Hot air balloon over desert tent camp. Pushkar, Rajasthan at 6:30am.
So many early morning wake-ups. It’s hard to tell when this vacation was stripped of its relaxation. I think it might have been in the airplane on the way here, perhaps as the flight passed over Eastern Europe. This morning we needed to have our belongings out of the tents by 7am. As I unzipped the hatch door for the final time I was greeted with a sweet view of a half dozen hot air balloons passing overhead. It was a nice way to greet the new morning. Breakfast was I don’t even remember what. I’m pretty sure I just had a bowl of cornflakes and some toasted white bread. After thirty minutes we had to be on the bus to Jaipur.
The ride took about three hours. There was a stop after the first hour at a convenience store/cafe in some random podunk town I couldn’t find on a map…but then again I’m in India so it’s not like a lot of these places are familiar to me. I had fallen asleep during the first hour (listening to Live Songs, by Leonard Cohen) so in order to stay awake I bought a bottle of Coke. This is relevant only because it was the first soda I’ve had in over three months. Somewhere, somehow, somebody is reading this and organizing the world’s tiniest parade to be held in my honor.
View from the Hotel Mansingh in Jaipur, Rajasthan.
We checked into the Hotel Mansingh shortly after twelve noon. Our first stop of the day was the observatory in Jaipur, which is where astronomers and astrologers use some antiquated, ancient machines for purposes of telling time and figuring out…to be honest I’m not all that into astrology so I don’t know what the machines were for. Something about ascendents or rising signs. It was supposed to be cool because they had individual instruments for the different zodiac signs, so you could take a picture next to whatever machine corresponded to your birthday and if there happened to be an astrologer around (there wasn’t) you could find out shit about your…astrology. Whatever. I took a picture next to my birthday machine and that was that. Some of the sun dials were pretty cool…but who uses sun dials anymore? Every machine we have is automatically linked to Greenwich Mean Time, right?
The next site on the tour of Jaipur was a Royal Palace where the Maharajas live(d). There are still maharajas but they don’t really rule over anything. The palace was super-nice, though. Very opulent. Oh, and apparently the last maharaja of Jaipur died reentry (as in, within the past month?) and appointed his twelve year old grandson the next in line to his throne. The kid lives in one corner of the palace, and if I had to guess which one it was I’d say it was the one with all the guards shooing the monkeys away. Baboons. Whatever the fuck they are. They’re all over the place in this part of Rajasthan. There were some in Pushkar, but I’d say there are way more in Jaipur. I feel like more people take pictures of monkeys than they do the historical or holy sites. I don’t get it. The big joke at the palace was that there was once a Maharaja who was 7-feet tall and 4-feet wide, and weighed over 500 pounds. The center building (I think it used to be a guests’ quarters) museum keeps one of his royal robes, a pair of his pants and underpants on display. They were gnarly.
Our next stop was a fucking textile factory. Much like the carpet shop before it, the textile factory was a place the older women with money to burn were brought to just to bleed them a little bit. Stimulate the local economy. I was content to stay on the bus until someone informed me that they were giving out free soda and rum. I got a little shot of dark Indian rum that was fantastic. It smelled strongly of caramel, and tasted very sweet and full and delicious. Then I found a youngish white guy sitting in the back of the textile store with a bottle of the rum and two older Indian gentlemen. One was a tour guide from France, the other two worked at the store. I plopped down next to them and poured myself a glass of rum. We chatted about Pushkar, Jaipur, and these arranged visits to shopping centers. We finished the bottle of rum and one of the employees went to grab another one for us. I got a pretty solid buzz going after a few glasses of rum, and just when I thought I was going to get silly drunk they said it was time to leave. Too bad.
How to survive an afternoon at a textile factory/shop in Jaipur. Note: The smokes aren’t mine.
Back at the hotel I located the gym and ran, which started tepidly due to my half-drunkenness, but I finished strong. I’ve been doing my best to keep up with marathon training, but it’s proven difficult what with spending a weekend in the middle of the fucking desert and having all my days meticulously organized by someone other than myself. I ran a shade under 14 miles (my training goal for the day) but didn’t worry about not meeting the goal because my not understanding the metric system led me to run too far the other night in Delhi.
I showered and had a late dinner in the hotel. There was Malai Murg Tikka (boneless pieces of chicken marinated in yogurt and mild spices, grilled in a charcoal oven) and a lamb dish that was really spicy and great. I ate way more than I should considering what time of night it was, but I’d just finished a long run so I felt obligated to recover with a big meal.
Tomorrow we’re going to the Amber Fort, which is supposed to be a really great site in Jaipur. You have to get to the fort by elephant, which should be neat. It’s located in Old Jaipur, and I believe that the area used to be the capitol of India once upon a time. I could be wrong. My tour guide could be just as wrong if not more wrong for telling me that. Afterwards there’s a trip to a jewel factory. If it’s anything like the carpets and the textiles I’ll want to blow my brains out. I guess there’s a chance they’ll have some rum for me. I sure hope so. I hope I didn’t toss that marigold into Pushkar Lake for nothing!
Radio Jaipur [MP3]
