An India Adventure

Village Life - Passing Time Playing Chapot — Village Life - Passing Time Playing Chapot

Prolog

Working for a global IT company, I’ve visited India several times a year for the past decade. Always enjoying companionship of local colleagues, but never seeing India beyond a 5 Stars Taj or American hotel, and our salubrious corporate offices. We have a self contained site, including dining and medical facilities.

I was well overdue for seeing India up close and personal. Sharing the experience with Sarah, my wife, we began exploration in Mumbai. There is poverty throughout the city, but the place is also bursting with life and positive energy.

Mumbai

It was Sunday. The agenda began with Dhobi Ghat, the worlds largest outdoor launderette. Most tourists on look on from the roadside, two stories higher than the laundry. We wanted the full shop-floor experience and paid a voluntary entry fee to smell the detergent baths close up.

To dhobi in concrete wash pens is a physical experience to behold. Men in chemical ridden water scrubbing, bleaching, dying and flogging clothes by hand. Hanging to dry is managed by women, and men then press garments with heavy charcoal heated irons. It’s a marvel that no item is lost nor delivery mixed up. One word of warning for the squeamish — Nothing is hidden in site the tours, including bathing men.

Our next drop off point was the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. I stayed there once and the only word to describe it is ‘spectacular’. The lobby, palace staircases, restaurants and bars are open areas, and well worth seeing. The ‘Gateway to India’, Leopolds Bar (a must for readers of the novel Shantaram) and Colaba market are easy walking distance. As are boats embarking for Elephant Island to see the ancient Buddhist and Hindu hand carved caves.

Mumbai possesses few pavements of western standard. They are narrow, uneven and crowded. Then comes needing to see the other side of a road. There are no pedestrian crossings and no perceivable right of passage. Crossing is an art form. The best tip is to cross like a cow. Slow, deliberate and straight, while traffic unnervingly weaves around you. No one slows nor stops, and not a square inch is left without tarmac contact. It’s like Tetris with lorries, cars, auto-rickshaws, bicycles, animals and people tightly packed.

The next days in Mumbai weren’t the greatest. Sarah picked up a gastric bug. The sort that ensures tummy cramps and the shits with 3 second warning. If you’ve drained an old car’s radiator, India diarrhoea is the same consistency — hot, rust coloured water dispensed from a high pressure hose. The advice for Delhi belly is stay close to the toilet for 36-hours. Normal service then resumes.

Jaipur, Part-1

Thursday’s flight to Jaipur was with Jet Airways. They apply the same customer care package as Ryanair in Europe. Low cost ticketing is vigorously up-sold at bag drop. Usually to upgrade cabin luggage not fitting inside a shoe box or checked luggage being a kilogram over a feather light allowance. We beat the measures. The next conjure is upgrading seats. Weak from excessive flows, Sarah gave that look that needs comfort. We handed over 13,000 rupees for business class.

Our flight landed in the evening. We were welcomed by our friend Arush, his father and our driver for the next week, Bablu. Jaipur is an open, welcoming city. Well maintained wide roads and few high rise buildings. The antithesis of Mumbai. We checked into the Hari Mahal Palace. A place akin to the Best Marigold Hotel for the low level of building maintenance it enjoys.

We started the next day in the worlds largest literary festival. This is an annual event with global authors being interviewed on large stages across a huge site. It’s an amazing spectacle and a worthy pilgrimage for anyone who is widely literary. Not that we would include ourselves in this category. A few days later we met a socialist author in Agra who expressed disdain of our conservative reading list for novels.

The festival was as busy as London’s Oxford Street on a Saturday when we arrived. By lunchtime it resembled a Tokyo Subway train at rush hour. Hard to imagine on a site so large, until visualising that half a million people attended this year. Tired of being canned sardines, we left early afternoon and headed for Jaipur’s (pink) old city and retail therapy. Not the smartest move. The pink city’s streets are a must see, but not for mid afternoon shopping!

A foreigner stands out at the best of times, but locals shop in the morning and evening when it’s cooler. Shoppers were few, and like a Royston Vasey scene (from the The League of Gentlemen), we strangers are fair game for “Can I help you at all” moments with the frequency of a hummingbirds wings. Eventually worn down, we bought bangles for Sarah and hightailed it back to Bablu’s car.

In need of a more relaxed venture, Saturday’s excursion was booked through Viator. A visit to Amber Fort and City Palace. Our guide, Ashok, was amazing. Notwithstanding absence of artefacts, every room was brought to life in colourful description. Our minds saw the maharaja and maharanis of Amber Fort sat in sparking rooms with mineral painted ceilings that mirrored the symmetrical patterns of richly coloured carpets on the floor.

One excursion certainty is the enterprise culture stops. First, expert carpet weavers and traditional screen printing. Many carpets then rolled out with dazzling showman flurry until we shared the construct of underfloor heating in our home. We rapidly progressed to the fabric floor and bought silk scarves. Stop two was to see precious stones expertly cut and polished by hand. Sarah saw a beautiful sapphire bracelet, and doe eyes did the rest.

Wallet emptied, we moved on to City Palace. The residence of Jaipur’s royal family has many fascinating references to history under British occupation. Though it’s not a photogenic place, and camera use is prohibited in near all rooms. This is understandable, given the ancient carpets and paintings that retain splendour by low level lighting. City Palace is worth the visit, but don’t expect to feel the bewitching charisma of Amber Fort.

Bharatpur

Sunday was 4-hours drive to Bharatpur and the Laxmi Vila’s Palace (Heritage styled) Hotel. Not that we stayed longer than a bag drop. The afternoon was a chance to go off-piste. Arush had arranged for us to meet his uncle, Manoj. The next drive was 90 minutes off-road to his Fruit Farm. As we entered (and left) the small village, Manoj stopped many times to introduce us to the president, ex president and his many friends. With a wry smile, Bablu said “They don’t see many foreigners.”

No one at the Farm spoke English. For the Farm tour, our escort yelled crop names in Hindi until we were able to pronounce them correctly. Then we giggled. While I was busy photographing fruit bats, Sarah shared cigarettes, which gave our guide a 10-minutes coughing fit. Again, much to everyone’s amusement. Finally, we took tiffin with Manoj’s family, pointing at objects and exchanging Hindi for English words. One final group photograph and we left, richer for the experience.

On Monday we saw the 29 sq. km of Keoladeo National Park. A bird sanctuary that includes 375 avian species, 34 species of mammals and 7 species of turtles — To name but three of the many life forms. Our encyclopaedic rickshaw peddler picked out species, named and described them like Google. One spoiler is noisy halfwit visitors who startle critters before you have chance to grab the perfect picture. A moment when you want to plunge a 2H pencil up their left nostril.

Agra

We drove from Bharatpur to Agra on Tuesday. Staying at the chic Aman Homestay Hotel. This oasis is just 400m from the transport site to the Taj Mahal. The owners welcome was matched only by her home cooking, which was wonderful. Our hotel room opened onto a rooftop honesty bar and dining area. A location that had sleep disrupting potential, but as people who enjoy sociable company to the last, we were the latest noise on the roof.

Agra was one night stay. We photographed the Taj Mahal at sunset from gardens across the river, and later booked a 30-minutes full-moon visit. Getting into the mausoleum at night runs the gauntlet of India petty rules. Boarding the shuttle required 3 ink stamps on your ticket. We unwittingly received two. Being a stamp short of a trio, we were sent back to the start and our allotted half-hour reduced 30% while we made the round trip. The experience was worth it, once we’d captured a perfectly lit moonlight photograph.

From Agra, we drove 4-hours back to Jaipur and stayed in the Alsisarh Aveli Hotel. It was a delight to see the four poster bed complete with chiffon reminiscent of a maharani‘s boudoir. Then romance deepened at seeing the night’s moon. Sat with a glass of red wine on the terrace, the visible full-moon was unusually dusky. Only then did we realise it was a lunar eclipse of the supermoon. How can passions not be aroused after that.

Jaipur, Part-2

Sunsets and moonlight, but we hadn’t seen a sunrise. No better place to do that than Jal Mahal Palace, which sits in Man Sagar Lake. I do mean within, as several stories of the building are submerged by design. Sunrise is an ethereal backlight to the Palace, which reflects in the still water. After an enchanting early start, we drove to the hilltop Fort for magnificent views of Jaipur city enveloped in morning mist. Back to the hotel for breakfast and next to the experience highlight of our stay.

Amber Fort has 130 elephants that transport tourists10-minutes up hill and through the gates. We didn’t want to ride, much preferring to spend time with them. The elephants work half-day, and Thursday afternoon we visited a farmstead that keeps eighteen. We walked around the farm with Raani and fed her. The bond felt unbelievable. Sarah and I both fell in love with Raani.

Travelling had become a theme of this holiday. Friday was a seven hours round trip to Pushka — A Hindu pilgrimage site that involves both temple and lake in ritual. First we took flower heads into Brahma temple where the petals are blessed. Next to the lake for a ritual of family blessings. Then cast the flowers into the lake and place money for the poor onto a coconut. An odd experience for atheists, but one that’s relaxing of mind and body.

We stayed for an hour in Pushka. Sarah was again feeling the onset of Delhi belly cramps. Thankfully, the sickness and diarrhoea experience returned after we reached sanctuary of our hotel. Saturday’s intended hotel high-point of Neemrana Fort Palace would quickly come off the menu. Another 3-hour car journey with irregular bodily functions wasn’t going to happen. We cancelled our hotel and stayed a further night in the Alsisarh Aveli.

This was a wise move. It was Saturday evening before Sarah felt safe and well enough to leave the compound. Opting for a short return visit to the pink city, the experience was totally different. Streets were buzzing with potential buyers and our ability to attract unwanted shopkeepers attention much diminished. This wasn’t a shopping trip, we wanted to photograph the colour and energy of open air bazaars, and the visit didn’t disappoint.

Sunday was the end of our lollipop. A 24-hours journey from Jaipur with Mumbai, Paris, and Southampton airport waypoints before reaching our home. Time for one last sightsee before our 1pm departure to the Terminal 2. We opted for the wholesale vegetable and flower market. A must see for any photographer. The bartering energy is huge, the colours are intense and images flow into the camera.

Epilog

There are holidays and there are experiences. India was the latter. One that we will always treasure. Rajasthan is a true wilderness and city adventure, and one that gives latitude to safely do things your own way... As long as remembering to cross like a cow.

©Martin Urch

Martin Urch hereby asserts his moral right to be identified as author of this work.  No part of this work may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

Published by Incredible Journey Publishing, www.martinurch.com