Agra, Jaipur

June 14 (photos in "Jaipur")

Left the hotel at nine for the 240 kilometer drive to Jaipur. Crawled out of the Agra traffic to the 'highway,' a slightly wider road that sometimes had a line in the middle ostensibly to separate the directions of traffic, though is ever a line is blurred, it was that one. The rain had stopped in the night and the air was cooler and we were able to keep the windows down except when it became impossible to keep begging children's hand from wandering around inside the car. Raj made it pretty clear he didn't like it, so being good car-citizens, we listened. 'Fer Merleng' Agra ('OK, bye-bye, see you later'). Once out of Agra we saw the land spread forever behind rows of eucalyptus. Rice and wheat and some small factories out of town.  The rain starts up again, and the road turns to mud and ruts and it get tough to make out shapes - a man with an umbrella, a dog, some cows, a dead buffalo on a donkey cart, army trucks, two bear standing on their hind legs. Some open space, then another little village a half a mile down the road.

At 10:30 we leave Uttar Pradesh and enter Rajashtan. While Raj pays the taxes we are lulled into buying a hand cut garnet necklace from a man repeating 'Morning time, morning time' through the window. We are his first customers... Raj drives with two horns. Blowing one means something, blowing the other means something else, and blowing both at once means something altogether different. And he get a lot of practice. There are very rare moments on the road when we're alone, no other cars in sight, just trees lining the side of the road, huts and houses and the remnants of some temple or another, nothing to pass or honk at, and Raj honks, just to make sure the horn's still working.

Barreling over flooded road in this torrential rain, everyone speeds up, overtakes each other more blindly, thinking I guess the faster you go the quicker you get through it. And at one point everyone stops to allow one way traffic control over a hugely flooded part of the road. Water up to the floorboards, when our turn comes Rag manages to move the Ambassador through the river of a road. Then spend the next half an hour throwing on the brakes suddenly at fairly high speeds, 'Trying to dry them out,' he tells us. After hours, and hours, not stopping for tea, or lunch, or cigarettes, we enter Jaipur from the old part of town, buildings empty and falling down, and the road narrowing, and becoming more familiar as an Indian city street. Then we're in the thick of it, in and out of the Pink City gates looking for the hotel, which Raj has never been to. We circle another hour, asking jitney drivers and finding it on the map (like that helps...). But we find it, an old Jaipur home being lovingly restored, complete with religious paintings in all the alcoves, and the most beautiful wall and ceiling paintings. Stained glass doors that lock with old pad locks, some grounds, a small pool and charming young men is Sheik outfits.

We take some tea and fruit, wash up a little, then wake Raj to take us to City Palace, the walled part of town around which sprawl countless shops and temples and an endless stream of people and cows and cars and carts and motorbikes and bicycles. We wander for a couple of hours, find Raj, some beer and wine and go home. Tomorrow we wander more in Jaipur, and then leave for Pushkar. We've decided Udiapur is too long in the back seat of the Classic Ambassador, bouncing over Indian highways as if we are late for a very important mission, just to turn around and circle the wagon back. Instead we'll stay an extra day in Pushkar and Jaisalmer.

The next day we do some tourist things, walk through City Palace again, then along the lake because we need to. We've not been doing that much walking, not nearly as much as we're used to, so walking the kilometer along the lake in the rain, even though Raj didn't really want us to was the thing we wanted. Past the elephant stands and the gypsy camps, we meet up with Raj and climb to the Amber Fort, another Mogul monolithic castle thing nestled in the verdant hills. This one though was built to stymie anyone who made it past the moat and the acid and the various other deterrents. There are interior mazes that end in dead ends and we walked without a guide,  got lost a number of time in the heat and humidity. When we left we paused before walking through some garden gates. A young Indian woman was laughing at Phoebe for being hesitant to walk past a Doberman sized monkey, perched there like a lot of Indians, waiting on a tip. So the woman grabs the arm of her young man and sashays by past, only to have the monkey grab after the box she was carrying - grab after it and here, catching his fingers in her sari and she screams and jumps up and down and someone comes to the rescue and shoes the monkey, whose teeth were barred and shining ling polished steel. "That's hubris," I tell Phoebe, still a little shaken. We ride home, take dinner out with Raj and then ready to leave for Pushkar.

Comments

[malinda]

Hi people,

Greetings from Kelly Ave.
Wow the rain there! And that Raj, reminds me of feeling like a prisoner at the mercy of one Indian driver down near Malaysia, we could not figure out how to slow the guy down, pleading ..., yelling, money, no! You must stay safe so you can come home and tell us your stories. The photos are Great! and the descriptions, always, incredible. Meanwhile, the lawn's been vacuumed, furry ones fed and walked, turtles located and many nods and heys on the path with now "When Are They Coming Home?"
Love,
Malinda

[dave]

Greetings Travelers,
I haven't read the blog for about a week, but it's fun to let a few days build up and then read it backwards. Like you're in the car with Raj and then in the next "chapter" (previous day) we're introduced to the character of Raj. The whole blog reads really well that way, from top to bottom - backwards. I can't wait to get to the begining and to see you guy's again.
Love,
Dave

[Matt]

Hunts,
Know nothing of where you are and the challenges at this moment, only that, having been on the sub-continent myself, in less than favorable conditions, and given what I hear of man- and nature-made calamities of the moment, it would be reassuring to hear from you.

Peace
Matt