V - Coloured Cities
We’re currently running the kaleidoscope of Indian tourism. Our first day out in India was to the Red fort in Delhi. After leaving Agra, we went on to the pink city – Jaipur. This morning we arrived in the Golden City Jaisalmer. Our next port of calls ends the rainbow in the blue city of Jodhpur. (Apologies for the confused metaphor, we had originally intended to travel to Jodhpur first leaving the golden city till last but that would have meant a very long journey from Jaisalmer in the far West to Ranthambore and the jungle South of Delhi.
We got to Jaisalmer by overnight train but were badly prepared. The city lies in the desert. Tomorrow we are heading out to see the stars on a camel, and at night it gets pretty cold. Our train arrived at 5:40am by which time Oberon had never been cuddled so hard as we clung desperately to each other for warm. (Actually, weirdly, it was only the adults who felt perishingly cold – the children slept like little angels, but believe me both those little hot water bottles were well used.) It turned into the most beautiful experience as we thawed out on a youth hostel roof watching the sun rise over the golden city, with the rooftops echoing around the call to prayer and my first decent coffee in ages – (most to date has been what my mother would unaffectionately call “gnats’ piss”).
Youth hostels often have a reputation for being cheap, grotty boarding houses perfumed with the scent of Lynx Africa and the over-packed rucksacks of American teenagers. In my twenties I took a lot of outdoor-pursuits-based European trips for rich teenagers and can attest that some youth hostels are incredibly beautiful and affordable! The queen of these was a youth hostel in Barcelona which had an entry hall worthy of a 5* hotel. I tried to google it earlier but couldn’t find it so perhaps it has been put to more ostentatious use. Equally the youth hostel in Holland Park is the most gorgeous setting in the richest part of London for very reasonable prices. A favourite stop of mine is the Pen-y-Pass hostel at the foot of Snowdon in North Wales. There are some real gems out there, youth or not. Jaisalmer has something of that backpacker feel. It’s all about getting out into the desert here with little package trips. Having enjoyed some of those backpacker routes across Australasia and Southern and Eastern Africa, it’s quite fun to walk into a cool hostel with a laid-back atmosphere and out of date guidebooks lying around with pages ripped out.
It’s a strange thing how travelling feels like a wasted day. We managed a trip out to a haunted fort before we took the train. Rhiannon wanted to go because its name was Bhangarh – which sounds like Bangor, a little town in North Wales. The fort was weird. This beautiful stone village being taken over by “Horror trees” (where spirits lurk) and monkeys. The story goes that a beautiful princess moved into the fort on marriage, but was desired by an evil sorcerer. He tried various charms and finally made a perfume which should have intoxicated and seduced her. She had a strong devotion to Shiva and saw through the plot destroying the phial. This killed the wizard who with his dying breath cursed the village to destruction. Most of the inhabitants left what was old Jaipur to build present-day Jaipur, but some stayed and were killed by a cyclone which took all the roofs off the houses. Those spirits remain to haunt the living. Curiously, despite the stone, some beautiful temples and an impressive fort the place remains abandoned. There’s obviously enough power in the tale to prevent any attempts to reinhabit the area.
It's a relatively simple tale, but I ended up telling Apollo the story at least a thousand times. He’s at that “why” phase – “Why did the wizard die?” “why did the storm come?” “why did the wizard want to marry the princess?” The good news is that the story is pretty fixed in his mind now and has clearly taken his imagination.
There was though a lot of travelling but it’s not a wasted day. When travelling you have to remember that driving out of town, catching a train, shivering through the night, eating bad food, lugging about huge bags is all part of travelling and experiencing a city, country, people. All those small interactions, all those foul toilets and wallahs yelling “CHAI!” through the night is part of how you come to experience a different country. Awful, banal, amusing, boring, fascinating it’s the backdrop of why you travel, and the background colours of how you come to know a country.
Animals are also part of that backdrop. Monkeys are everywhere, as well as these little stripey squirrels called Ghilahari, goats, cows, donkeys, buffalo, antelope, pigs, all wander about at random. You see the occasional horse, camel, in certain places elephants. We were delighted by a snake charmer outside Jaigarh fort, who let Oberon hold his snakes Carlos and Juliet, and then tried to charge him a thousand rupees. The birdsong is often incredible and we have to offer constant warnings of leopards and tigers to keep the children close.
One of the happier things about the trip so far is that our experience is improving as we move on. Delhi was difficult, smog and fog and so much traffic – walking around felt unpleasant and everywhere people were pitching for business. Agra was like Delhi but on a smaller scale and at least relieved by the genuinely emotional experience of the Taj Mahal. Jaipur was altogether nicer and we had a wonderful guide. But not having much time in a huge city we zapped around in a car catching highlights. Jaisalmer we’ve experienced much more on foot. I took Apollo up a hill to see one of the ninety-nine forts, which being made of sandstone (“the golden city”) all look like sandcastles. Later, all of us wandered down for a little shopping and lunch in a vibrant and colourful market, but without being constantly hassled and getting a much better sense of what is a much smaller city. Travelling is always a compromise between skimming along the surface and trying to get a deeper sense of place and people. I’m looking forward to stopping and getting a more in-depth experience when we get to South India, but for now just having a little more time and space to get the sense of a place is very pleasant.
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