Jaipur

On Sunday, Barbara and I rode an elephant named Monee up the steep walkway to Amber Fort, a beautiful old fort palace near Jaipur. The guys walked up with the rest of the mere mortals; Barbara and I arrived in style!

This is not Monee, but a more colorful co-worker. Their days are just trudging up and down the steep road to the palace. Their favorite foods are sugar cane and chapatis. I had neither with me, sadly.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amber_Fort


The Amber Fort is a beautiful old building--begun in 1592??-- with the most gorgeous light inside many of its rooms. It is in remarkable condition.


















We visited a village the night before. Our driver Malagar asked a friend to take us home with him. Americans had never been to that village before, so we were quite the amusement.

At our first stop, some of their work is sewing spangles on the edge of sari material, and doing the rough cut for semi precious stones. One man brought out a handful of stones, mostly amethyst, and had me choose one. Malagar suggested that I choose a 2nd one, so I did. They were gifts for visiting the village! Across the street, another young man gave me a cut Zircon, and we had our photo taken together both holding the little plastic bag it was in.







I was also encouraged to try out the hand-powered machine that chops up something that looks like alfalfa, and was photographed turning the wheel with one of the teenage boys. I think it was animal food. That household has five water buffaloes to feed, so a lot of chopping goes on.

At the 2nd stop, 17 male first cousins and 13 female cousins (whoever hadn't married and moved away yet) live in houses nearby each other, sort of all on the same block. They have an uncounted number of children and teens, dozens it seemed, and several of the immediate families always cook and eat together. Not sure how it all works, but I like it. In that extended household, the majority of them hold government jobs. The man who brought us is one of the 17 men. He commutes to the big city (Jaipur), about 30 minutes away (maybe less) and runs a small guest house in the city.

Right when we were leaving--Malagar was turning the car around as we were saying goodbye--one of the cousins, an accountant, whose porch was used for our visit and who spoke the most English, invited us in to see his house. The building felt like it was on a narrow alley, with another building facing it, and two or three attached homes in each building. Their fields planted with wheat were on one side of the houses, and their water buffaloes were on the far end of the fields. One common local architectural style has many levels with an open courtyard. Catches the breeze and keeps the house cool. Their home is three stories tall, and includes two cooking areas and an attached enclosed barn for the animals, which also has an open courtyard.

When we got to the top, it was all empty deck except for a small kitchen. And it was enormous! About 8 times the size of the upstairs deck at our house. In the summer when the temperatures can be 45C during the day, they all sleep up on the roof.

It was dark by then, and a lovely cooling breeze was blowing. And all the stars were there! It was a wonderful sight. The bottom of the sword on Orion was so clear--hadn't seen it in years--and the Milky Way was right overhead. The Milky Way! It is still there. I told them there are only about 8 stars in the sky at my house. . .

There were two power outages while we were there, an every day occurrence. There is a thing that people say here when the power goes out, and I am translating it very loosely: We never have power outages, it only happened just now that you are here. I get it, but it would take many words to try to explain it if you don't, and to explain why it's funny.

Last night we walked through the town of Pushkar, which is filled with mostly French foreigners sporting dreadlocks. It's a very hippie town which adds yet another layer to the experience. There are over 400 temples in Pushkar. Many of them are just little nooks, and Pushkar is considered a Holy City, a very special place, by the Hindus.

There was a local event last night, a traditional dance and music performance on the grounds of a large temple. We waited quite a while for them to begin, and sat through lengthy speeches and introductions. The people-watching was superb! We are here one more night then we hit the road again.

There's a lag time between taking photos and having them ready to post. . .in the meantime here is a photo of the 4 of us, in a 500 year old Jain temple in Bikaner. The picture was taken for us by the temple priest, who has it down to a science! More photos coming soon.