We were awakened around 7am with scrambling on the roof, sort of lolloping noises, lots of creatures and then a little while later they were back. Monkeys I thought and later as we stood outside our hut watching some of the cornucopia of exotic birds we see all the time in India and young German confirmed that a raiding party of monkeys had attacked the hotel - some had entered his room and his banana was missing! They have obviously learnt that at that time people are still asleep and have balcony doors and windows left open.
We were sleeping in a small hut at the end of the hotel garden, over the wall is the wildlife reserve complete with water buffaloes (which we saw) but even some tigers and wild elephants (which we have not) but it is nice to look out on. Mind you we realised we were on the front line - not for tigers or monkeys - but for mosquitos and made sure the hotel mended some holes in the door screen and then had to use our bodge tape to repair their mosquito net. We slept fine until the monkey raiding party but have moved to a much better hotel - a lovely 3rd floor room at tree top level, a sweet breeze and gorgeous view and probably fewer mossies.
We are in Kumily, still in Kerela but up in the Western Ghats and right on the border with Tamil Nadu. We had the most extraordinary bus ride up here, actually two buses, a 6 hour journey in all that cost us all of one pound fifty each. The first bus was fine, took us to a large town south of Kochi from which we sought out the Kumily bus. We have discovered that timetables mean little, we had turned up at Kochi 45 minutes early and still missed our direct bus to Kumily so we (and two German girls travelling the same route) took local buses. We discovered that our final 110kms up to Kumily in the hills was to be on the most decrepit bus in the bus station and the driver started her up and drove like it was some kind of race, there were no straight stretches on the road and we roared around each corner. We all jammed ourselves against the side of the bus (I have a bruised elbow and shoulder and Tess has a sore bum - excuse the technical term) but actually it was a fascinating drive. We passed many places covered in bunting for one political party or another, loudspeaker vans driving up and down - its election time here. And then as we ascended the Ghats there were jaw dropping views (Tess did not look), the bus careering around corners. As we got higher the lush jungle suddenly gave way to a bright green landscape of pin cushions with a few tall trees growing among them - it looked like a sort of Telly Tubby land and we realised that this is a big tea planting area, it looked just like the packets of tea, lines of pickers working on the steep hillsides. There are also spice gardens everywhere and Kumily is filled with spice shops. Just down the road we came across a Cardomen wharehouse with lines of women chatting and sorting piles of seeds - it looked very sociable work.
Brian
Brian isn't quite right, I did look but was extremely thankful that he was on the side next to the drop, we had both wedged ourselves in the corner of seats on oposite sides of the ailse to preven the one on the outside of the seat form ending up on the floor, I am not kidding the driving was that frantic. Strangely, I didnt notice the uncomfortable seats so much, probably due to the fear factor.
I have turned into a right moany old bag. I got us our 400 r back at the hotel in Kochi for a non appearing but prepaid taxi. At the Coffee Inn, very good write up in Lonely Planet; I had to ask several times for the many rents in the bug mesh to be mended, complained that the room was dirty (which it was) and complained about the wildly over salted pasta sauce. I was told that the room was dusty because their machine was broken, when I pointed out that a damp duster would have done the trick the man went into full Basil Faulty style hotel management school performance and got very sulky.
As compensation for the rigours of the journey and not having had a proper meal yesterday we went to the most expensive hotel here "Spice Village" (we now overlook it from our balcony). It's one of those 'if you have to ask the price its not for you' places, but had a very good buffet super for a reasonable amount. The food was lovely and you could have gone round again and again, if you'd had the appetite and the nerve. We ate plenty, had a beer and watched some lovely Indian clasical dance and went home tired but happy.
Tess
Friday, 27 February 2009
Wednesday, 25 February 2009
Fort Cochin - fine as long as you don't move
Our second flight with Jet Airways from Mumbai to Kochi(Cochin) was as good as the first one - Mr O'Leary of Ryanair would no doubt not approve of the real cutlery, free food and excellent on the ground service. And the comfortable brand new budget airline terminal was great - and we enjoyed reading all the papers which without exception had the front page and much of the inside devoted to the success of Slumdog - plenty of good natured discussion on how British or Indian the film was but mostly they were celebrating the partnership and the success of their music man in particular. As we taxied out we passed one of those slums, hard against the airport perimeter wall, packed solid boxes of corrugated iron, wood and other building materials, not apparently an inch of space left - but presumably people were moving about in there (and being deafened by the jets).
Kochi is hot, I mean real sauna like, the taxi ride from the airport was fine and the ferry across to Fort Cochin was fun but as soon as we started walking into the town we realised that any movement leaves you wringing wet. We found a place to stay for two nights with AC and stood in front of the cool air until we had the strength to go outside again. It was dark and we noticed blue lights zooming up above the road and then floating down - we soon came across the boys selling 'Indian technology' - blue light on some kind of catapulted parachute, there is something every place we go!
After a stroll by the sea we had a meal in one of the road side places - this is a tiny place of small roads and full of Dutch, Portuguese, French, British and other foreign names and buildings, quite unlike anywhere else we have been - as you approach most eating places a whispered 'Wine? Beer?' greets you, and in the place we ate the beer was brought to us in a teaport and two mugs for drinking. On the bill we were charged for 'Special Tea'. They have no licence of course (and even the poshest place we stayed in Mt Abu went to lengths to disguise the availability of beer) but you might think that the presence of Kingfisher beer umbrellas and napkin holders might alert the local authorities to the prohibition breaking! Oh and on the adjacent tree an eagle sat and watched us ('Its our pet'). I should say its also an extremely friendly place and full of travellers, its another chill out place like Dahab only with a lot of Indians here as well - but chill out is hardly the right term when a nights sleep depends on a blast of the AC every few hours!
We have already told you of how we booked twice for our first flight on the way here. In fact we got Rifaq to take us out to the airport on the evening before we were due to fly to try to sort it out with the Kingfisher airline office. A young woman Garima (I think that is spelt correctly) checked our booking
'Here it is you are four people"
'No, we are two people but booked twice by accident, we need to cancel one booking. We need to then catch an afternoon flight to Kochi'
'But this is an evening flight, we have no morning flight, its 8.30pm not am'
You can imagine our crestfallen faces followed rapidly with a stream of invective against the web site not using the 24 hour clock - nor actually including the pm. Seeing our faces Garima sprang into action - I will help you, I will sort this out!
Then despite all the phone lines being down (like power cuts a constant problem) she got on her mobile for a long discussion and negotiation, culminating in a big thumbs up sign as she got both sets of now useless tickets cancellend for only a small fee. Then she went into the airport to the Jet Airlines check in desk and got us cheap seats on their flight in the morning - and all she asked was that Tess wrote a good comment - we would have struck a medal for her and given her the freedom of Cambridge we were that grateful! So Garima is front runner for the most helpful person we have yet met.
We are off for a short ferry ride to Vypeen Island and then up to a beach about 25km away shortly and are due to leave here in the morning for the mountains - a nature reserve where we will not need AC to survive!
Brian
Kochi is hot, I mean real sauna like, the taxi ride from the airport was fine and the ferry across to Fort Cochin was fun but as soon as we started walking into the town we realised that any movement leaves you wringing wet. We found a place to stay for two nights with AC and stood in front of the cool air until we had the strength to go outside again. It was dark and we noticed blue lights zooming up above the road and then floating down - we soon came across the boys selling 'Indian technology' - blue light on some kind of catapulted parachute, there is something every place we go!
After a stroll by the sea we had a meal in one of the road side places - this is a tiny place of small roads and full of Dutch, Portuguese, French, British and other foreign names and buildings, quite unlike anywhere else we have been - as you approach most eating places a whispered 'Wine? Beer?' greets you, and in the place we ate the beer was brought to us in a teaport and two mugs for drinking. On the bill we were charged for 'Special Tea'. They have no licence of course (and even the poshest place we stayed in Mt Abu went to lengths to disguise the availability of beer) but you might think that the presence of Kingfisher beer umbrellas and napkin holders might alert the local authorities to the prohibition breaking! Oh and on the adjacent tree an eagle sat and watched us ('Its our pet'). I should say its also an extremely friendly place and full of travellers, its another chill out place like Dahab only with a lot of Indians here as well - but chill out is hardly the right term when a nights sleep depends on a blast of the AC every few hours!
We have already told you of how we booked twice for our first flight on the way here. In fact we got Rifaq to take us out to the airport on the evening before we were due to fly to try to sort it out with the Kingfisher airline office. A young woman Garima (I think that is spelt correctly) checked our booking
'Here it is you are four people"
'No, we are two people but booked twice by accident, we need to cancel one booking. We need to then catch an afternoon flight to Kochi'
'But this is an evening flight, we have no morning flight, its 8.30pm not am'
You can imagine our crestfallen faces followed rapidly with a stream of invective against the web site not using the 24 hour clock - nor actually including the pm. Seeing our faces Garima sprang into action - I will help you, I will sort this out!
Then despite all the phone lines being down (like power cuts a constant problem) she got on her mobile for a long discussion and negotiation, culminating in a big thumbs up sign as she got both sets of now useless tickets cancellend for only a small fee. Then she went into the airport to the Jet Airlines check in desk and got us cheap seats on their flight in the morning - and all she asked was that Tess wrote a good comment - we would have struck a medal for her and given her the freedom of Cambridge we were that grateful! So Garima is front runner for the most helpful person we have yet met.
We are off for a short ferry ride to Vypeen Island and then up to a beach about 25km away shortly and are due to leave here in the morning for the mountains - a nature reserve where we will not need AC to survive!
Brian
Tuesday, 24 February 2009
From Mumbai Airport
This key board is very sticky, I am typing standing up, look on the bright side, it's a free connection
but it may have even more typos and spelling mistakes than ever!
Aurangabad was good. The hotel was basic but clean, with the most amusing loo. It had a very large sort of wing effect around the seat, ridged too, we thought it might have been an unsuccesful prototype of a combination squatter come western style toilet, regected because of health and safety issues.
We also had a lovely, safe, slow, cautious driver called Rifaq, he drove us about for 2 and a bit days and was so nice and helpful. Best of all his car was an old Ambassador, white and shining, bench seat at the front, some thing from the 50,s.
We saw the Ellora ansd Ajanta caves and they are just fantastic. I had never heard of them till we got here and as no one had properly described them I thoughtwe were coming a long way to see some caves ? They are better described as rock temples, carved out of cliff faces in the way that Petra is. Talk about impressive, we will up load some photos when we have an opportunity.
Ajanta caves are hughe and it was extreemly hot in the deep gorge in which they are situated, there are 30 caves, I saw about 7 and Brian made it round the whole lot. I sat in the shade and waited for him, between us we drank 2 l of water in about 2 hours!
Ellora caves are more easily accessible and much more exiting, they are so carved and decorated, just beautiful, with much more of the origional colour visible and one of the caves is actually a complete Jain Temple carved out of a cliff. Loads of Gods of all sorts and many live bats in the darker deeper recesses. My 50p torch from the Marks sale came in very handy.
Travel today much better, we left the hotel in the dark due to a 6am power cut, we had packed last night and had the wind up torch for room checking. No breakfast, hotel staff still asleep on their quilts in the lobby. Fortunatly the budget airline jet is fantastic and we had breakfast on the plane.
Tess
but it may have even more typos and spelling mistakes than ever!
Aurangabad was good. The hotel was basic but clean, with the most amusing loo. It had a very large sort of wing effect around the seat, ridged too, we thought it might have been an unsuccesful prototype of a combination squatter come western style toilet, regected because of health and safety issues.
We also had a lovely, safe, slow, cautious driver called Rifaq, he drove us about for 2 and a bit days and was so nice and helpful. Best of all his car was an old Ambassador, white and shining, bench seat at the front, some thing from the 50,s.
We saw the Ellora ansd Ajanta caves and they are just fantastic. I had never heard of them till we got here and as no one had properly described them I thoughtwe were coming a long way to see some caves ? They are better described as rock temples, carved out of cliff faces in the way that Petra is. Talk about impressive, we will up load some photos when we have an opportunity.
Ajanta caves are hughe and it was extreemly hot in the deep gorge in which they are situated, there are 30 caves, I saw about 7 and Brian made it round the whole lot. I sat in the shade and waited for him, between us we drank 2 l of water in about 2 hours!
Ellora caves are more easily accessible and much more exiting, they are so carved and decorated, just beautiful, with much more of the origional colour visible and one of the caves is actually a complete Jain Temple carved out of a cliff. Loads of Gods of all sorts and many live bats in the darker deeper recesses. My 50p torch from the Marks sale came in very handy.
Travel today much better, we left the hotel in the dark due to a 6am power cut, we had packed last night and had the wind up torch for room checking. No breakfast, hotel staff still asleep on their quilts in the lobby. Fortunatly the budget airline jet is fantastic and we had breakfast on the plane.
Tess
Monday, 23 February 2009
Aurangabad
We are in Aurangabad and this might be a short blog - power cuts a constant threat and even when you have power there are load sharing arrangements - good way to get you up is to cut off power to the ceiling fan at 6am! Its hot here and a fan is essential.
We had one of those great railway journeys you hope to forget on the way here from Mumbai. We know you like to hear that we are also suffering and this was suffering - we were on Sleeper Class, not AC and thought that would be OK as it was a 4.30 - 11.30pm ride not an overnight. It was in any case all we could get. But we could not have been more wrong, at the first stop in a Mumbai suburb loads of people swarmed into the carriage, some commuters and some longer distance travellers, any notion of seat or bunk booking went out the window (well there weren't windows there were metal bars). Tess looked out to see a face looking in - someone hanging on the outside! Well it might on paper have seemed like a shortish journey but on those hard seats with little padding and several extra people crammed onto the seat and up on the top bunk it seemed an age. Things got worse when India's version of Harold Steptoe arrived with two women (wife and daughter maybe) and started busying himself inserting them into non existent seating spaces and inserting his copious bags under seats - even chucking out other bags. When he started under our seat it only took about 10 loud Noes and Tessa's legs firmly in the way to convince him he was not going to move our bags as well. Mind you the way he got those women seated (and eventually on bunks) got space to lay out the evening meal was a sight to behold. We did not have seats together (the big problem of having Reservations Awaiting Confirmation we discovered) so sat togother anyway and then declined to shift for bunk putting down - Tess had the bunk but we would have had to shift an old couple and have me got back to shift the several people occupying my bunk space. So they hated us but had to wait until midnight when we and most of the train got off to get their final bunks down.
We decided that with the RAC status for our long trip down to Kochi that we had been overenthusiastic about the following days travel. We have a nice cheap hotel here with other travellers to chat to and we have already been to the stunning Ajanta Caves and will go to the Ellora Caves today. Tomorrow we fly out of here to Mumbai and then onto Kochi - arriving the day we would have in any case if we had taken the long train ride. We got our money back on the train tickets and have spent a good deal more on the flights - and the constant power outages meant we have managed to book ourselves on the first flight twice! Just as I was about to press Send the power went so with a loud OH NO! we started again - and how have two tickets each! Hopefully a visit to the airline might sort it out but its one of Indias' budget airlines so we might not get a refund - that will mean that power cut cost us 100 pounds.
Brian
We had one of those great railway journeys you hope to forget on the way here from Mumbai. We know you like to hear that we are also suffering and this was suffering - we were on Sleeper Class, not AC and thought that would be OK as it was a 4.30 - 11.30pm ride not an overnight. It was in any case all we could get. But we could not have been more wrong, at the first stop in a Mumbai suburb loads of people swarmed into the carriage, some commuters and some longer distance travellers, any notion of seat or bunk booking went out the window (well there weren't windows there were metal bars). Tess looked out to see a face looking in - someone hanging on the outside! Well it might on paper have seemed like a shortish journey but on those hard seats with little padding and several extra people crammed onto the seat and up on the top bunk it seemed an age. Things got worse when India's version of Harold Steptoe arrived with two women (wife and daughter maybe) and started busying himself inserting them into non existent seating spaces and inserting his copious bags under seats - even chucking out other bags. When he started under our seat it only took about 10 loud Noes and Tessa's legs firmly in the way to convince him he was not going to move our bags as well. Mind you the way he got those women seated (and eventually on bunks) got space to lay out the evening meal was a sight to behold. We did not have seats together (the big problem of having Reservations Awaiting Confirmation we discovered) so sat togother anyway and then declined to shift for bunk putting down - Tess had the bunk but we would have had to shift an old couple and have me got back to shift the several people occupying my bunk space. So they hated us but had to wait until midnight when we and most of the train got off to get their final bunks down.
We decided that with the RAC status for our long trip down to Kochi that we had been overenthusiastic about the following days travel. We have a nice cheap hotel here with other travellers to chat to and we have already been to the stunning Ajanta Caves and will go to the Ellora Caves today. Tomorrow we fly out of here to Mumbai and then onto Kochi - arriving the day we would have in any case if we had taken the long train ride. We got our money back on the train tickets and have spent a good deal more on the flights - and the constant power outages meant we have managed to book ourselves on the first flight twice! Just as I was about to press Send the power went so with a loud OH NO! we started again - and how have two tickets each! Hopefully a visit to the airline might sort it out but its one of Indias' budget airlines so we might not get a refund - that will mean that power cut cost us 100 pounds.
Brian
Saturday, 21 February 2009
Impressions of Mumbai
Brian enjoying the true backpacking experience at the Taj hotel.
We have bid a sad farewell to the Shahs, Sunaina struggled through horendous traffic last night to deliver us to the station for our overnight train to Mumbai. I had told Tess that when travelling in 1974 I noticed that I was always placed in sleeping compartments with 'suitable' fellow travellers. When we reached our compartment we met an elderly Indian lady with good English and then were joined by a man - our immediate discussion of the level of senior discount for train travel immediately identified us all as pensioners - and it turned out both the man and woman were visiting from the States - so we were a compartment formed of international pensioners! It seems our wedding in Ahbad made the local papers, when we mentioned we had been to a wedding the man said we might have been in the papers as he had read about it that day.
Across the ailse in the further two bunks were a young woman, her sister and a 1 and a half month baby - presumably on the basis that pensioners would look kindly on babies! The Indian rail system really in a marvel and this business of forming up suitable groups is just a further aspect of it.
You get perhaps half a nights sleep on the sleepers and we were in to Mumbai Central station before 7am - most passengers having left at an earlier station in the north of the city. At the station we discovered two things, they dont have tuk tuks here and they don't have the small stripey squirrels that have been dashing in and out of the corner of our sight ever since Delhi. What they do have is taxis - yellow and black ones, all exactly the same, old model Fiats I would guess and every one built maybe 25 years ago at least and perhaps delivered covered in bumps! As it was so early and we had to get to the other station to leave our bags (we leave on another train this afternoon) we took one of the taxis to discover that they were double parked on every street - too early for business and enough taxis for the whole of Asia by the look of it.
Depositing our two bags for the day took just about one hour! First our rucksacks were not acceptable without locks (how can you lock a multi-pocket rucksack?) so we were sent away. We discovered a stall selling small locks and set about fixing them to Tessa's pack whilst I used my cable and lock to bind up mine. So back we went. Now we had sticky lables wrapped around each of the locks and were sent away again - a vague wave across the station forecourt (this is the busiest station in Asia so for 'forecourt' you need to imagine a version of Hades), then we saw a xray machine and put our bags through - the man at the end then waving us away when we pointed to the Left Luggage. So back to the Left Luggage to be sent away again! We needed a signature from the man at the machine (well obviously - but why did he just sit there?) so back to him and then finally back to the left luggage where this time our bags were accepted, forms were completed and we were left to get out of the steamy station. Tess was meanwhile warning several other travellers of the process and sending them across the station to purchase locks.
So we wandered down to the Taj Mahal Palace hotel - the older part now closed after the attack of November, in fact we walked from one major site of the attacks, the CST station to the other one. The new part of the hotel is however open and after bag and body searches we entered the hushed and air conditioned splendour of those able to spend about 600 dollars per night. Our target was a quick wash and then a sumptious breakfast. The buffet breakfast has to be seen to be believed and we spent just about half our daily budget on filling up for the day! You could get used to the level of service mind, Tess wanted a stamp for a postcard and it was immediately taken away to be posted for her - mind you she did not wait for the change as that seemed out of place!
So eventually it was back out into the haze and humidity of Mumbai, a stroll around the Gate of India from which the British finally left in 1947 and then to a nearby internet cafe - although we were somewhat alarmed to see smoke pouring from every window of the first building of the street and then from every other building - including the internet cafe, a fearsome smoke machine was being used to fumigate everything for mosquitos. But we found this cyber place away from the fumes.
We taken another train this afternoon to Aurangabad arriving about midnight and tomorrow we will go to the Ellora Caves, we leave that night on another overnight train back here to Mumbai and then begin our 35 hour trip down to Kerala - we suspect we will have had enough of train travel by then and may end up regretting not flying. Our train this afternoon is not air conditioned either, it will be a case of hoping the open windows create enough breeze.
Brian
Friday, 20 February 2009
We went to a marvelous party!
Photo of the Shah's new house - designed by Snehel Shah
Well, it was two parties really; our hosts in Ahmedabad, Snehel and Sujata Shah asked us if we would like to go to part of the marriage celebrations of the daughter of Snehel's cousin. The Shah family is large and very close and there are many Uncles, Aunts and cousins.
Of course we were really delighted to be asked to join in the celebrations, it is marriage season here and we have seen and heard many wedding parties as we have traveled about, to see more at close quaters was a priviledge not to be missed. Also, because of our 'traveling light' policy it meant that the shopping embargo was well and truly broached, because we could not go to two wedding party evenings looking only slightly better than tramps (at least in the very well dressed context of an Indian wedding). Brian, as previously reported had a silk Kurta and a nice pair of white trousers made. I had bought some fabric in Udapuir and had that and some more fabric I bought in A'bad made into two 'Punjabi' suits (its what they call the top with split sides worn over trousers here). I needed two though Brian could get away with one outfit and his smartest Rohan trousers and shirt for evening no 1.
Evening one (for us, it was about evening 4 for the brides and grooms family) was an evening of music and dance put on by the Grooms family. We drove quite a long way out of A'bad to a sort of country club. There was a stage and the biggest buffet supper you can possibly imagine. The catering at these do's is on a very grand scale and so slick. Tables staffed with chaps who might be cooking rice pancakes or puris or chapati, others with heated serving dishes with about 5 varieties of different curry, salads, relishes, rice, dahls and some things like soups, bruchetta, pasta etc etc,all vegetarian all delicious. You go round with a huge plate and a spoon and are served small portions of everything and encouraged to go back for more of anything you really like and then there is pudding, at this event it was a very nice chocolate cake. As Jains are vegan and teetotal the drink is water, pepsi, fruit juice, Indian tea (spiced, sweet, with the milk already in it) or coffee.
After eating and talking the party all drift over to the seated area to watch the show, the gathering is of at least 400 people, all related to the bride or groom or very close friends. The show, lasting about three hours is a mixture of professional singers and musicians doing a mixture of film music and Indian oldies but goldies and younger members of the family (bride and groms age) who do dance routines and put on a cod quiz show called 'Perfect Partner' and based on 'Do you want to be a millionaire?' Everyone sings along to the oldies but goldies and the evening ends about 1.30am with dancing to the band. By about 10.30 its begining to get a little chilly so at the rear of the audience some braziers are lit and the old (and those who hadn't the forethought to bring a warm top) sit around them and talk.
Every woman at this event is dressed to tha 9's. Jewelery (real not costume) glitters on arms and ears and at throats. The gleam of high carrat gold is soft and luminous, red beads really are rubies and the earings have to be seen to be believed. Women are dressed in a variety of styles, saris of every hue you can immagine, punjabis, dresses with high waists and gored skirts worn over tight trousers (like the outfits you may have seen in Indian minature paintings), there are also Rhajestani style outfits of full skirt, tight blouse and a length of fabric sort of wrapped round the waist and up over the shoulders. Seqins glitter, gold and silver brocade falls in elegant folds, little girls skip about in pretty skirts and blouses and silver or gold sandles.
Many of the men have also put a lot of effort into their dress. Many wear Kurtas, some wild silk, some made of fantastic brocade in all sorts of colours, trousers are often quite theatricly baggy and of a different colour to the Kurta, almost everyone wears sandals.
The next day was the actual wedding ceremony. All the women had stepped up their outfits and the jewelery was even more dazzling, I really have never seen anything like the display put on by Indian women at a big wedding, they looked fabulous.
The bride arrives and is danced into the wedding ground by her family to the noise of a very loud band. The groom arrives in a car covered in flowers and they are both escorted in. The guests sit around the sacred area (where the priest conducts the ceremony) chatting, eating delicious snacks, listening to musicians playing traditional music while the ceremony carries on under the tent in the middle. The ceremony takes about an hour and a quarter and is quite complicated, ending up with the bride and groom being tied together with a red rope and then a pink scarf and doing 7 (I think) circuits of the sacred area, the groom leads for 4 times and the bride for 3, signifying that this is a partnership.
Then the bride leaves with her new husband and his family (she returns after an hour or so) the guests all mill about and talk. There are at least 750 people so there are plenty of people to talk to. Later the bride and groom come back, more friends and business associates arrive and the huge buffet is served. Much like the night before but more of it!! While guests are eating the bridal party sit on a dias and receive their guests, much shaking of hands, embracing and taking photos. The bridal party and their close family (100 or so people) sit down to eat at about nine, after everyone else has had the buffet.
We left at about 9.30pm, our hosts did not get back till midnight and they have the final function of the week long event this evening!
Sorry this is a bit long, hope you find it interesting,
Tess
I don't think I will ever forget the scene as we arrived. The band was in full pelt, the young men and women dancing - particularly the young men forming circles, hands in the air, gyrating, it was a complete thrill to be part of the accompanying throng moving towards the marriage ground.
There were some very touching points of the actual ceremony (Sujata had persuaded us to sit with the close family in the front row so whilst most of the guests sat further back enjoying chatting and the excellent Indian classical music Tess and I could have a very good view of the actual ceremony - with relatives explaining what was going on from time to time). Tess has mentioned the seven steps taken by the bride and groom, there was also the point at which the two fathers came forward, sat close facing each other and placed food in each others mouths signifying that the marriage was the joining of the two families and not just the two young people. The ceremony was conducted by the priest and two assistants with a complex series of symbolic acts involving fire, liquids, flowers etc and all the while the priest explaining to the groom and bride the significance of each act and how it provided guidance to them in their future lives.
Afterwards as the only non Indians there we were constantly approached - particularly by Indians who had lived in England - for a chat. The atmosphere was quite unlike any English gathering, the ability of Indians to explain exactly how they are related to each other is astounding - it made my head spin to try to keep track and I had to observe that the complete lack of alchohol was a definite advantage, just copious amounts of excellent food and trays of cold water brought to you every few minutes. We had many good discussions about India, its economic growth of which Gujartis are very proud - and of course of the success of Slumdog Millionaire about which they also take great pleasure! Two days we will certainly not forget!
Brian
Wednesday, 18 February 2009
Things are different here
Brian is suffering from a bit of a hay fever out break, the mustard harvest at Mount Abu meant there was a lot of 'stuff' in the air and it has made him very sneezy and bunged up.
So anyway I thought I would do a list of a few things that have made me look twice, wonder 'what on earth?' etc. This is not in any way critical or intended to be rude about India and its people, it is just stuff that is different.
People work really hard here, if you only have a basket and a few vegetables you display your veg nicely in your basket and sit by the road to sell them, if you have a brush you sweep things, the old (men and women) pick up rubbish or dead leaves or dust monuments etc. Whole families do building or road works, women in beautiful saris wield pick axes or carry stones or sand in big bowls on their heads, the oldest child looks after the little ones and the baby sleeps in a cradle made out of two A frames with a pole between them, on the pole is tied a large cloth by its four corners and inside is a baby - this can be on the central reservation of a 4 lane highway. Seen this morning on our way by road from Mount Abu, a woman grouting between the kerb stones of a bit of central reservation under construction while her two small boys (aprox 18mths and 3 yrs) played in the gap (maybe 3 feet) between the two sets of kerb stones that made up the central reservation.
People also work by shifting things or people about, there must be millions of tuc tucs in India all ready to squeeze in up to about 10 people (possibly more). There are also bicycles and these are used for personal transport and for delivery. There are 4 wheeled trolleys that people push about, some are used as stalls in markets or at road sides, some for delivery of goods, next come the large 3 wheelers, like a really big tricycle, over the two back wheels is a flat bed and this can be a mobile stall or a peddle powered delivery cart, at night the place where you sleep. There are also carts pulled by animals, donkeys, oxen, and most exotic looking, camel carts. Sometimes you see donkeys with panniers carrying building rubble or bricks, occasionally you see Elephants carrying people and stuff (I'm not sure what, something no one needs in a hurry).
There are also tuc tuc vans and Apis, just like the ones you see in Italy, these are often laden with gas bottles, produce and huge numbers of cardboard boxes. Motor bikes and scooters are used for personal transport, but rather more people on them than we are used to seeing at home. So far my largest count has been 5 - small child on petrol tank, dad driving, larger child, mum side saddle (in sari) with largish toddler casually under her arm. Only the driver wears a crash helmet (and not always) often even if worn the helmet has not got the chinstrap fastened. The young drive scooters, girls looking like exotic bandits because they swathe their faces in scarves so that only their eyes show, in order to protect themselves from dust I think.
There are also very old fashioned invalid chairs that are a large tricycle with the chain worked by handles rather than peddles. I have not seen a single wheel chair as we know them.
Lorries here look very solid and quite old fashioned, I think its because they don't seem to have many of the sort that are a cab that you can hitch a container to. Also they are decorated with tassles, painted patterns, shiny metal that has been punched with patterns and aways "horn please" or "Horn OK" in fancy writing on the tail gate.
Things you may have read about the way people crowd onto transport are all true, shared jeeps are filled beyond reason and then people get on the roof, small lorries transport swaying crowds squashed into the back, people ride on top of loads of sacks of produce or on lorries full of bricks.
Bricks, that reminds me of the huge number of brick fields and brick kilns we have seen as we travel around. Also miles and miles of firms selling cut marble and granite, you can hardly think there could be any mountains left.
Oh, lastly (for now) there is absolutly no concept of 'mutton dressed as lamb' here. No matter how old , tiny and bent you are you will never think 'perhaps I am past the age where this cerise/turquiose/red/peacock blue/lavender/baby pink sari will look good on me'. No; pattern, colour, sequins, embroidery - bring it on, and very good they look too. You occasionally see a woman in a white or grey sari and women in banks and offices sometimes wear darker colours, but they certainly are not the norm.
Tess
Tuesday, 17 February 2009
Jain Temples, Mount Abu
This is day one of week seven, I can't believe we have been away from home for so long. The time is flying by!
Yesterday we traveled by by train, 3 A/C (three bunks , one above each other, in an air conditioned carriage) train was not very full, it started from Amhedabad at 9,30 and got to its final destination, Delhi many hours later. It took till 3.20 to get to Abu Road only a couple of hundred K from A'bad. We rocked gently along, sometimes looking out of the window at life in the villages and fields, sometimes sleeping like the rest of the passengers. Indians seem to be really good at sleeping - on trains or almost anywhere else they seem to be able to take their ease.
Once we got to Abu Road we found a taxi to take us up to Mount Abu, about 45 mins up a huge lump of rock that just errupts out of the plain. We are staying at the Kishangarh House , the former summer residence of the Mahararaja of Kishangarh. It is very pretty and very quiet, there were only three of us in the hotel last night. Brian and I had our dinner about 7.30, in the large, gloomily lit dinning room, watched closely by the waiter who rushed forward as each dish was emptied. Slightly un-nerving but you couldn't fault him on polite and prompt service.
When we finished eating we read for a bit in the very attractively decorated sitting room, sitting on one of the many red covered sofas. The room and adjoining corridor are decorated with assorted princely photos of wonderfully dressed family groups, there are also large brass elephants and a range of decorative items like teapots and such.
We slept well after the lovely hot shower, I was warm enough but Brian could have done with another blanket, its much cooler up here at night. Today breakfast in the sunny courtyard and then a walk round the very pretty lake, followed by coffee and a cake (a rare indulgence). After that a jeep up to the Temple complex at Delwara.
If any of you reading this ever come to India these temples are not to be missed, the carving is the most beautiful and the most detailed I have ever seen. The stone is mostly white marble and honestly some of the carving looks more like piped sugar paste than stone. The workers were paid by the amount of dust they collected, so I guess it was in their interest to carve in the most tiny detail they could manage. Just fantastic and glowing in the noon day sun. There were loads of people being shown round, but only two other Europeans that I saw. It is a pilgrimage site of great importance to Hindus and the temples are of the Jain sect.
Tessa
Yesterday we traveled by by train, 3 A/C (three bunks , one above each other, in an air conditioned carriage) train was not very full, it started from Amhedabad at 9,30 and got to its final destination, Delhi many hours later. It took till 3.20 to get to Abu Road only a couple of hundred K from A'bad. We rocked gently along, sometimes looking out of the window at life in the villages and fields, sometimes sleeping like the rest of the passengers. Indians seem to be really good at sleeping - on trains or almost anywhere else they seem to be able to take their ease.
Once we got to Abu Road we found a taxi to take us up to Mount Abu, about 45 mins up a huge lump of rock that just errupts out of the plain. We are staying at the Kishangarh House , the former summer residence of the Mahararaja of Kishangarh. It is very pretty and very quiet, there were only three of us in the hotel last night. Brian and I had our dinner about 7.30, in the large, gloomily lit dinning room, watched closely by the waiter who rushed forward as each dish was emptied. Slightly un-nerving but you couldn't fault him on polite and prompt service.
When we finished eating we read for a bit in the very attractively decorated sitting room, sitting on one of the many red covered sofas. The room and adjoining corridor are decorated with assorted princely photos of wonderfully dressed family groups, there are also large brass elephants and a range of decorative items like teapots and such.
We slept well after the lovely hot shower, I was warm enough but Brian could have done with another blanket, its much cooler up here at night. Today breakfast in the sunny courtyard and then a walk round the very pretty lake, followed by coffee and a cake (a rare indulgence). After that a jeep up to the Temple complex at Delwara.
If any of you reading this ever come to India these temples are not to be missed, the carving is the most beautiful and the most detailed I have ever seen. The stone is mostly white marble and honestly some of the carving looks more like piped sugar paste than stone. The workers were paid by the amount of dust they collected, so I guess it was in their interest to carve in the most tiny detail they could manage. Just fantastic and glowing in the noon day sun. There were loads of people being shown round, but only two other Europeans that I saw. It is a pilgrimage site of great importance to Hindus and the temples are of the Jain sect.
Tessa
Sunday, 15 February 2009
Valentine's day
We are just back from two days in the lush and beautiful Gujarat countryside. Snehal Shah was taking a group of students out to the world heritage site at Champaner on which he is completing work on a book on the many beautiful mosques and other monuments in this 'lost city' of the 15th century.
We first visited a hunting lodge at a place called Jumburghoda where we were to stay the night - in fact an old rambling building with outhouses (in which our bedrooms were situated) at the end of a sandy track amonst the fields growing just about everything - including rice. This track is called Palace Road - the reason for which became apparent when we were taking tea and a distinquished woman approached us and to whom we were introduced, Snehal had almost snapped to attention when she came and I did likewise. We discussed our visit and the evening meal - all organic food from their fields and we all broke our strict vegetarian regime to try their chicken dish (peacocks and guinea fowl were wandering about but are apprently not for the table) and we were also introduced to her daughter. Our meal arranged we bade farewell when Snehal told us she was not just the proprieter but in fact the Queen of Jumburghoda - a former Princely State prior to Independence and of course with no remaining powers. The Lodge and grounds are the royal residence - hence Palace Road, a grand name for a sandy track!
On to the Champaner sites, and whilst Snehal took his student group off we were passed onto Professor Joshi as our guide - a 75 year old former Professor of Economics who is a resident of the area and an enthusiast of the monuments. Having been shown around one of the astoundingly beautiful old mosques Joshi asked us where our car was so we could start visiting some of the other widely scattered sites, we replied of course that we did not have one when lo and behold we spotted Ghiselle, a Swiss woman we had met in Ahmedebad who had just arrived with a driver! So Joshi immediately hijacked Ghiselle and driver to make a single group to visit further sites.
After the site visits we were dropped in the village to get a bus or shared jeep back the 25km to the Lodge and our problems began. Noone spoke English nor could anyone understand my obvious mispronunciation of Jumburghoda so we got only vague wavings of fingers or assurances that there were no buses. Finally one shared jeep said 'yes' and we squeezed in the back, Tess with a small child on her knee, when the jeep was full (that is with five in the front seat, people hanging on the side and back and squatting on the roof ) we set off - the wrong way!
Finally we got him to stop and trudged back to the village (and past the dead dog again!)
Snehal was texted, came to our rescue and eventually located a bus, already full but we squeezed in and even got seats at the first village - not for long however as we turned a corner to find a whole bus load of people beside a broken down bus, all plus their driver were somehow squeezed in and we set off - with us now quite unable to see the road and to spot Palace Road - however the driver had been asked by Snehal to stop and he did so. Very hot we walked the kilometer or so to the Lodge showered and took some tea in the shady gardens.
As the sun was setting we decided to take a walk through the fields, as we left the Lodge grounds a car with Queen and daughter and another couple drove out, the man driving wished up good evening in excellent English and told us about a step well across the fields and how to reach it. We replied that we had just been discussing the six storey underground step well at Ahemdebad so would indeed be interested
'Well this is a very simple country one, but well worth the visit' - and as he said farewell and drove on we concluded that we had just met the King!
We found the well, the way pointed out by a woman among what I guess was a tribal group, they all occupied small tents made of blue plastic gathered around a couple of trucks. The well was a large circular construction with a spiral of steps leading down to the water. We passed also coconut palms, all their trunks burned to make climbing easier and with poles and foot holds lashed to the trunks.
Returning to the lodge as the light failed we noticed that all the egrets (which are in every field) had gathered in flocks and were flying low through the trees along a small river valley. Reaching our bedroom block we found the hot water wallah busy making a fire under the old boiler attached to our block wall - for Snehal's shower as it turned out since he had just returned with a promise of cold beer to accompany our looked forward to dinner under what was now a very starry sky. And Tess and I agreed that this was a lovely place to be spending Valentine's Day!
Brian
Thursday, 12 February 2009
News from Ahmedabad
Life since we reached the Shahs' wonderful, modern house (Snehel is an architect) has been really fantastic. Sujata is a truly talented cook, what she can do with vegetables, pulses, grain and spices is a treat for the taste buds and the eye and the nose too. We are being looked after, taken out and entertained in a very generous and friendly way and we are profoundly greatfull,
One of the treats we have been offered is to join the Shah family when they attend the wedding of the child of a cousin of Snehels'. As you can immagine this is an opportunity not to be missed, a Hindu wedding is a feast for every sense, but not to be entertained in our present disreputable traverlers clothing.
I am glad to report that the shopping embargo has been well and truly breached. I have bought fabric in a shop that would make my fellow textile friends weep for joy. Bolts of cloth in every colour, texture, pattern and state of embelishment that you could wish to see, some very resonably priced to stuff that must have been very expensive even here. The staff in the shop were willing to take down endless bolts of cloth and let one hold it up, feel the texture, try and match colours and advise on fabric content etc, none of the serve your self malarky.
I have bought stuff for a trouser/top combo that I think is really nice and that will look not too exotic to wear at home and have been measured up and it is being made up as I type. The tailor lives across the way from the Shahs and Sujata has known him since he was a by and played with Sunina. once we hace the card reader sorted I hope to be able to show you my outfit. Sadly, because of all ths hospitality I have regained any weight I managed to lose in Jordan and Egypt, so I will look as chuky as ever.
Brian has also been measured for trousers and a Kurti (mid thigh Indian gents shirt) and trousers. He also had to be taken to a shop to choose fabric and has a very tasteful raw silk in creams and pale browns, the natural colours of the silk. We both have new sandles as well. We will have to post stuff home, but there you go!
Tessa
One of the treats we have been offered is to join the Shah family when they attend the wedding of the child of a cousin of Snehels'. As you can immagine this is an opportunity not to be missed, a Hindu wedding is a feast for every sense, but not to be entertained in our present disreputable traverlers clothing.
I am glad to report that the shopping embargo has been well and truly breached. I have bought fabric in a shop that would make my fellow textile friends weep for joy. Bolts of cloth in every colour, texture, pattern and state of embelishment that you could wish to see, some very resonably priced to stuff that must have been very expensive even here. The staff in the shop were willing to take down endless bolts of cloth and let one hold it up, feel the texture, try and match colours and advise on fabric content etc, none of the serve your self malarky.
I have bought stuff for a trouser/top combo that I think is really nice and that will look not too exotic to wear at home and have been measured up and it is being made up as I type. The tailor lives across the way from the Shahs and Sujata has known him since he was a by and played with Sunina. once we hace the card reader sorted I hope to be able to show you my outfit. Sadly, because of all ths hospitality I have regained any weight I managed to lose in Jordan and Egypt, so I will look as chuky as ever.
Brian has also been measured for trousers and a Kurti (mid thigh Indian gents shirt) and trousers. He also had to be taken to a shop to choose fabric and has a very tasteful raw silk in creams and pale browns, the natural colours of the silk. We both have new sandles as well. We will have to post stuff home, but there you go!
Tessa
Senior Citizens, Disabled, Freedom Fighters, Tourists
Yesterday we achieved a very important task - booking our train tickets for the final weeks of our time in India - involving getting down south to Kerela and then (via one flights) travelling up to Darjeeling and (we hope) a good view of the Himalayas.
Getting all the tickets booked was little less than miraculous - after some initial research using the timetable book we approached the ticket counter marked for tourists (and freedom fighters among other groups) checked out some further information and were sent away with request forms to fill in for each journey - a total of 8. Back to the counter where the clerk started checking our forms, finding a number of mistakes and correcting them, it all took time whilst the line behind us grew longer and restive, perhaps even mutinous! So we were sent away when the checking was done to wait whilst the queue was dealt with and the clerk took his advertised 'recess' after which we were finally called back. One by one he started issuing our tickets but inevitably by the time one was done someone had pushed forward, guesticulating, shoving their form through, shouting about one query or another. In truth we were quite happy to let him deal with people - international relations could otherwise have been damaged!
Finally we had our tickets although I had no idea with what degree of success, the high noise levels and my poor hearing meant I had nodded through all sorts of queries in the hope that it would work out. We staggered away from the counter after three hours with what we hoped were the right tickets.
The Shahs driver Ghitu drove us back to the house but it was only later when Sehal Shah came home that I was able to check the tickets with him.
"All OK, you will get on every train and because you are a foreigner they will definitely allocate you a berth"
I said that back in 1974 before computers that booking that number of tickets could have taken three days
"Three days! Three months - they would have had to telegraph all your destinations!"
So we have our tickets, we travel thousands of kilometers, there are six overnight trips and one trip to Kerela is about 30 hours. And the cost for second class with our senior citizen reduction?
About 125 pounds for the two of us - match that Richard Branson!
Of course we have already done one rail trip from Udaipur to here on the very slow and old fashioned narrow guage railway. We had a four person compartment but shared only with a nice psychiatrist from Chittogargh, it left on time we chatted for a while, made up our bunks with the supplied bedding and settled down at about 9.30pm whilst the train wended its way through the invisible hilly landscape. It rocked and bounced, rather comforting, rather like being in a large pram pushed by a drunken nanny. It got us here on time, the night passed reasonably quickly, a knock on the door at 4am to get ourselves ready for arrival where we were met by Snehal Shah and his daughter Sunaina.
Brian
Getting all the tickets booked was little less than miraculous - after some initial research using the timetable book we approached the ticket counter marked for tourists (and freedom fighters among other groups) checked out some further information and were sent away with request forms to fill in for each journey - a total of 8. Back to the counter where the clerk started checking our forms, finding a number of mistakes and correcting them, it all took time whilst the line behind us grew longer and restive, perhaps even mutinous! So we were sent away when the checking was done to wait whilst the queue was dealt with and the clerk took his advertised 'recess' after which we were finally called back. One by one he started issuing our tickets but inevitably by the time one was done someone had pushed forward, guesticulating, shoving their form through, shouting about one query or another. In truth we were quite happy to let him deal with people - international relations could otherwise have been damaged!
Finally we had our tickets although I had no idea with what degree of success, the high noise levels and my poor hearing meant I had nodded through all sorts of queries in the hope that it would work out. We staggered away from the counter after three hours with what we hoped were the right tickets.
The Shahs driver Ghitu drove us back to the house but it was only later when Sehal Shah came home that I was able to check the tickets with him.
"All OK, you will get on every train and because you are a foreigner they will definitely allocate you a berth"
I said that back in 1974 before computers that booking that number of tickets could have taken three days
"Three days! Three months - they would have had to telegraph all your destinations!"
So we have our tickets, we travel thousands of kilometers, there are six overnight trips and one trip to Kerela is about 30 hours. And the cost for second class with our senior citizen reduction?
About 125 pounds for the two of us - match that Richard Branson!
Of course we have already done one rail trip from Udaipur to here on the very slow and old fashioned narrow guage railway. We had a four person compartment but shared only with a nice psychiatrist from Chittogargh, it left on time we chatted for a while, made up our bunks with the supplied bedding and settled down at about 9.30pm whilst the train wended its way through the invisible hilly landscape. It rocked and bounced, rather comforting, rather like being in a large pram pushed by a drunken nanny. It got us here on time, the night passed reasonably quickly, a knock on the door at 4am to get ourselves ready for arrival where we were met by Snehal Shah and his daughter Sunaina.
Brian
Monday, 9 February 2009
Udaipur
What a lovely town! It is in a very hilly area and the town (at least the old part) is quite hilly too. Small streets crammed full of people, animals, fruit, veg and animal feed being sold on the pavements, shops, loads of cooperative groups who do traditional minature painting and many temples and cows - absolutely loads of cows.
Subhash told us that people keep cows in their houses (I think he meant courtyards) they feed them in the morning and evening, but in the day they are free to roam the streets and they eat any vegetable left overs that people give them and chapatis.
We have been to the "City Palace", home of the former ruler of Rajesthan and he has a very extensive home indeed with a very great deal of colourful decoration, carving, painting, whole rooms done out in coloured mirror glass etc, etc. The Indian Princely dewelling is big on decoration and it looks wonderful.
Today we have been to a lovely park, nice and quiet after the busy streets; seen a wonderful wedding procession on the way back to town. There were the bride and her attendant in a carriage pulled by two white horses, followed by the most colourful group of about 100 ladies you could ever wish to see, followed in turn by the town band in their red uniforms all blowing their brass instuments fit to bust.
Once back in town we went to visit the largest of the temples and watched a bit of a ceremony, a lot of very elderly women chanting, a couple dancing (far more gracefully than most English pensioners could manage) and a chap in white doing priestly things at the back in the shrine. After the chanting everyone got something to eat and had a chat to each other. It was so interesting to watch and as long as you keep still and quiet, no one seems to mind. Also I did donate to the food fund.
Tess
We really like Udaipur, its a spectacular setting and as you will see from the photo when we can upload it, surrounded by hills and set among several lakes. Its also a place we can navigate - the streets are a teeming bustle like all streets in India (particularly fascinating are the group of four donkeys laden with rubble from a building site which navigate their own way across town and back again - how do they do that?) but the central part of town is compact and after being totally lost the first time we walked through it we rapidly found our way around. Of all the places we have been in so far in India this is our favourite and the hotel we had for our second night had the most wonderful view both from our room and particularly from the roof restaurant.
I have to report that the shopping embargo has collapsed and we have been in several fabric shops today where substantial (in Indian terms but not in Sterling perhaps) purchases have been made - just irresistable to T. We also visited one of the painting cooperatives yesterday and a further gift was purchased there.
In a few hours we leave on an overnight train for Ahmedebad - where we are greatly looking forward to staying with the Shah family. From there (and with advice we hope from the Shahs) we will be making our way further south.
Brian
Subhash told us that people keep cows in their houses (I think he meant courtyards) they feed them in the morning and evening, but in the day they are free to roam the streets and they eat any vegetable left overs that people give them and chapatis.
We have been to the "City Palace", home of the former ruler of Rajesthan and he has a very extensive home indeed with a very great deal of colourful decoration, carving, painting, whole rooms done out in coloured mirror glass etc, etc. The Indian Princely dewelling is big on decoration and it looks wonderful.
Today we have been to a lovely park, nice and quiet after the busy streets; seen a wonderful wedding procession on the way back to town. There were the bride and her attendant in a carriage pulled by two white horses, followed by the most colourful group of about 100 ladies you could ever wish to see, followed in turn by the town band in their red uniforms all blowing their brass instuments fit to bust.
Once back in town we went to visit the largest of the temples and watched a bit of a ceremony, a lot of very elderly women chanting, a couple dancing (far more gracefully than most English pensioners could manage) and a chap in white doing priestly things at the back in the shrine. After the chanting everyone got something to eat and had a chat to each other. It was so interesting to watch and as long as you keep still and quiet, no one seems to mind. Also I did donate to the food fund.
Tess
We really like Udaipur, its a spectacular setting and as you will see from the photo when we can upload it, surrounded by hills and set among several lakes. Its also a place we can navigate - the streets are a teeming bustle like all streets in India (particularly fascinating are the group of four donkeys laden with rubble from a building site which navigate their own way across town and back again - how do they do that?) but the central part of town is compact and after being totally lost the first time we walked through it we rapidly found our way around. Of all the places we have been in so far in India this is our favourite and the hotel we had for our second night had the most wonderful view both from our room and particularly from the roof restaurant.
I have to report that the shopping embargo has collapsed and we have been in several fabric shops today where substantial (in Indian terms but not in Sterling perhaps) purchases have been made - just irresistable to T. We also visited one of the painting cooperatives yesterday and a further gift was purchased there.
In a few hours we leave on an overnight train for Ahmedebad - where we are greatly looking forward to staying with the Shah family. From there (and with advice we hope from the Shahs) we will be making our way further south.
Brian
Saturday, 7 February 2009
Through Rajasthan
We are currently in Udaipur and have just been watching the sun set over the lake with the palace -or rather very expensive hotel - sitting in the midst of the water. Last night we were in Pushkar again at a lakeside at sunset by the bathing Ghats and in the crowded market street. Both these places are rather more user friendly that the previous places we have been - nice to wander the streets and enjoy the bustle.
We had better come clean - we are living in luxury at the moment, being driven from place to place by Subash our driver and enjoying some rather up market accommodation -last night in Pushkar we had a room in the finest place there complete with beautiful gardens, swimming pool,man in turban at the gate who saluted you. We are going to be drummed out of the backpackers fraternity for this. And today we are in a similar place overlooking one of the lakes. We took this form of travel when it became clear that getting a train out of Delhi to Agra and then training it down in stages to Ahmedebad was going to entail at least two extra days in Delhi so we have taken a budget busting decision to go in comfort. This means we get delivered to lots of sites, get advised on what to pay, get told stories and sung to a bit as we go. The downside is some very long journeys and the indescribably dangerous driving that is the norm on Indian roads. We are here two nights and then at last we get a train to Ahmedebab - an overnight and very slow sleeper which I can assure you we are greatly looking forward to - particularly as we are in first class (and this means first class with bunks not the Egyptian version) but as senior citizens we get one third off all rail travel so that puts first class in the good value category.
Brian
Pushkar was realy lovely and I am beginning to think that I might be able to manage India.
The god all the temples are dedicated to in Pushkar is Brahma, he went to Pushkar with out his wife, took up with a young woman selling yoghurt and married her. His wife came along and was extremly cross and said that his punishment was that the only place in India that would have temples to him was Pushkar. It is lovely, higledy piggledy little streets full of shops selling lovely things, the mosy gaudy temples you can think of, all coloured lights and garlands of flowers. Monkeys, cows, loads of little birds, pidgeons by the hundred and hippies of all nations.
At the lake side there are steps down to the water (a bit murky looking for bathing) and people walk down to the water and pray and throw in flowers, all sorts of ladies in the most beautiful cloured clothing, old chaps in dhotis, youngsters in western style clothing and lots of chanting and bell ringing coming from the temples. Also you can look at people's shops with out being chased down the street, its all fairly relaxed.
Tessa
We had better come clean - we are living in luxury at the moment, being driven from place to place by Subash our driver and enjoying some rather up market accommodation -last night in Pushkar we had a room in the finest place there complete with beautiful gardens, swimming pool,man in turban at the gate who saluted you. We are going to be drummed out of the backpackers fraternity for this. And today we are in a similar place overlooking one of the lakes. We took this form of travel when it became clear that getting a train out of Delhi to Agra and then training it down in stages to Ahmedebad was going to entail at least two extra days in Delhi so we have taken a budget busting decision to go in comfort. This means we get delivered to lots of sites, get advised on what to pay, get told stories and sung to a bit as we go. The downside is some very long journeys and the indescribably dangerous driving that is the norm on Indian roads. We are here two nights and then at last we get a train to Ahmedebab - an overnight and very slow sleeper which I can assure you we are greatly looking forward to - particularly as we are in first class (and this means first class with bunks not the Egyptian version) but as senior citizens we get one third off all rail travel so that puts first class in the good value category.
Brian
Pushkar was realy lovely and I am beginning to think that I might be able to manage India.
The god all the temples are dedicated to in Pushkar is Brahma, he went to Pushkar with out his wife, took up with a young woman selling yoghurt and married her. His wife came along and was extremly cross and said that his punishment was that the only place in India that would have temples to him was Pushkar. It is lovely, higledy piggledy little streets full of shops selling lovely things, the mosy gaudy temples you can think of, all coloured lights and garlands of flowers. Monkeys, cows, loads of little birds, pidgeons by the hundred and hippies of all nations.
At the lake side there are steps down to the water (a bit murky looking for bathing) and people walk down to the water and pray and throw in flowers, all sorts of ladies in the most beautiful cloured clothing, old chaps in dhotis, youngsters in western style clothing and lots of chanting and bell ringing coming from the temples. Also you can look at people's shops with out being chased down the street, its all fairly relaxed.
Tessa
ps added a few pics to this one and to the Taj Mahal, here is a picture of the lake at Pushkar, Standing by the swimming pool at our Pushkar hotel and (sorry its the wrong way round, its the wrong pic) a picture from the Amber Fort, Jaipur
Thursday, 5 February 2009
Taj Mahal
We were advised to start our day with an early morning visit to the Taj Mahal, so we were up at 6am and off into thee dark and quiet streets. Subash dropped us off at the battery bus for the short trip down to the Taj, we didnt have to pay, but I think that was because we got on an empty bus and then a group also got on and I think it was assumed we were with them.
At th gates to the Taj we got out tickets and were then formed up into Mens and Ladies queues in order to go through security. You cant take in any electronic stuff, pens, pencils etc. I had to give up my felt tip pen and Brian his torch, we were able to put them in a locker, though that meant Brian had to go through the search and electronic gate again. Finally about 7.25 we were walking towards the gate into the Taj from which you get the first veiw of the building. Having seen so many photos of it it is difficult to explain how very much more beautiful it is in real life. The early morning light was pearly but with a touch of gold in it from the rising sun and the building does look as though it is simmering and floating. It is so hugh and so solid, but it does look delicate and airy.
Up close the decoration is so beautiful, every surface is patterened in some way, either white on white with delicate carving or the lovely flowers and patterns in coloured stone that you have all seen. Also the building its self isnt plain , stark white but a mirriad of shades of white, grey, buff and the palest pinl all gleaming in the rising light, just lovely.
Tess
It really is the best time to see the Taj I think (and apologies for the lack of photos but this is yet another PC that won't accept our card reader) and all the better for being relatively quiet. I first saw the Taj Mahal in 1974 and that was in the dying light of the day. I had been attending a conference in Delhi and a couple of coach loads of us set off for Agra only to find the road blocked by an accident. The coach drivers decided to take a side road and inevitably one coach became stuck on the unmade road, it took several hours to get a tractor and enough villagers to get it moving and by the time we arrived at the Taj it was closing. In those days there was just a guy on the gate, not the extensive security of today and I guess somehow ("important guests from Delhi!") we were allowed in after hours. So just a few dozen of us had the place to ourselves in the dying light of the day. I was with a young Indian woman Veena and one other person looking down that long stretch of water towards the main Mauseleum when Veeen (named after a musical instrument) began singing as we walked slowly in time along the path, a rather lovely way to arrive.
Emerging from the Mausoleum we noticed a bit of noise at the railing along the river bank. The Taj stands high above the river and we saw down at the river edge an old man shouting and gesticulating, with a small boy beside him. I asked some others what he was shouting
"he is saying if you throw down some Rupees the boy will jump up and stand beside you"
This seemed an unlikely feat given the height so I asked what would happen if you threw some money down
"The man will laugh at you and tell you what a fool you are!".
Another person in our group from Bengal told me of his first visit many years before when he was a student. It was the time of full moon and he had of course heard of how wonderful the building looks in the moonlight. As he left he asked the gatekeeper if he might return to view in the night
"Absolutely not. Garden closed. Entry forbidden".
He pleaded with the gatekeeper, telling him he was all the way from Calcutta and might not get the opportunity again. Eventually the gatekeeper relented, pointed to a small gate and told him that if he came back later, paid a little money, he might be admitted for a short private view.
So he turned up, the gatekeeper emerged from the shadows, pocketed the bribe, opened the gate just wide enough for our friend to enter. He was immediately entranced by the glow of the dome through the trees and walked forward his eyes only on the dome. But then a soft sound reached his ears and he stopped gazing at the beautiful domed building and looked about him - to see hundreds of others, sitting, standing and lying on the grass - all who had bribed the gatekeeper for a private view!
Brian
At th gates to the Taj we got out tickets and were then formed up into Mens and Ladies queues in order to go through security. You cant take in any electronic stuff, pens, pencils etc. I had to give up my felt tip pen and Brian his torch, we were able to put them in a locker, though that meant Brian had to go through the search and electronic gate again. Finally about 7.25 we were walking towards the gate into the Taj from which you get the first veiw of the building. Having seen so many photos of it it is difficult to explain how very much more beautiful it is in real life. The early morning light was pearly but with a touch of gold in it from the rising sun and the building does look as though it is simmering and floating. It is so hugh and so solid, but it does look delicate and airy.
Up close the decoration is so beautiful, every surface is patterened in some way, either white on white with delicate carving or the lovely flowers and patterns in coloured stone that you have all seen. Also the building its self isnt plain , stark white but a mirriad of shades of white, grey, buff and the palest pinl all gleaming in the rising light, just lovely.
Tess
It really is the best time to see the Taj I think (and apologies for the lack of photos but this is yet another PC that won't accept our card reader) and all the better for being relatively quiet. I first saw the Taj Mahal in 1974 and that was in the dying light of the day. I had been attending a conference in Delhi and a couple of coach loads of us set off for Agra only to find the road blocked by an accident. The coach drivers decided to take a side road and inevitably one coach became stuck on the unmade road, it took several hours to get a tractor and enough villagers to get it moving and by the time we arrived at the Taj it was closing. In those days there was just a guy on the gate, not the extensive security of today and I guess somehow ("important guests from Delhi!") we were allowed in after hours. So just a few dozen of us had the place to ourselves in the dying light of the day. I was with a young Indian woman Veena and one other person looking down that long stretch of water towards the main Mauseleum when Veeen (named after a musical instrument) began singing as we walked slowly in time along the path, a rather lovely way to arrive.
Emerging from the Mausoleum we noticed a bit of noise at the railing along the river bank. The Taj stands high above the river and we saw down at the river edge an old man shouting and gesticulating, with a small boy beside him. I asked some others what he was shouting
"he is saying if you throw down some Rupees the boy will jump up and stand beside you"
This seemed an unlikely feat given the height so I asked what would happen if you threw some money down
"The man will laugh at you and tell you what a fool you are!".
Another person in our group from Bengal told me of his first visit many years before when he was a student. It was the time of full moon and he had of course heard of how wonderful the building looks in the moonlight. As he left he asked the gatekeeper if he might return to view in the night
"Absolutely not. Garden closed. Entry forbidden".
He pleaded with the gatekeeper, telling him he was all the way from Calcutta and might not get the opportunity again. Eventually the gatekeeper relented, pointed to a small gate and told him that if he came back later, paid a little money, he might be admitted for a short private view.
So he turned up, the gatekeeper emerged from the shadows, pocketed the bribe, opened the gate just wide enough for our friend to enter. He was immediately entranced by the glow of the dome through the trees and walked forward his eyes only on the dome. But then a soft sound reached his ears and he stopped gazing at the beautiful domed building and looked about him - to see hundreds of others, sitting, standing and lying on the grass - all who had bribed the gatekeeper for a private view!
Brian
ps: we noted a comment from Mike (do we assume that is Mr Levy?) about Delhi asking if it has become more middle class since his visit in 1974. Well yes and no is the answer. There are plenty of large banks and other indications of a large burgeoning economy and I would guess all that goes with a large middle and industrial class. There are for example places like Costa Coffee in the New Delhi area and one we went into twice (it was opposite the office of the company of our driver Subash), the second time was just before we set off on our current Agra-Jaipur-Udaipur-Ahmedebab trip and Subash has to repair a puncture. So we sat in the Costa Coffee enjoying the same coffee you do wherever you are (and at nearly the same prices) but we could not help noticing that directly across the road a parade of single story offices has a great number of people living on the roof, out in the open and no doubt one step up from living on the pavement. And we had also tried not to look at the group of crows breakfasting on a dead rat on the pavement outside. So yes there is a new trendy middle class Delhi with its laptops and coffee houses - but the crows are still feasting outside!
Wednesday, 4 February 2009
Impressions of Delhi
We had meant to blog a bit more about Cairo and to conclude that it was not for the fainthearted but lying in bed last night and thinking about Delhi I take it back, Cairo was a doddle compared. We walked wherever we wanted, we used the metro (although we never saw a single obvious non-Eqyptian on it) we were out in the evening sitting with a tea, we went into the old area and its markets, it felt OK and we only came nearly adrift getting to the Pyramids where we met the oldest Pyramid selling scheme in the book - taken to a 'government office' where we were told we had to take a camel/horse/buggy to see them 'its the desert" "its 15km to see them' etc etc. We got out of it but it was the only real problem we faced.
But Delhi is something else, simple chaos in the streets, large distances between places, no understandable public transport, the crappiest vehicles plying for hire, human life on the streets in more forms that you can imagine, horses, dogs, dogs, cows, goats and sheep. We have copped out and hired a driver Subash to take us around, its the only way to do it. And we had a fairly expensive hotel after I read some horror stories about Delhi's cheap hotels on the web.
There are the odd moments however - we heard a tremendous noise outside our hotel one evening and looking out from our fourth floor balcony saw a wedding party moving around the block to a large open banquetting area opposite, the groom on a large carriage pulled by two white horses, a huge number of people banging drums, playing trumpets and dancing wildly carrying lights and stopping every now and then to let off fireworks, it almost made Delhi seem human. And I was amused when we were stopped interminably at a traffic light to be assailed by the usual sellers of cloths, large bunches of peacock feathers (which look splendid) but also by a young man with a pile of novels all wrapped in plastic including the Booker prize win
ner and William Dalrymples City of Djinns about Delhi - both of which i have read - and many others that could have been carefully chosen by a literary critic for him.
Brian
But Delhi is something else, simple chaos in the streets, large distances between places, no understandable public transport, the crappiest vehicles plying for hire, human life on the streets in more forms that you can imagine, horses, dogs, dogs, cows, goats and sheep. We have copped out and hired a driver Subash to take us around, its the only way to do it. And we had a fairly expensive hotel after I read some horror stories about Delhi's cheap hotels on the web.
There are the odd moments however - we heard a tremendous noise outside our hotel one evening and looking out from our fourth floor balcony saw a wedding party moving around the block to a large open banquetting area opposite, the groom on a large carriage pulled by two white horses, a huge number of people banging drums, playing trumpets and dancing wildly carrying lights and stopping every now and then to let off fireworks, it almost made Delhi seem human. And I was amused when we were stopped interminably at a traffic light to be assailed by the usual sellers of cloths, large bunches of peacock feathers (which look splendid) but also by a young man with a pile of novels all wrapped in plastic including the Booker prize win
ner and William Dalrymples City of Djinns about Delhi - both of which i have read - and many others that could have been carefully chosen by a literary critic for him.
Brian
What can i say about our two days here? Well the traffic is asstounding, Brian said its like a ball bearing run, where all the balls just manage to move around each other and really it is. Motor bikes with ttwo adults and children wedged between them, the man has a crash helmet but no one ellse does, a woman riding side saddle on a motor bike and holding a baby, tuk tuk's with upwards of ten passengers and a driver, carts pulled by poor old horses or very large bullocks with huge horns. All the time the noise of car horns, they hoot at each other all the time, from little toots to long sonorous blasts, that was Delhi and our journey to agra today has confirmed the though the traffic thins out slightly you hav to factor in herds of sheep, loads of donkeys, camel carts and lorries driving the wrong way up the fast lane.
This makes it sound as though all we have done is drive aboutbut we have seen fantastic monuments, all sorts of wonderful buildings set in tranquil expanses of green with beautiful green parakeets flying about, monkeys and the most delightful little squirels hopping arround.
Today we have seen the agra fort, hugh and wonderful and seen the Taj Mahal fron the top of the Fort, looking along the river. Tomorrow the Taj at dawn.
Tess
ps managed to add some pics see blogs below and to this one the pics are:
the wedding celebration outside our hotel in Delhi, monkeys at the Presidents mansion and Subhash and Tessa by the final steps of Gandhi prior to his assasination
Monday, 2 February 2009
Delhi and before
Our taxi ride into Delhi at 5am rates as one we are surprised to have survived, just our luck to get the smallest and most decrepit taxi on the rank and as he swerved throught the mercifully light traffic in the pram sized vehicle we did wonder if and in what state we would get to the hotel - the major accident we passed on the way did not help.
Our overnight flight was on a cheap shuttle flight for some of the millions of workers in the UAE from this part of the world, we think there were only three women on the flight of which Tess was one and that we were the only foreigners. Everyone else of course had huge amounts of excess luggage as booty was taken back home.
We left Dubai after three astounding and amazing days with Ahmed's family in Abu Samra. The experience was at first a totally disorientating one as we arrived in the bosum of a large extended family in a very large house served by numerous servants. After we arrived we thought our visit was about to be severely truncated when Ahmed came to our room to say his cousin has just died as a result of a car accident the previous night - we decided we really should not stay in the house in the circumstances and made some unsuccessful efforts to get an earlier flight onto Delhi but in the morning Ahmed would not hear of our going and arranged for a driver and housemaid to look after us and take us about until after the funeral. Once that was over the family assembled and we began a round of visits, coffee and teas, meals traditional style on the floor, visits to small farms, to camel stables, and late nights (the main meal is not until 10pm with men always eating first and ladies afterwards) with the family chatting. We soon were dressed in the traditional Kedora and I hope tomorrow we can get some photos posted to show you how we looked.
Brian
The differences between our life in Egypt (clean but tatty hotel, lots of walking, eating very modestly) and our three days of complete pampering in UAE are just so huge that it is difficult to describe. We were looked after, our washing and ironing was done and we were fed in a lavish manner, the food in Abu Samra was fanstastic. The household is traditional so men and ladies eat separately, men first, women next. You sit round a large plastic covered table cloth in a huge, carpeted room. I was given a spoon (I discovered that I am useless at eating with my hand and being left handed is a bit of a problem because of course the left hand is only used for one purpose and it isn't eating), even with a spoon I still spilled more rice than anyone else.
The house hold concists of Ahmeds most charming mother, his Dad (very handsome), Ahemed and up stairs his older brother (who is a policeman and not about a grat deal), his brothers wife, Minou and their four very lively children - Mubarak (9), Moser(7/8), Meera(5) and Salem(3), with the exeption of Salem who dosnt go to school yet, they all speak really very good English and even little Meera can write and knows all her letters. They are lively though and the reason we couldnt get on the internet at Abu Sabra was an unfortunate incident with a glass of Ribena and a laptop. We did however manage to look at the wedding photos of Sophie & Laurences wedding, which every one love (they were particularly taken by Elspeth, ooh went all the ladies.)
Only the young people speak much English and they speak very good English, women of 25 to about 35 speak some English and older ladies only speak Arabic. Every one was absolutly lovely to us though, very generous with their time and with assorted gifts and as I was taken about to tea with various ladies the younger ones always translated. I was also allowed to do 'Man' things, like visit the camels and the camel racing training place and Brian was allowed to be in the same room as unvieled ladies (as a sort of adopted family member). We both had a lovely visit to a cousin of Ahmed's who showed us her traditional holiday home in the desert and told us about the ways in which people used to do things.
I could go on for ages, but I will finish here.
Tessa
Our overnight flight was on a cheap shuttle flight for some of the millions of workers in the UAE from this part of the world, we think there were only three women on the flight of which Tess was one and that we were the only foreigners. Everyone else of course had huge amounts of excess luggage as booty was taken back home.
We left Dubai after three astounding and amazing days with Ahmed's family in Abu Samra. The experience was at first a totally disorientating one as we arrived in the bosum of a large extended family in a very large house served by numerous servants. After we arrived we thought our visit was about to be severely truncated when Ahmed came to our room to say his cousin has just died as a result of a car accident the previous night - we decided we really should not stay in the house in the circumstances and made some unsuccessful efforts to get an earlier flight onto Delhi but in the morning Ahmed would not hear of our going and arranged for a driver and housemaid to look after us and take us about until after the funeral. Once that was over the family assembled and we began a round of visits, coffee and teas, meals traditional style on the floor, visits to small farms, to camel stables, and late nights (the main meal is not until 10pm with men always eating first and ladies afterwards) with the family chatting. We soon were dressed in the traditional Kedora and I hope tomorrow we can get some photos posted to show you how we looked.
Brian
The differences between our life in Egypt (clean but tatty hotel, lots of walking, eating very modestly) and our three days of complete pampering in UAE are just so huge that it is difficult to describe. We were looked after, our washing and ironing was done and we were fed in a lavish manner, the food in Abu Samra was fanstastic. The household is traditional so men and ladies eat separately, men first, women next. You sit round a large plastic covered table cloth in a huge, carpeted room. I was given a spoon (I discovered that I am useless at eating with my hand and being left handed is a bit of a problem because of course the left hand is only used for one purpose and it isn't eating), even with a spoon I still spilled more rice than anyone else.
The house hold concists of Ahmeds most charming mother, his Dad (very handsome), Ahemed and up stairs his older brother (who is a policeman and not about a grat deal), his brothers wife, Minou and their four very lively children - Mubarak (9), Moser(7/8), Meera(5) and Salem(3), with the exeption of Salem who dosnt go to school yet, they all speak really very good English and even little Meera can write and knows all her letters. They are lively though and the reason we couldnt get on the internet at Abu Sabra was an unfortunate incident with a glass of Ribena and a laptop. We did however manage to look at the wedding photos of Sophie & Laurences wedding, which every one love (they were particularly taken by Elspeth, ooh went all the ladies.)
Only the young people speak much English and they speak very good English, women of 25 to about 35 speak some English and older ladies only speak Arabic. Every one was absolutly lovely to us though, very generous with their time and with assorted gifts and as I was taken about to tea with various ladies the younger ones always translated. I was also allowed to do 'Man' things, like visit the camels and the camel racing training place and Brian was allowed to be in the same room as unvieled ladies (as a sort of adopted family member). We both had a lovely visit to a cousin of Ahmed's who showed us her traditional holiday home in the desert and told us about the ways in which people used to do things.
I could go on for ages, but I will finish here.
Tessa
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