone use my camera to take my picture, so I didn't buy one. I think the elephant ride would have cost 250 Rs if you went on your own.
There were hundreds of wild monkeys all over the place. They were more common than squirrels at home and much more aggressive. It's best to keep your distance from them because they can carry hepatitis and rabies, but they will sometimes follow you -- especially if they see you have food. When we were leaving, I saw one grab someone's bag from behind and run with it. The man made as if he was going to chase the monkey, and it dropped the bag. As usual, there were always birds everywhere.
It was hot and sunny. Herman hadn't come. I heard it was because he wasn't feeling well. All over the place we were beseiged by aggressive salespeople trying to sell us all kinds of things like purses and little fake cobras that seemed to move in small baskets. I bought a small purse for no one in particular back home. It cost me 100 Rs. I had talked the guy down from 200 Rs, but I later learned I could have gotten it for as low as 60 Rs. Now that I had a small purse I ended up granting requests to store people's elephant pictures in it.
The site was very beautiful and I took quite a few pictures. When I was leaving, I took a picture of one of the salesmen selling food. It was a great picture, and he gave me his address on a card so that I could send him a reprint. I bought 20 postcards for 50 Rs and paid another 50 Rs to take pictures. Asking prices for puppets started at $10 or 350 Rs, but you could get them as low as 50 Rs or 40 Rs.
We then went to a silk carpet factory where after a small magic show, they demonstrated all phases of carpet production. I tend not to be too crazy about magic shows. They're all tricks and illusions that are not explained to you, so whenever I see a trick it's as if the performer is saying, 'I have a secret. I have a secret. I have a secret.' Anyway, I really enjoyed watching how they applied flame to a carpet to burn off ends that stick out. It was pretty neat. I have been to a carpet factory in Egypt, but they didn't show us that part.
In the display room, they offered us free rum and Pepsi, vegetable pokora and bananas while they showed us various carpets. I thought I'd have to be pretty drunk to buy one of their expensive carpets. I guess they were cheap by western standards, but they still weren't worth it to me. Still, others did buy. I sat with Marc and Marie and talked with one of the salesmen. One of the more interesting comments the man made was that of the people that come through the door the ones who buy carpets tend to be the serious or sad-looking people. He said you can't sell anything to happy person who is content with what he has.
Back at the hotel, I picked out a bicycle for the bike ride to Sariska -- number 28. The original plan was to bicycle to the castle in Samode, but it was decided bicycling to the tiger sanctuary would work out better. I had a large fruit plate of mangos, bananas and apples, vegetable pokora and water from the cafeteria for lunch (44 Rs). You would write down your order on a ticket and they would call you when it was ready. I talked with Catherine, Antje and then with Jenny and Lisa. I wish I had as much vacation as Jenny had. Often on the trip it seemed that even though my traveling companions paid more in taxes every year, they lived better than we do in the States.
Thirteen of us wanted to see an Indian movie or part of one anyway, so Rachel negotiated a price with a man who seemed to be in charge of the motorized rickshaws in front of the hotel. She referred to him as scum. In the end it came to 5 Rs per person. Carolyn, Marissa (on Carolyn's lap), Paul (a 26-year-old high school teacher from Australia) and I were in one. When we were dropped off in front of the theater, no one collected any money from us.
The theater was amazing. Coming off the streets and into the building was like going to a different world. It was huge inside and clean with blue carpeting. There were different tickets for diffeent levels in the theater and prices varied accordingly. The levels were named after gem stones. We bought emerald tickets (21 Rs). Inside I thought I was in one of the largest regular movie theaters I had ever been in. People brought their babies with them. Their was a music video with singing and dancing and a rather provocative ad before the movie actually started. It was scheduled to start at 6:00 PM.
The movie was titled 'English Babu Desi Mem' and was about an English Indian who goes back to India and falls in love with his dead older brother's daughter's son's caretaker. There was some English in the movie which helped a lot. The music and dancing were pretty good -- kind of in the Michael Jackson music video style. We didn't stay for the whole thing. By the time we left, the sun had gone down. It was another 5 Rs to get back, and our driver was there to make sure all the money including the money to get to the theater was collected.
Claudia, Francesco, who had bought a carpet, Jerry and Jenny, who bought two, went out for dinner. When they came back, they said they saw what they took to be the celebration of the brother-sister festival that was going on. Rachel later said that it was a wedding. I stayed and talked with Marie, Marc, Lisa, Marissa and Carolyn. I wanted to call home, but the phone was in use. I bought a roll of 36 exposure 200 speed film for 150 Rs, postcard stamps for 12 Rs and 20 postcards for 40 Rs at the hotel shop. Jerry and I talked for a while before falling sleep.
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We were up by 7:00. Jerry washed first. I did my best to shower. I wrote a postcard and mailed it. I talked with Marissa at breakfast after sitting with Rachel, Jo and Carolyn. Again I thought of calling home. At roughly $2.60/minute I'm glad I didn't. We took the bus to the remote village of Samode 40 km northwest of Jaipur. This time I sat on the left side towards the rear with Lisa, who I learned is the oldest child and to my surprise didn't like the movie 'Strictly Ballroom.'
At one of the stops I joined others in buying rum for 80 Rs. We saw a funeral procession en route. I was sitting next to the window when Hans decided to give Lisa advice about her acne. He asked her if she ate a lot of dairy products. She said no, but he told her that if she would cut them out of her diet, her complexion would improve. He said he knew because he had the same problem. I was stunned at his insensitivity especially since her face still had scabs from her accident. Hans really had a gift for it.
The Samode Palace, one of India's most beautiful heritage hotels, was very beautiful. There were courtyards, several floors, a roof you could walk on and every room (actually each room was more like a suite) was beautiful and different. Everyone went around checking out each other's rooms. Jerry and I were in room 202. Our beds were raised fairly high. We had an area for entertaining, a changing room on the way to the bathroom and a toilet you had to take stairs to reach. After settling in, I went to check out the view on the roof and toured rooms.
A bunch of us ended up sitting in a covered ornate area overlooking a courtyard. I thought of it as the blue room since the overall effect seemed to give off that color. We had lunch while we chatted. I had vegetable pokora, french fires and soda. I talked with Paul about the United States, Chicago and health care.
After a while, Jerry, Lisa, Maritsa, Jenny, Antje and I went exploring Samode on foot. We were soon joined by locals who pointed things out and ultimately showed us things they wanted us to buy. They seemed to try to match up one of them with one of us. A young man named Patel stuck with Lisa and me. I think he said he was 27 and not married. The town wasn't very big. We were looking for the market and apparently we walked right past it and were on the verge of leaving town before we turned back and explored other avenues. We lost Jerry and Maritsa for a while. We took our shoes off to visit a mosque which we wouldn't have even recognized had our guides not pointed it out to us. Jerry ended up going into the school and giving a little talk.
Patel tried to sell me some paintings, but I really wasn't in the mood to buy. I had seen some in the stalls on the castle grounds which had appealed more to me. He also showed me his coin collection. If I had any coins on me, I would have added to it. They made a last ditch sales effort before we went back into the castle. I went back to the stalls and bought a couple of silk paintings for friends. They cost me 325 Rs, but the price had started at 500 Rs.
At 4:30 Karen, Antje and I hiked up the stairs to the fort overlooking the Samode Castle. It was a good climb. Karen was out of breath, so we took breaks on the way up. There were two guides up there waiting for us. At first I was annoyed at that, but they did unlock the fort and let us in, pointing out sights as we went along. The view of the castle, the town and the valley from the fort was amazing. I climbed onto a wall and risked a long fall by walking along it to take a picture of some structures in the surrounding countryside. I regretted getting out on the wall since looking down made me less steady. One of the guides warned me not to climb up there, but by that time it was too late. |
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