Blog – Page 33 – Where is Phil now?

The Red Palace and White Temple, Jodhpur.

Thursday 10 November 2016 – Jodhpur, India.

A very frustrating and largely wasteful day. In the end I did visit all the locations I wanted to visit, but I did not spend as much time in each as I would have liked, though one of them was a waste of time and a tuk tuk ride. More on that later.

Today was the day the banks would re-open after being closed yesterday and all would become well with the world again, I hoped. As we all know, hope is a cruel mistress, and while the banks did open, my issues were not really resolved. Just moved around a bit.

If you have not read yesterday’s post then a wee recap of the situation is required. The Indian government announced on Tuesday night, much to the surprise of pretty much everyone, that the 500 and 1000 rupee notes would not be legal tender from the end of the month. New 500 rupee notes would be issued and the 1000 scrapped and replaced with a 2000 rupee. This is an attempt to disrupt the massive black and grey economy in India. It is massive. The ATM’s here only provide 500 and 1000 rupees notes. Though they are supposed to be legal tender for a while yet, basically no-one is accepting them, including my hotel. It is all I and all the other tourists have. To make matters worse the ATM machines are all closed Wednesday and Thursday and the banks were shut yesterday as well.

As I am leaving the Jodhpur first thing tomorrow morning I had to get cash today, my bill is going to be 5800 rupees. I have 5000 in bills that they will now no longer accept and they do not take credit cards. Hmmm…

After fare welling Christina and Jorg after breakfast, Natalie and I went to the bank just after it opened at 10. We passed a small pre-wedding on the way.

And this delightfully named, and closed hotel. I cannot imagine why it was not a booming success, maybe it was the location on the buy main road?

There was a massive queue as we expected, but as we had fairly straightforward transactions and are westerners, we were allowed to bypass the queue and go straight to see the manager He informed us we could only change 4000 each per day (the same as the locals) and that we needed a photocopy of our passports. He didn’t have a photocopier, so it was back out on to the streets to the photocopy shop, get copies and then back to the bank to get our money changed, 4 1000 rupee notes became 40 100 rupee notes.

We met some other tourists who told us of another bank that did not require a photocopy of our passport so we sneakily went there as well, supposed to be only one transaction a day, this one had an even bigger queue which we again we told to bypass. I changed my last 1000 rupees.

I now had money I could use, but this still left me short of what I needed to pay for my room, and no-way of getting any more – I may as well keep spending and do a couple of tourist things, like see some of the other key sites of Jodhpur.

This took me till after 1:00 to get sorted so I had lunch with Natalie and the group she was heading off with before finally getting out the door to do something. I grabbed a tuk tuk and made an agreement with the driver to take me to the Red Palace, the White Temple and then back to the guest house. I think we were both happy with the outcome.

Built on top of Chittar Hill, Umaid Bhawan Palace, or the Red Palace as it is known is one of the largest private residences in the world, and is truly massive. Construction was started in 1927 and it was finished in 1943. It was initially built to help local farmers with employment and the end of a long and severe drought.

I was very disappointed with the Red Palace. I knew that it was still the Maharajah’s home and that most of it had been converted into a luxury hotel, but I didn’t realise how much of it was. There is not a lot to see in there and I could not get a straight on, straight up the middle photo. It is a fabulous looking building…

There is a small collection of very dusty classic cars as well.

I was not there long and I think my tuk tuk driver knew I wouldn’t be as well, he was waiting at the gate when I exited and we took a slow and fumey ride across town to the White Temple.

Jaswant Thada, the White Temple, sits on the same ridge as the fort I visited yesterday, and is far more accessible than the palace; not being a private residence, but a cenotaph. It was built by Maharaja Sardar Singh in 1899 in memory of his father, Maharaja Jaswant Singh II, and serves as the cremation ground for the royal family.

The mausoleum is built out of intricately carved sheets of marble and is quite glorious.

I am not too sure who this dude is, point to the fort, I am assuming he is not leading an invasion, the statue looks quite new and I expect one day someone will put up a sign with some information.

I think you used to be able to get down to this small lake, and get a classic reflection photo, and also walk around the back of the temple, but it is all closed off now which is a shame, I would have liked to explored a bit more widely if I could have.

I had to wait to try and get photos without other people in them, luckily the place was relatively quiet or I would not have bothered. Lovely building.

The interior is bare, but glows almost as much as the exterior. The walls are lined with paintings of the family line, it goes back a long way.

In the grounds of the building are a number of smaller mausoleums.

After a relaxing explore in and around the temple I asked my tuk tuk driver to take me back down into the noisy, smelly and chaotic city below and drop me at the clock tower square.

I wanted to see nearby Gulab Sagar lake, the small lake I saw from the fort last night, it took 8 years to build and was started in 1788 to provide water to the community by the then Maharajah, Vijay Singh. It smelt so bad of rubbish and sewage that I took one photo and left, my plan to walk round it was swiftly discarded, even though the light was perfect for it.

I wanted to go back to the stepwell and see it in the daylight, it is a magnificent piece of construction, even better in daylight, and still pretty empty of both tourists and locals. The design is just so awesome, I loved the lines and angles, a huge amount of though must have gone into building something that was practical, functional and yet beautiful to look at.

I went back up to the roof top bar we went to last night as I wanted to grab a couple more photos of the fort and the white palace – obviously I had to sacrifice some more of my hard earned money to buy a beer!

And that was it, the end of my touring in Jodhpur, the sun was setting, and I am off tomorrow, there is still a lot more to see here, but I have so little time, and even less money!

In the end I was allowed to pay the remainder of my accommodation on my credit card at a local travel agent, it wasn’t ideal, but no-one had a choice. While I was there I also picked up some medicine at the local pharmacy, something to at least prevent my nose from streaming. I couldn’t, or didn’t want to get anything I didn’t recognise for my increasingly sore throat. Strepsils would have been perfect!

I never did see any Jodhpurs either…

Mehrangarh Fort in Jodhpur.

Wednesday 09 November 2016 – Jodhpur, India – Part 2.

The last post left myself and three people I met in the guest house heading up to Mehrangarh Fort, which looms over our guest house and completely dominates the northern skyline of the city.

Construction of the fort started around 1460 by Mahrajah Rao Jodha, when he decided to relocate the town of Mandore to the top of the hill. It was initially completed almost 200 years later, though a second phase of construction took place in the 18^th century. I am not sure which bit is what though. It is a monster of a fort, the stones that make up the walls are absolutely massive and it is an absolute marvel of construction. The current head of the Rathore clan Maharajah Gaj Singh II is still the custodian of the fort.

From the outside the entrance is impressive enough! I have not seen such high walls on a castle before, it is truly monstrous.

Regrettably I did not take an audio tour with me and make some notes as we walked around, we were a little pressed for time. I am struggling to find information to fill in some of the detail of the what I took photos of. I took a lot of photos…

I am assuming the works of art on either side of the entrance gate explain the retaking of Mandore from the Mewar by Rao Jodha.

Getting inside was an issue, as I mentioned in my last post the Indian government changed the currency overnight and the fort were not accepting 500 or 1000 rupee notes, which everyone had, not just us, a number of other visitors were also struggling to pay. Fortunately, unlike all the other places I visit on this trip, they took credit cards so Jorg paid for us all and we gave him (useless) 500 rupee notes; 500 rupees was the entrance fee. These notes are exchangeable in a bank, so they retain value, they just cannot spent in many places, even though they are valid currency until the end of the month.

Once inside I was wow…

And this was just getting inside the first level of walls. We arrived quite late in the day and a lot people were leaving, we intentionally arrived late as we wanted to be there for sunset.

There was not a huge amount of detail outside of the museum and palace section, little bits here and there, all sort of built into the design of the building.

There was some pretty cool doors and gates as well.

The museum was impressive, linking a variety of buildings and multiple levels, it was not full of marvels, but the walk around the buildings was really interesting.

There were some interesting knick knacks to see.

The view out of the windows on all sides over Jodhpur under a dropping sun was stunning.

I will visit the White Palace tomorrow.

I tried to sneak photos of the fort staff whenever I could, though they were quite accommodating and cheerful when I got busted.

As the sun started to really drop we headed off to the far western side of the fort to the Chamunda Devi temple for the sunset. There was limited viewing so I walked back up the hill a bit and got the temple in the very unspectacular sunset.

Amusingly, us westerners are the subject of some interest to the Indian tourists, even I have had my photo taken with individual and small groups of Indian men. However, unlike Christina, I am not a 6ft tall blonde woman, as we were heading out of the fort she became the focus of attention of a couple of groups and a melee of photo taking with Christina, Natalia and Jorg the centre of attention ensued.

I slunk off to one side as soon as the madness started, attention is not my thing 🙂

Though I did have my own fan. I think she was just avoiding the madness as well

It was after dark before we finally extracted ourselves from the adoring fans and the fort. There was time for a couple more final photos before heading back down to the guest house.

Natalie went off with some friends for dinner and I was invited by Jorg and Christina to join them for a meal in the Cafe Royale, a small cafe near the Clock Tower, which they discovered had really good coffee in earlier in the day. The food in the cafe was really good, but the best thing was the family that owned and ran the cafe, a really lovely couple and their two sons, who we spent the rest of the evening with.

After we had eaten and chatted for a while the parents asked us if we wanted to see the stepwell, I had no idea what one was, but they said it was very close by and we should come and see it. It is not in the guide book, and there is almost no information about it on the internet, so I cannot find out when this one was made. There are quite a few around India and Pakistan.

Basically a stepwell is a well with steps that go down to what was at the time of building, the lowest level the water drops to. Stepwells date back as far as 600ad, but the most prolific era of building was the 12^th to 17^th century, so this is pretty old. And also stunning. Probably the highlight of my stay in Jodhpur. The fort is amazing, but this is amazing and beautiful as well.

Toor Ji Ki Bawari stepwell, at night. I will definitely go back here tomorrow and see it in the day time.

On the recommendation of our new friends, Christina, Jorg and myself stopped at a nearby roof top bar for a couple of beers and the stunning view over the city; before heading back up to the guest house and sleep. Looking at a city from slightly higher than the street always introduces a whole new perspective – and a wealth of things that get missed at street level.

Another good day – considering the US election result and we the fact we are all uncertain as to what the heck is going to happen when the money runs out.

Jodhpur – The Blue City

Wednesday 09 November 2016 – Jodhpur, India – Part one of two.

I was up pretty early this morning and took a few photos from my room with its view over the city, it is quite smoggy again today and my throat is not getting any better. I am not sure if it just the poisonous air, a cold coming on, or both. I suspect both. This is the Red Palace and I will visit it tomorrow.

The restaurant is on the roof of the guest house, which sits some way up the hill between the flat of the city and the monstrous fort above. The view is spectacular, in all directions.

As Natalie and I were discussing our day we were joined by a German couple, Christina and Jorg and we all agreed to meet this afternoon and visit the fort together.

There was some interesting news today, apart from the US election results. In an effort to stamp out the grey and black economy that is pervasive in India the government have declared that the existing 500 and 1000 rupee notes will no longer be legal tender. Everyone has till the end of the year to change them. This is a major issue as so many Indians do not have bank accounts and literally have cash under the mattress. For instance, the home stay owner in Agra where I am writing this update says he has over a million rupees in cash. The wrinkle in the plan is that no-one can change more than 4000 rupees a day, so for those with vast amounts of cash this is a major issue. They could stick it all in the bank of course, but that means declaring the income. I really don’t sympathise too much about tax dodging, but this is creating an epic drama here.

In an effort to make the transition all banks are closed for the day and all ATMs are closed for two days. This is a problem. I do not have enough money to pay for my accommodation, and that is before I spend any money today. Which I am going to do as I am here on holiday. I will at least pay for entry to the fort, and I need to eat. To complicate this, irrationally, no-one is now accepting the 500 and 1000 notes, the notes we get from the ATM, all tourists have them, along with many many local people. So, even though they remain legal tender until the end of the year our guest house has informed us all they will not accept the only money we have. They also do not take cards. Frankly a complete and utter pain in the arse, more on that as the days unfold.

My plan this morning was to find the Blue City and take a walk around for an hour or so and then come back for lunch and then go up to the fort mid-afternoon and stay for sunset.

Natalie left with me and pointed me in the general direction of the Blue City, though I never did find it… Jodhpur is the second largest city in Rajasthan, and the old central part around the base of the fort is named the Blue City as so any of the houses there are painted blue. Unlike Jaipur and its Pink City, the Blue City is not really confined to one geographic space, so while I never really found the core of it, I did pass a lot of old blue buildings.

I walked for about an hour, it was warm but not overly so, and the streets, as such, are narrow and windy and ludicrously dangerous with speeding motorbikes. I cannot imagine the accident rate here. They are mostly too narrow for cars, though the odd tractor seems to make it through OK.

You might think from my photos that there were no people about, there were plenty, but I am not a fan of poverty porn, nor asking people to take their photo, so I avoided accidentally, or deliberately pointing my camera at people. This kid did walk through my shot, which is one of my favourites from the morning.

Except these guys who asked me to take their photo 🙂 I have no idea what they were making in those large wok looking things. I asked but had no idea what they said… [Edit] thanks to Arv, who commented below, I know now that these fine gentlemen are making an Indian sweet called halwai…. [end edit]

Even though I was pointed to and walked in the general direction of the Blue City, I never quite found it, I ducked up side streets and alleys, peered round corners, took a turn here and turn there, finally ending up not knowing where I was. Not quite lost, though at one point I did a complete loop and passed by the shops I had walked by 10 minutes before. I ended up getting a tuk tuk back, and it took a lot longer than I thought!

There was plenty to see nearby as well, perhaps I should have just stayed local, but where would be the adventure in that!

I arrived back at the guest house in time for lunch (I am eating way too much food, and it has all been great). I have stuck to eating local dishes, though all the places I have been to also serve pasta, pizza, something called ‘Maxican’ and quite often Chinese as well. I don’t see the point in coming to India to eat Italian food.

I met up with Natalie, Christina and Jorg mid-afternoon and we all headed up a small path near the guesthouse to the mighty edifice that dominates our skyline. More on that in the next post !!

Off to Jodhpur.

Tuesday 08 November 2016 – Jodhpur, India.

I was up again at 6:00 am to get a final walk up to the camel fair in. I met Trev in reception and we walked to the small shop we went to yesterday to buy biscuits to snack on as we walked, and to get some small change to give to people if we photographed them. We split up at that point, I wanted to take a bit of a walk around the town to look at and were possible to photograph some if the buildings.

Once the town starts humming around 8:30/9:00 all those frontages turn into shops or stall holdings.

The streets were pretty quiet at 6:30 which was nice for a change. Like yesterday it was quite cool outside, cool enough for many Indians to be wrapped up in jackets and hoodies. I just enjoyed my t-shirt and shorts and the cool air. The town has some beautiful old buildings in it, a lot of them are temples, like the one below. When the streets are busy with life, stalls and the ubiquitous motorcycle I tend to spend all my time looking where I am going, rather than at some of the interesting things around me. If I ever come back to India I would like to come to Pushkar and see it when it is less manic.

After a quick circuit of one side of the town I walked over to the fair ground, the hot air balloons were back, but not attracting such a big crowd today.

I soon found Trev in the field we met the gypsy girls yesterday, he had promised to come back and photograph the last of them this morning. I said a brief hello, but not wanting to be constantly hassled by people wanting money or food I wandered off to where the main section of camel traders were where there we less beggars, but a lot more tourists.

It is really hazy today, I could not see this hills on the other side of the town and the air was rough, after an hour I was coughing and my throat was quite sore. I didn’t see much that I had not seen before so headed back to the hotel for breakfast and to get ready to leave.

It is still quite early in the morning, the breakfast fires are burning and the people and camels are eating breakfast. A lot camp under their trailer on the road side.

There was a minor panic when I was told I had to pay for my room and food in cash and I knew I did not have enough. This sort of info really should be on the booking website as I suspect it does cause issues when cash is not easily accessible. I had suspected this may be the case, so went to pay an hour before I had to leave. The ATM had no money, and the second machine took two attempts before it gave me some cash, there was a brief moment of nervousness. As I am travelling solo today I decided to not get much out, enough cash to see me through. I am glad I got some as the Indian Government changed the rules the following day, I wish I had gotten the full allowance!

The taxi ride from Pushkar to the station in Ajmer, 11 kms away, was not too stomach clenching, only one manoeuvre of overtaking a van that was overtaking a bike that was overtaking a horse drawn cart, while being overtaken by another bike – into the face of oncoming traffic. Whew.

I had a rather dull hour long wait at the station, no other westerners in sight, though I did briefly talk to a family from Delhi who had been down from Delhi for the festival. Thankfully I was not asked about cricket, my knowledge is very slim these days.

The train arrived a little early, I am in two tier AC class carriage, all my trips are in AC2. My ticket said carriage 2, so I waited where the front of the train should be and jumped into the second carriage, which was an AC2, my allocated seat was empty, Yay. But, hmm, so was the entire carriage. I thought that was great, a nice and quiet trip, no listening to other people playing loud TV shows on their phones, a real bonus.

Just as we were about to leave I was informed by the ticket inspector that carriage 2 is the OTHER end of train, about 20 carriages away. Fortunately after some consultation he let me stay as there was no time for me to get all the way to the other end before departure. Whew!

It was a rather dull ride, a lot of featureless plain in the 224km between Ajmer and Jodhpur. I wrote a bit, read a bit, dozed a bit and basically enjoyed the freedom of an empty carriage.

I arrived in Jodhpur about 6:30pm and it was already dark. I took a (ripped-off) tuk tuk to my hotel, which is very near the fort, in fact the fort looms over us, rather majestically I might add. I had dinner in the restaurant at the hotel and then spent the rest of the evening in my room catching up on photo editing and writing.

I am really looking forward to visiting that fort tomorrow!

Pushkar Camel Fair

Monday 07 November 2016 – Pushkar, India.

Fortunately last night was much quieter than the one before and I seemed to manage a bit of sleep before the alarm went off at 6:00. Trev and I had agreed to meet at 6:30 and get to the camel fair before the sun popped over the horizon. The alleys and streets between the hotel and the fairground were pretty deserted, fortunately one shop was open and we managed to pick up a small packet of biscuits each to munch on in lieu of breakfast.

I enjoyed the walk to the fair this morning, with all of the tourist shops closed and very few people on the street there was no pushing and shoving, very few motorbikes whizzing past and no-one asking you to come into their shop, or for food or money. The best part of it was the people who were out were very friendly, saying hello or Namaste from their doorways and windows as we walked past. It was so much nicer than the sell, sell, sell mentality during the day. I can see why Pushkar is so popular outside of the festival. A friendly town!

With so many animals arriving in the past few days, and it was noticeable that a lot had arrived overnight, as well as smoke from the wood and dung fires the herders and small stall holders had for cooking and warmth the air was pretty thick, and this would be noticeable as a fine haze in some of the photos. In the fairground itself there were three hot air balloons being gassed up which attracted a large number of people who came along to have a look.I loved this business opportunity, I didn’t buy any, not sure if camel dung paper would be allowed into New Zealand or Australia.

There were quite a few other photographers around when we arrived and the numbers picked up noticeably as the morning progressed, so there was a bit of competition for angles and shots, some were quite aggressive as well. At times it was quite shameful watching their interactions with the local people. Why are some people so rude?

It was breakfast time, for both the animals and the people as we started to wander around. Some of the herders had their families with them, huddled together near their stock for warmth.

Not many had tents or camel trailers that were used as a shelter which surprised me. I guess the air is dry most of the time so sleeping in a bed roll under the stars is practical; though probably not comfortable and definitely not a life I would choose. These must be hardy folk.

More and more herds arrived throughout the early morning. Pushkar is on the edge of the Thar Desert, it is very sandy, and there is scattered scrub around. I am assuming the area we are in is a small farm holding during the rest of the year?

I think I have been snapped while snapping.

There are a number of small buildings and fenced areas as well as a number of large water troughs. You can lead a camel to water, but you cannot make it drink!

I really liked the camels, they have amazing faces, and can pull the most wonderful expressions, most of the time they look a bit stupid, but sometimes you can see a smart knowing look in their eye.

I was still after a classic silhouette photo, though did not manage to get one while I was there, always so much happening in the background. This was as close as I got.

I suspect these three in the alley to the hotel were part of the mass dog brawl the other nights. There are an awful lot of dogs on the streets, but so far none have seemed intimidating or dangerous, though they do bark a lot at night.

I spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon in the hotel, it was a lot warmer today, and the town is so busy. There was no need to go outside; plus I had photos to edit and blogs to write. At 4:30 Trev and I met up again and ventured back up to the market. I found this rotting old scooter on the way.

We decided to approach from a different angle this time and went to a field that was less crowded with tourists. We passed through the fairground on the way, it looks like it is starting up now, it has been quiet the past couple days. I think it is the first time I have seen pigs rooting around in the ground at the foot of a ferris wheel.

The horse section of the fair is next to the fairground, and there was a lot of horse trading happening today.

This field seemed to be more focused on farmers with one or two camels, compared to where we went yesterday where there seemed to be larger herds.

With less tourists around we became a magnet for the kids looking for food or money, some demanding to have their photo taken. We were approached by a lovely looking gypsy girl and as Trev is into portraits rather than landscapes he agreed to take her picture for a few rupees. This triggered off all her friends/family members and within a flash there was five or six girls wanting in on the action. I really don’t photograph people, I am not comfortable doing it, and I am even less comfortable asking someone and then paying them. I hung on the perimeter and watched.

One girl turned up to the impromptu photo shoot quite late and missed out, she followed us around for ages asking for her photo to be taken – and for the small amount of rupees that come with it. In the end I relented and took a couple of pictures of Lila, she was a nice kid, determined to have her picture taken, she was also the only one who was prepared to do more than just stand there, and a did a dance pose for me. I would have liked to have been able to separate her more fully from the background, but over all I was happy with the photo I took.

As soon as I pointed my camera at her another one of the girls popped into the frame. She was a bit older and far more cynical and bored about the whole thing, as long as she got her rupees. Maybe it is me who is old and cynical and it rubs off ?

We got a bit weary of the demands in the end and took a slow walk through some of the fields back to where we were yesterday. So many camels, so many tourists!

By the end of the day I was feeling like this.

There are not many trees – but I had to take at least one photo as I do like a tree.

Trev and I met up for dinner again and went back to the place we went to last night. It was not far from the lake so we took tripods along with the aim of doing some night shots. There are no bathers at night, and after 9:00 there were very few other people out.

The photography was a bit of a wash out though. The lake, back dropped by the lights of the town were boring when shooting with the wide angle lens, and the big zoom was too heavy for the lightweight tripod. I tried to zoom in tight on some of the buildings as the shapes and shadows were quite interesting, but I could not get then camera still enough to get anything remotely sharp so we gave up and went back to the hotel. I took this one from the restaurant.

I had a really good day! Though I think I am eating too much of this great Indian food.

I am not sure that Indian drivers really need the encouragement!

‘No drugs, alcohol or non-veg food’. Pushkar.

Sunday 06 November 2016 – Pushkar, India.

I have come to Pushkar for the camel fair, the fair takes place over the first week or so of the annual Hindu Kartika festival. The camels and their herders arrive over the first few days and the bulk of the buying and selling happens four or five days after the fair starts. There is an expectation that up to 50,000 camels will come this year, along with numerous horses, goats, pigs and cows. My plan was to do the town based activities in the morning and then venture out to the fair in the late afternoon as the day cools down. I am also hoping to get some of the classic, camel silhouette against the setting sun shot, no originality here!

It was a really bad night last night, the music stopped pretty much dead on midnight which was great, but the honking of motorbikes in the alleyways and from trucks, and buses delivering pilgrims to town, on the main roads went on for quite a lot longer. Once that had settled the dogs started howling and barking and there was a dog fight right outside the hotel at 2:30. Finally to cap it off; at 4:30 the mosque started up. I am so glad I had a full sleep the night before.

After breakfast I loaded up my camera bag and sauntered down the hill into town, I am getting a little familiar with the various alleyways and paths, and am reasonably confident I can find my way back to the hotel from most parts of the town. I was planning on walking around the lake today, the far side seems to attract a lot less people and I was hoping to be able to spend some time sat on the lake side enjoying some piece and semi-tranquillity.

I made it about a quarter of the way around before running out of road. I could have walked around on the lake side; barefoot, of course, but was unsure if I was allowed to. So I didn’t. I spent a bit of time looking around town, the main streets are really crowded, loads of pilgrims are arriving for the religious part of the festival and loads of tourists are here to take photos. Hopefully obeying the cultural rules (as if!).

Back at the hotel I met up with Trev, who I briefly met yesterday. We chatted for a while, he is English, a couple of years younger than me and into portrait photography. He has been to India numerous times, including the camel fair and speaks a little Hindi, which is very useful if you are doing portraits and want to communicate with your subjects! It was great to meet up with someone to go exploring with, it makes things so much easier having someone to talk to and watch your back as it were. It also meant that going out of the hotel at night to eat somewhere else was much safer, not that I ever felt unsafe at all, Pushkar is quite a friendly town.

Trev and I met up at 3:30 and started off with a visit to the lake. The lake is very busy in the morning, and quietens down in the late afternoon. As Trev has been here before and was more familiar with customs I found it is perfectly acceptable to walk around the lake front, so we did. Being careful to not to take photos of the bathers that were on the shore, as per the rules!

When the light dropped and started to get a bit more interesting we went to the fair to look for some camel photography action. There were far more camels than yesterday, and I was surprised at A) how docile they were, walking around them was quite safe, and B) there was no smell. I had though being in proximity to a large number of animals would be a bit stinky. Not at all; maybe the fumes of Delhi and Jaipur had dulled my sense of smell.

By my standards I took a lot of photos, almost 100. There were a lot of other people taking photos, and it times it was a bit of challenge to get shots with no photographers in them, or without one jumping in front of you. There was no such thing as manners here. The herders, in the main take it all in good, if rather bewildered, spirits.

I loved this chap, you cannot just attend camel fair, you have to attend camel fair in style!

By accident Trev and I found a good spot where the camels were coming round a corner of a field and the sun was dropping almost over head. We set ourselves up and ten minutes later we had been spotted and a whole bunch more people came over, almost crowding us out. We stayed there for a while as small groups and individual camels and herders passed by.

Along with the ever present camel tour. I was offered one by the hotel before I met Trev and am glad I did not take it, they do not look to be as interesting or as much fun as getting in amongst it all.

Trev grabbed these two guys and had them pose for him, he got right down on his belly to get the post shots, and I snuck a quickie in while he was shooting. It was like watching a master at work.

Once the sun had gone below the horizon we abandoned our spot and headed back to the area while the herds were going to camp.

There was a little bit of trading gone this evening, a good study of a camels teeth is obviously crucial.

It was a good session, and we left as the sun had almost gone. Back at the hotel it was a quick rush uploading images from the camera to the computer to see what I had got. I was pretty happy with my first day effort. It is quite tough shooting, lowish light, hazy conditions, a lot of movement in all directions and loads of others competing for the same shot. Fun in other words…

Trev and I went out for dinner, the food in our place is great, but Trev had found another restaurant that quietly sold beer, which is very rare in Pushkar. We met up with Greg, another photographer and England resident for food, a couple of cans of lager and lots of travel and photography talk.

It was a really good day, I very much enjoyed hanging out with those guys, seeing Pushkar and a hell of a lot of camels! Roll on tomorrow.

PS, yes I do love lens flare. It was deliberate, honest! 🙂

Pushkar.

Saturday 05 November 2016 – Pushkar, India.

The big mission today was to get from Jaipur to Pushkar. By Indian standards they are virtually neighbours and the journey will only take three hours. However, for a middle aged westerner who has not travelled for a while and is out of the ‘zone’ this still seemed like enough of a challenge for one day. Though, in the end it was all too easy. Thankfully.

As I only have a short time in India and no room for faffing I have fully planned ahead. Train tickets and accommodation has been booked in all the towns I am staying in. This allows for no flexibility, but it does mean when I get up in the morning on a travelling day I know what I am doing, where I am staying and mostly, how I am going to get there. This does remove all of the stress of travelling when it has not been done for a while.

Not having to worry about the logistics of the morning, and having been awake for 30+ hours I surprised myself by sleeping for well over 8 hours last night. I was groggy when I woke, but felt damn fine for all that sleep. My first Indian breakfast of lassi and paratha was really nice and set me up well for my travels. The hotel had a roof top eating area and I found an old fort (maybe?) out the back, cool!

I took a tuk tuk to the station which was about 1.5 kms from the hotel, the traffic around the station was pretty intense, but I was left alone as I made my way into the main hall. The sign providing information about the train was helpful.

There was a version in English too I realised after watching for a while. English is spoken to some degree everywhere here, all the people I have met so far have had some English which does make travelling less complicated. The train was late, but not by a huge amount, I was a little nervous standing on the platform, I had no idea what to expect and had visions of very crowded trains.

Even though I had booked the more expensive air conditioned carriage; it was still very cheap by UK standards. I expected there to be more westerners waiting for the train, I am going to Pushkar for the annual camel fair, which attracts a lot of tourists, so I was surprised to find there were only four other westerners on the platform, a group from Germany and they were heading somewhere else. This did ramp up my nerves a bit.

Which was all unfounded of course… I found a birth just fine, I was facing backwards which is not my preference, but it was entirely comfortable, quiet and ultimately enjoyable. I even had lunch on the train, a vege biryani that was very nice too. I took a few photos out of the window over the course of the 2 ½ hour journey. There was not a lot to see, flat, semi-arid farmland, all the way to Ajmer where I disembarked.

I had heard stories of tourists being ‘pounced’ on by touts when they get off trains and was expecting this as I walked through the crowded ticket hall. Nothing. Outside only one bloke came up to me to ask if I wanted a taxi to Pushkar, which I did, he offered me a price less than I expected, so I said ‘yes’ to that and jumped into the back of his very small Suzuki mini-van. The ride took about 40 minutes, there was a lot of traffic on the road, so it was nice and slow, I didn’t need to hang on once, even as we snaked up and down through the small hills.

Pushkar is a small town, with about 14,000 residents normally. During the festival this swells to over 300,000. It was very busy when I arrived. I am staying in the Everest Hotel, up the hill from the main drag and with a great view over the town. If it were not for the numerous signs pointing in its general direction it would be impossible to find through the myriad of alleys and pathways in the upper town. It is a real warren, with the hidden dangers of speeding motorbikes to add to the fun, plus the dogs and cows and their little land mines…

Pushkar is a small Hindu town wrapped around a very small lake on the edge of the large Thar desert. The lake was supposedly formed when the god Brahma dropped a lotus flower onto the earth. It is a very important Hindu pilgrimage town and all Hindus aim to make at least one pilgrimage here in their lifetime. The main pilgrimage time is now, in the month of Kartika, the eight month of the Hindu calendar. The desert tribesman come to the town for the pilgrimage and for the annual camel fair, up to 50,000 camels are caravaned across the desert to be traded. This is what attracts the tourists. The main camel fair takes place in the first week of the festival, with the main religious day being on the full moon later in the two week celebration period. I will not be here for that long sadly, but I do have three nights, so will see plenty of camel fair action I hope.

I met an English guy, Trev, as I checked in, he has been here before and promised to give me some camel fair tips, which was cool. Once I checked in and dumped my gear in my room, I grabbed my camera bag and headed out the door. I like my room, it is large and airy and reasonably comfy, and blessing of all blessings the shower is hot, something I will appreciate once the layers of dust start to make my hair feel like a nest.

Unlike Jaipur I was not given a map of the streets, I doubt one exists, I was led down the hill a short way to a main intersection and left to it. I expected to get immediately lost. Which is fine by me, I am sure there is a lot to see.

Deciding to check out the camel fair first I sauntered off in the direction I was pointed in, once out on the main road it was pretty easy to spot. I am assuming these two ferris wheels are not here all year round.

It is still early days in the fair, and there are not many camels around. I did see some though, but these are dressed up to give rides to tourists. I am sure I will find plenty more during my stay.

Horse trading is also part of the fair and there are a number of horses here, all tied into position which I thought was harsh on the horses, however I am not in England anymore and what is unacceptable there is not the case here. The horses from Rajasthan are unique in that their ears stick straight up from the top of their heads.

It was about here that I discovered the recently repaired 24-105mm lens does not work. It worked when I last went to Epping Forest, but now it does not focus at all. I have been forced to use the heavier and longer 70-200. It is a lovely lens, but hopeless for close up work.

I found this snake charmer who I paid about £1.20 to take some photos while he charmed the obviously stupored cobra, which I also got to touch. When in India. A bunch of Chinese tourists also took photos and when they did not pay they were followed down the road while he yelled at them. I wanted to go and tell them to not be so bloody rude!

Knowing I would be back tomorrow I left the fair and walked down to the lake in the middle of the town. The lake is surrounded by 52 bathing gnats. These are not temples as such, but places to go and relax, meditate, pray and bathe in the holy lake.

A couple of these are commercial operations aimed pretty much (being blunt) at scamming tourists. I got scammed. Not by much, but still more than I would have ‘donated’ to their charity. It did leave a sour taste, and sadly I did not read about it being a scam until later in the day. Fore-warned is for armed as they say. I also discovered that you should not take photos on the lake, as a number of the women bathe bare breasted, that was after I had taken photos…

I was a bit disgruntled from being ripped off so went back up to the hotel, where I took a few photos over the town from the really nice roof top restaurant/relaxing area. It is a bit hazy today, but that has kept the temperature down to a decent level, which I appreciated.

And of course the neighbourhood rhesus macaques!

I spent the evening in the hotel, I am not yet confident enough to walk the streets at night on my own, getting lost in the dark would possibly not be a good idea, though I am sure it is a very safe place. It was a Saturday night and I ended up reading till midnight when the music finally stopped. And the dogs started…

This post has taken two hours to assemble from the already uploaded text and pictures, the internet it diabolically slow here.

The Pink City of Jaipur

Friday 04 November 2016 – Jaipur, India.

The real culture shock hit once I got out on to the street. The hotel owner gave me directions to the ‘Pink City’ the main tourist area of Jaipur after the Amber Fort. It seemed to be a fairly straightforward walk along a main road. This is not a main city thoroughfare like you would find in any western city. There are no footpaths, and if there were they would still be used by cars and motorbikes, it was chaos out there. Though it does all appear to be reasonably safe, keep your line and everyone works around you, cars and motorbikes included. Not sure if I would mess with a bus though. Where there was a raised footpath it covered the sewer and in so many places the path was broken and the stench of the sewers mingled with the fumes of the vehicles. It was pretty unpleasant.

I walked for quite a while and saw no sign of the ‘Pink City’ gates. I started to wonder if I was going in the right direction, and soon gave up in confusion and despair. Eventually I did what I should have done back at the start. I took a tuk tuk, one of the three wheeled motorbike taxis. I asked the driver to take me to the Pink City gates, discovering that I was heading in the right direction all along; it was just a hell of a lot further than I thought.

Jaipur is the capital city of the state of Rajasthan. It is named after its founder Jai Singh II who built his capital here in the late 17^th century, the Amber Fort. As the population expanded the capital was moved down to the flat land below the fort and was named Jaipur. In 1876 the maharajah had the entire old city painted pink, the colour of friendship, to welcome the Prince of Wales. The city palace sits within the Pink City, and was my objective for today. I had about 30 minutes to get there before they stop allowing visitors in at 5:00pm.

Once through the city gates I was confronted with the bazaars, each section dealing with a different kind of product, spices, cloth, metals, leather, all have their sections. It was very crowded and a little disorientating to begin with, it wasn’t helped by the main thoroughfare being packed solid with noisy, smelly traffic. At least there was some sort of footpath along the shop fronts. I did not take a load of photos here. I am very reluctant to aim my camera at people I do not know. If you have followed my blog at all, you would probably have guessed this by now. Some people are good with people and others are not. I sit very much on the ‘not’ side of the equation. I suspect this will continue to be an issue through the rest of my India journey.

I did take some photos of the buildings though. By law all buildings have to be painted pink. I would love to have the paint supply contract!

Reluctant to offend, I did not take any photos of shops, or people near shops, or anything that tried to capture the busyness and colour of the bazaar, though I did see a few things that caught my attention. Like these dolls for instance.

And a small shrine on the side of a building.

Eventually I found my way to where the City Palace was located, I saw a bus full of westerners and decided to follow it!

Passing through a small square, full of parked tourist buses, I finally found a place that I felt comfortable taking photos in. Goats, monkeys and bikes abounded, my sort of thing.

I paid the entrance fee to the City Palace just before the office closed. There were still a lot of people inside and I had an hour before everyone was booted out.

Wondering around listlessly I didn’t really pay a lot of attention to what was going on, nor to the history of the place. In the past I tried to get a bit of background before I enter a castle or a palace or temple so I can get an idea of what I am seeing. I had not done so here and it impacted on my enjoyment, plus I had been awake for 27 hours and was knackered. I took a couple of photos and left without seeing much at all.

Though I did appreciate the silence.

I headed off round the back of the palace, down some streets that I suspect tourists do not generally go, I like back streets.

They are quieter and often more interesting – and on the other side of the gates there was a lot less pink!

I eventually found my way back to one of the main streets and as it was approaching evening I decided to grab a tuk tuk back to the hotel. Alcohol is almost frowned upon in Rajasthan, though cannabis is, I believe, legal. My tuk tuk driver was smoking a joint and offered to sell me some, which I politely declined. I am not sure if it impaired his driving or not, hard to tell on these streets.

Back at the hotel and verging on darkness I asked the hotel owner if I could buy a can of beer, he pointed me in the direction of a beer shop not far away, but on the other side of the main road. It was a challenge getting across that road, all for the sake of beer! As I walked back up the smaller, one way street the hotel was on, I discovered that having lights on your vehicle appears to not be mandatory, driving a car down a one way street the wrong way, seems to be OK as well. You really need to keep your wits about you. I drank a can of beer in my room before dinner as it is not allowed in the hotel restaurant, it was very nice!

Dinner in the hotel was good, cheap and delicious, though sleep was even better…

Welcome to India

Friday 04 November 2016 – Jaipur, India.

Warning – culture shock! They should put that underneath the sign at the airport that says Welcome to India. I am pretty sure that no matter how much you prepare to come to India for the first time, no matter how much research you do, how many Youtube clips you watch or friends you speak to; when you get onto the streets you will find it is all overwhelming. I did anyway.

As usual I left home early and took two tube trains to Heathrow Airport. I was glad it was post rush hour as lugging a back pack and camera bag on the tube is no fun at all. I have decided to take the DSLR backpack travelling for the first time, with three lenses, it is big and heavy and awkward. Hopefully it will be worth it. I am also taking the pocket camera, just in case. My carry on camera bag weighs significantly more than my pack.

I was taking three flights, the first, to Abu Dhabi, was just over six hours. It was a really nice flight, good service and the meal was actually excellent! I watched some really terrible films (Star Trek, Central Intelligence, and on my neighbours screen – The Shallows. I did not need the sound for The Shallows.) I also started watching the BBC series The Night Manager, which was great. Sadly they did not have it on the next leg.

It was a quick turn round before I was on my next flight, a three hour trip to Delhi. It was not too bad either, though the chap next to me started snoring about 5 minutes after we took off, so it was headphones all the way. I watched the new Ghostbusters film. It deserved the terrible reviews it got.

The landing in Delhi was through a dense layer of low cloud, though once off the plane I discovered it was not low cloud. Just stinking, eye burning smog. Gross.

The journey through immigration and baggage was slow, luckily I had 4 hours until the connecting flight to Jaipur. I picked up a sim card for my mobile and some Indian Rupees. It took eight attempts on the ATM, they work differently to UK ones, and I had to use my UK card which was annoying as I was planning on spending NZ money as right now it is worth more !

I was pleasantly surprised by the domestic terminal at Delhi, really nice. Clean, comfy and not a rip off compared to other airports. Well done Delhi Airport. The flight to Jaipur seemed to take about 10 minutes, up and down, it was well under the scheduled hour. Being a smaller prop-jet it was the bumpiest of the three flights and there was not a lot to see out of the window as it was very hazy below.

I had arranged a pick up from my hotel, which I was not charged for. Given my hotel was £13 a night I was surprised! The journey was my culture shock moment. I am so glad I did not try and get a bus, it would have been just too much. Jaipur is the capital of the state of Rajasthan – more on it in my next post. It is the biggest city in Rajasthan, but not huge. But it was rammed, cars, bikes, motorbikes, people walking, dogs, cows, buses, trucks. Everything. Makes Hoe St in rush hour look like an early Sunday morning. Everybody honks all the time, it is not so much an aggressive, retaliatory act here – more a warning of ‘I am coming, look out’. There are lane markers on some of the roads, pointless. No one drives in lanes. Indicators – pah, don’t need one, There is a horn. I didn’t take any photos out of the cab as I was just trying to absorb it. Plus, the pollution was really bad there as well.

I settled into my hotel and had a bit of an early afternoon lie down. I had been awake for over 24 hours. After a few, very short, minutes I got changed, grabbed a map and left the building. At least I got to wear my ‘travelling in hot, dirty countries where I do not know anyone’ clothes. It has been too long since these saw the light of day. Some may say this is a good thing.

It has been too long since these saw the light of day. Some may say this is a good thing.

Exploring time!

This may be the last post for a couple of days. I want to post more of Jaipur, but the internet is quite slow where I am now and I have a few photos to go along with the text.

I had to go to Berlin to see the autumn.

Wednesday 02 November 2016 – Berlin, Germany.

The Tiergarten in November. Wow, what amazing colours! I have been waiting, fruitlessly, for the trees to turn in Epping Forest, but they have been remarkably stubborn this year and it does not look I am going to get a display before I leave on my trip to India and New Zealand this week. Berlin’s Tiergarten certainly made up for, if not exceeded, what I will miss.

I have been here once before. Way back in 1987, when Germany, as a single nation did not exist. It was the autumn then to, and there is a photo of me in an album buried in a box somewhere of me throwing leaves in the air. I enjoyed Berlin then, and I did again this time, though this was a work visit; and a very busy one too.

I came over with my boss to attend ICEF, a very large language school expo. We had a small booth, in one of the worse spots and were hoping to generate some leads, if not sales, for the school management software he has developed. The conference is very sales focused so I was sort of expecting to be fairly quiet as the schools were selling themselves and were not there to buy systems. 4000+ people attend this event, so there is a big audience.

We left London on Sunday morning, I had a really early start, having to drive the 90km to Gatwick in fog to get there for 6:30am. I was surprised that we actually left as it was a bit of a pea-souper.

At least it was fine in Berlin.

We went straight to the expo centre at the Intercontinental Hotel to set up the booth, once done we attended a ‘first timers’ lunch on the 14^th floor of the hotel. We were very near the Tiergarten, I took a couple of photos out of the window. Not realising that this was as close as I was going to get for the next three days.

We were busy, really busy. Unexpectedly busy. Pleasantly busy. There was a lot of interest in the system which was great news for the company. I had sort of expected to be able to take a break each day and go for a walk outside, but we were busy from 9:00 am till 6:30 each night, and then it was a quick trip back to the hotel we were staying in for a shower and change and then back to the conference centre for ‘networking’. We left the first two nights at 1:00 am, we ‘networked’ a lot.

This was as much outside as I had for the first three days, the road between hotel and centre.

On the final day, Tuesday we did have a brief respite, but it was raining, so the closest I got again was a photo out the window of the 14^th floor again.

I did not go out for the final party on Tuesday, electing to have a quiet night in on my own. My boss and I are sharing a room, and I have not spent three full days with someone who was not El since I was travelling with Benne in Sri Lanka in 2013. I needed the space – plus the Arsenal were playing a Champions League game and I had a pretty good stream 🙂

The main reason I did not go out was I wanted to get up early and go for a walk before we had to go to the airport to fly back home. I am so glad I did….

I only had 45 minutes, so it was a short walk. The streets near the hotel were a bit sterile, the shops were the same brands as in London, and Barcelona and Copenhagen, everywhere really. There was none of that solid Germanic architecture I remembered I was a wee bit disappointed to be honest.

The Kaiser Wilhem Memorial Church still has the bullet holes in it from the Second World War, when it was mostly ruined by allied bombs, the remains stand as a memorial.

I walked round the perimeter of the zoo, most of which was in this wonderful park, with its wonderful autumn display. I took quite a few photos, none of which do any justice to the park.

The park crosses the Lanswehr Canal, and has a number of small lakes/ponds in it. There were some reflections but I did not really manage to capture them. The light was a bit low as well, but I was sans tripod unfortunately.

I definitely need to go back, I wanted to see some of the Berlin I remembered from the 80s. Going back in the autumn seems like the right thing to do.

I arrived back in London mid-afternoon, tomorrow I am off again, this time to India. I am very nervous about it all now. It has been a while since I have travelled somewhere ‘exotic’. I hope I am up for it all. I am also going to miss El and awful lot!