Reflections

From the magnificent to the tragic, ostentatious to the outrageous, chaotic to the sublime, India gives and takes, pushes and pulls, discards then embraces in a way that leaves one breathless. The country is vast, our journey just the tip of an iceberg of unfathomable depth. Strong, yet punishing, this subcontinent commands your attention, all of it, all the time. It is pleasure, it is passion, it is serenity, and it is spiritual. The people are a testament to its history, incredibly compassionate, possessing an inner warmth that openly radiates to those around.

On the plane ride back to Savannah my husband and I didn’t watch any movies, we didn’t read any books, we didn’t even really need to talk. Our shared experiences of the past weeks made these efforts seem uninspired. We sat, contented, at peace and spiritually satiated. As time drifted by, the clouds swirling under the aircraft, our eyes closed and we gradually slipped back into that mystic dreamscape of jungles, deserts, elephants, and Maharajahs.

Back Where We Started

Another short flight today and we are back to where we began. In a way it feels good to be back in the city. The hive of activity invigorates the senses. We are now in the final stretch, shopping must continue, there can be no fatigue or surrender, shopping must prevail. Attacking the streets we hit all the shops, the Colaba, Churchgate, Nariman Point, Malabar Hills, and Kemps Corner, no market is spared as we peruse Chor, Zaveri, and Crawford. Mumbai is like a 30-mile long open bazaar.

Exhausted, our hunger for shopping turns into just hunger in general. I have to briefly describe the food in India. There is a big difference to having an elegant Indian meal in the United States to having a street side meal in India. First of all, there are no bathrooms, and if there are bathrooms, they are indescribably hideous (Can anybody really wash their hands?). Secondly, there are flies everywhere. The local vendors wave them to the side then continue to serve your plate, actually just a circular landing pad for these vociferous flying mouths. Large piles of grains line the markets, but looking closer, the entire mass appears to be slowly moving, crawling with worms, larvae and other assorted creepy-crawlers.

Don’t get me wrong, there is exceptional food to be had, its just you can’t think about it too much. My husband, who has a completely abused palate, ate everything, loved almost everything and never got sick. I, thinking way too much about the no hand washing thing, ate very little except at the main hotels, and by the time we got back to Mumbai, had lost about ten pounds and had the appetite of the Mughal army.

Stopping at one of the business hotels on Nariman Point, we happened on perhaps the finest sight of all, a western style buffet. Everything a woman could want while on vacation in India – pizza, pasta, Chinese and Mexican food, and real bacon – meat I could recognize, even (forgive me for my sins!) a burger. My husband watched in disgust as I shoveled food into my mouth more than making up the ten pounds from the past two weeks. Satiated, we collected our purchases, and returned to the Taj to make plans for our departure.

This Is No Plain Jain

After a wild twenty-four hours, today we are taking a more spiritual path. A 90 km (55 mile) short, but incredibly winding ride drops us at yet another architectural jewel. Ranakpur is one of the most important Jain temples in India. The Jain religious is as fascinating as it is bizarre. Jains believe every soul is divine and has the potential to achieve God-consciousness. Jains are acutely aware of their environment and will go to extreme lengths not kill any living creature including insects. Spending some time with this gentle religion makes one feel like a bull in a china shop world. We definitely overlook the trees in the forest of life. The temple is a marvel of exquisite detail including over 1444 marble pillars all differently carved with no two alike. The Jains continue to worship in the temple making it both awe-inspiring yet somewhat eerie.
This place oozes with a spirituality that, upon departing, leaves one with a sense of inner peace and serenity.

After contemplating our lot in life, we embarked on the journey back home. The back roads through the mountain range have more hairpin turns than the Pacific Coast highway. We finally convinced our driver to stop at the side of a wonderful ravine to queasily partake in the scenery while allowing our esophagus to return to its rightful place a little closer to the stomach. Closing my eyes trying to quell the continued seesaw motion of my brain, I felt my husband take my hand and gently stoke my wrist. His hand felt sweaty and hairy – and small? I opened my eyes in surprise to find the cutest monkey stroking my hand, mischievously grinning with that look of “what cha got for me?” The driver handed me a candy, which the monkey promptly took out of my hand, unwrapped and popped into his mouth. Intrigued by my newfound friend, I offered him another, only to have it snatched from my hand by another monkey. Soon the entire car was surrounded by first a family, then what appeared to be the entire village of monkeys. I felt like the monkey queen, doling out treats to all my loyal half-pint subjects. This was fun. Then I ran out of candy. These little buggers don’t play nice, and they have a grill that would make a rapper proud. Suddenly I was surrounded by an unhappy midget soccer team, the driver yelled, threw his last handful of candies, and all of us piled headlong in the car. The monkeys, after sizing up the car and us, the occupants, admitted defeat and dispersed to the jungle. At least we weren’t nauseated anymore.

We spent our last evening in Udaipur sipping wine on the terrace, gazing over the lake, the full moon still hanging above the palace, swatting an occasional fly in very un-Jain-like fashion.

The Color Purple

This is not for the faint of heart. To be surrounded by thousands of completely drenched color-stained, clearly inebriated revelers is a little disconcerting. The spectacular color wars had begun. All those piles of colored powders had been combined with water and were now being hurled indiscriminately at anyone fool hardy enough to pass by. Mixing all the vivid pigments together eventually turns everyone into a sloppy purple mess. It’s an ugly, muddled chaos and looks like a complete blast. As foreign tourists, we were warned that the ensuing madness can sometimes turn dangerous, thus with some resignation, we watched from a distance. The other explosive ingredient to the carnival is bhang. A mixture of milk, spices, honey, and cannabis, this concoction adds to the surreal flavor of this festival. It also can be a rather problematic ingredient when combined with the usually sober youth. We didn’t try the bhang – sounded too much like dung – and I’m sure that’s what everybody felt like the next day.

Holi Moli

For some reason the moon seems bigger and fuller tonight. So close, it seems you could just reach out and touch it. The bright orb hanging low in the sky lights the surrounds in a cool blue hinting at the festivities ahead. We, dressed in our Indian finery, arrived at the Palace to join the distinguished crowd, all eagerly awaiting the evening’s events. The Palace is aglow with a million lights and candles, awash with colorful flowers, intoxicating swirls of incense tickling the nose, while exotic musical notes completed the sensory overload. The air is warm, the sky brilliantly clear, covered in stars, as if in an open competition with the palace grounds below.

The music intensifies and the royal procession enters the palace: guards, horsemen, entourage, and finally in an elegant, antique automobile, the Maharajah of Udaipur himself. Holi, or the Festival of Colors, takes place on the full moon in late February or early March celebrating the arrival of spring. Days before the festival, piles of wood are collected and stacked into elaborate pyres. Theses piles are then burned the night before the full moon, symbolizing the burning of the devil-minded “Holika”, sister of the demon king. Legend also has it that the dark faced Vishnu was jealous of his lover Radha’s fair skin, playfully covering her with pigments. (This year Holi falls on March 11th).

After a lengthy introduction, the celebration begins. The large pyre is lighted, and a flurry of dancers in extravagant costume, begin an ever increasingly frenzied dance. As the tempo and volume slowly increase, so does the amplitude and rhythm of the dance, until the entire movement is a blur of fabric and extremities, fire and humanity entwined in a whirlwind of exuberance. Exhausted, the dancers, royals, and us proletariat, retire to another courtyard for dinner and drinks. The dinner is a buffet that stretches across the length of the entire piazza, food of every shape, color, and size, beautifully displayed, meticulously served, and entirely unpalatable for either me or my husband. Alcohol, normally a rarity in India, flows freely. My husband, eagerly pillaging the Maharajah’s cognac, was now fast friends with the local camel merchant, both deeply entrenched in a boisterous conversation neither could understand. Looking over the parapet, I could see the fires burning throughout the city, the billowing smoke and sounds wafting upwards combining into a wonderful rue of happiness. The festivities lasted long into the night, giving absolutely no hint of the carnage to come the next morning.

Octopussy

Today it is up early to tour the City Palace. Still home to the Maharajah of Udaipur, this is actually a series of interconnected palaces massed into an impressive whole. Multiple courtyards and gardens open to grand views of Lake Pichola and beyond. Floating in the center is the Lake Palace Hotel, a Taj Resort, and featured exotic location in the James Bond flick. It is beautiful, but a little dated now that the Oberoi has arrived. The rest of the town and surrounds was also utilized in the movie providing the perfect 007 visual experience.

The town is lush and tropical, a distinct departure from the previous weeks travels. A wide variety of palms and a profusion of flowers grace the streets; even the beggars seem more laid back and relaxed.

Shopping is again on the agenda with a whole series of fantastic little shops. Another great facet of shopping in India is the government sponsored Artisan and Craftworkers cooperatives. Usually little cottage mom and pop stops, these places focus on promoting continued historically accurate local handicrafts. What the artisans produce differs according to where you travel in India. We witnessed everything from jewelry and furniture design in Mumbai, mosaic work in Agra, rug making and textile printing in Jaipur, to painting in Udaipur. They function by funding apprenticeships but also serve as living, working museums displaying often mind boggling precision. Educationally phenomenal, they allow one to witness the work behind the art, and after meeting and speaking with the artists, one can then purchase works with the profits supporting this valuable resource.

Having added quite magnificently to our growing stash of goods, we stopped at the City Palace’s outdoor café for a late lunch. The plaza was bustling with activity. A large pile of wood arranged like a funeral pyre for an aged Viking king loomed in the center of the square surrounded by thousands, no tens of thousands of flowers, in a multitude of ever widening circles. Hundreds of attendants where scurrying about in a mad cleaning frenzy. Innocently inquiring as to what all the commotion was about, the waiter appeared dumbfounded by our ignorance. “The festival”, he stated, “The Festival of Holi”. There is was again. That word. Tonight was the night of the full moon. The Maharajah of Udaipur was having his annual party to celebrate the arrival of spring. Did we want tickets? Do dromedaries have one hump? – Of course we want tickets. For a price you can do almost anything in this country. And so it was. Tonight we are the guests of the Maharajah of Udaipur, tonight we experience the Festival of Holi

Udaipur

Finally, off those god-forsaken highways and byways and back onto the airplane. I don’t particularly like flying, but compared to road travel, flying is grand. A short 30-minute flight takes us to another city and another world. After days of dehydrated, desiccated lands thirsty for even a drop of cooling rain, Udaipur soothes the soul with wondrous water. Like an apparition appearing to a tortured desert traveler, Udaipur refreshes the spirits and reinvigorates the body.

If you do decide to travel to India, I highly recommend the itinerary I have previously mentioned. Trekking through Northern India in this fashion keeps the wonderment coming and coming, with each new destination and sight seemingly better than the previous one.

Stepping off the plane we are met by our driver who mysteriously, after just a short distance, drops us off at a small jetty on the edge of a beautiful lake. A cooling breeze awakens us from the drone-inducing fog of the jet ride. An stately boat captain, standing proudly on the bow of a antique wooden yacht, graciously waves us forward, and after a brief formal introduction proceeds to launch us across the waterway. To be on a lake after all those days in the desert is a fantastic feeling. Udaipur City slowly meanders by as finally in the distance several structures appear. To the right, the sprawling Castle, to the left a fortress in the hills, and dead ahead, our first destination, the Oberoi Udaivilas.

I promise this is the last time I will blog about a hotel on this trip. This is IT. This is the best hotel in which I have ever stayed, anywhere, in any country, ever. I have included some pictures, but these cannot do it justice. It is just dazzling.

Jodhpur: Day 2

Set on the fringes of the Thar Desert, Jodhpur just feels exotic. Cattle and camels roam the streets, locals in outlandish garb jostle for space and your attention, and dominating the skyline above the ruckus is the gigantic Mehrangarh Fort. Entering through a series of impressive gateways, one can wind up the path previously traversed by Maharajahs’ armies and entourages. From the top, one has a vast birds eye view of the surrounding territories and a picture perfect view of the Blue City below.

I’m not one for museum stores, but this one is rather elegant. Jodhpur is rich with the history of polo. Truly the sport of kings (or in this case Maharajahs), there is a fascinating array of memorabilia and polo paraphernalia. The Jodhpur Polo Club is one of history and legend, and now my husband is a proud new member (at least that is what his t-shirt says). The store also sells a wide variety of local arts and crafts, some quite exquisite.

Returning to the market in the later afternoon we became keenly aware of a new degree of frenzied activity. It seemed overnight the market had been transformed by a whole new set of merchandise. Instead of the usual pickings of essentials like grains, linens, household goods, and of course, your staple of small local “damn you caught me” wildlife, there was a sudden influx of vivid, vibrant colors. Nothing subtle here. Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet and beyond, the full spectrum was out for display. On every table multiple plastic bags full of colored powders of every imaginable color and size had appeared. It looked like a cocaine den from the Wizard of Oz. Everywhere a profusion of the most gorgeous flowers just erupting at the bud in a tantalizing taste of what was to come. Holi. We started to hear this word a day or two before, but it didn’t mean much. The Festival of Holi was coming. We were about to be initiated and, like a naive college freshman at a total party school, initiated big time. Our guide, smiling coyly, directed us to one of the tables assisting our purchase of several packets of powdered wonderful. Ah, we were young, stupid and had no idea what was coming. Piqued your interest? Now you, like us, have to wait. Holi is two days and an entire city away.

Shop Til You Drop

Okay, lets talk a little about shopping in India. Everything, I mean, everything is available for purchase. If you can’t find it, someone will make it. If it is just a thought in your head, someone can produce it, and produce it cheaply, and produce it yesterday. Cottage shops give way to full-fledged industrial complexes all producing, producing, producing for our consumption, consumption, consumption.

The breadth of antiques and architectural treasures is unfathomable. Treasures are collected from all peripheral states gradually finding their way to street side Jodhpur. It is almost impossible to define ages of antiques, as the Indian craftsmen are extremely gifted in recreating almost any period piece. Fine antiques are recreated out of age-old wood and sold as authentic. Buyer beware. There are many stories of highly reputable dealers being bilked out of large sums of money for phony goods. For even a keen trained eye, it is almost impossible to tell the difference. Good thing our purchasing is based on – “wow, that’s really cool”, or “wow, that’s really cheap”.

Jodhpur is the place where for about twenty thousand dollars you could get enough merchandise to open your own Bombay Company and stay in business for years. It is also the place to find exceptional architectural accents and the occasional fantastic antique India artifact. British colonial treasures abound, the left over remnants from a proud, but torrid past. The street markets are bustling, the hawkers are hawking, the beggars are begging, and we, the tourists, are shopping.

Jodhpur: The Blue City

It’s back on the road today. An incredibly long, but only 295 km (183 miles) drive from Jaipur, brings us to Jodhpur, the Blue City. The further you get from Jaipur the more arid and extreme the landscape becomes. Goats and oxen are replaced by camels, fields of crops by sand and dunes, only an occasional wind torn, sun baked tree remnant breaks the vast horizon. This is Rajasthan at its cruelest. This is also Rajasthan at is coolest. You can just imagine the Maharajah’s armies in full battle regalia, a regiment of camels’ hooves thundering across the parched land trailed by a billowing whirlwind of dust and sand. If you have an extra couple of days think about possible side trips to Ranthambore Tiger Preserve or Jaisalmer –the Gold City- extremely close the Pakistani border. We, however, deferred wildlife and adventure travel for more pressing concerns –shopping!

Jodhpur is known as the shopping Mecca of Rajasthan. Everyone who shops in India eventually finds himself or herself here. Importers, exporters, transporters, all other sorts of –orters call this place home. This is the reason we initially decided to come to India. This was the city that was the secret weapon of all the dealers, this was it, and IT didn’t disappoint.

Tomorrow I will start to describe some of the incredible finds, and the wild and wonderful shopping experiences we had. Tonight I will leave you with some pictures of probably the most visually impressive hotel I have ever seen. This is the place Elizabeth Hurley married Arun Nayar. Even if you don’t stay here, you need to have a coffee, cup of tea, or dinner on the terrace. The rooms are gigantic, the hotel is gigantic, even the view is gigantic. In the evening with a crystal clear sky, a hundred million glistening stars, an incredibly calming warm breeze against your face, peering up towards the lighted fort upon the cliffs in the distance, you can only think of one word – magical. This place is truly magical.