Jaipur
INDIA
Pink Cities, Amber Forts & Midget Cows
By AARON
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Jaipur’s not too bad. Coming into it prepared can even make the city an enjoyable experience. I say “coming into it prepared” because Jaipur is well known for its scams, even among other India cities, and perhaps the biggest one is the gem scam.
Locals will “befriend you” and even go so far as to take you to luxurious dinners and fancy parties, thus giving the illusion of an affluent lifestyle, and will then start talking gems. Regardless of how it starts out, the ending is the same – you get taken for what can be quite a lot of money. Lyndi and I were prepared, but apparently one traveler we met wasn’t and the end result was him being chased in a moto-taxi all the way to the train station.
So while we did have to put up with numerous, and I mean a LOT of “friends” coming up to us with the same greeting line (“Excuse me my friend – I have just it the one question – Why is it that the tourists are not wanting the talks with the locals?”) we were able to enjoy Jaipur for its many other attractions.
Our first day was spent lounging in our nice hotel room at Karni Diwas, and then taking in the sights of what is called the “Pink City”. Called the Pink City for its pink painted walls and buildings, the old part of Jaipur is completely walled in and contains shops and bazaars that you can walk through and buy anything from a colander to numerous varieties of incense.
Between dodging our “friends” at every corner wanting to know why on earth we didn’t want to talk to them, we soon found ourselves at Jantar Mantar Observatory, just outside of the City Palace. The observatory was a collection of giant architectural astrological instruments that were used in calculating anything from the time of day to star signs and the movement of the earth. “Jantar” means instrument, and “Mantar” means calculation, so the literal translation of the place is “Calculation Instrument”.
I would say it is a must see if you’re in Jaipur, as the main sundial tower reaches about 3 stories high, but the most amusing part of the visit was our private tour. Seeing the listed prices, Lyndi and I hired a guide for 200rp (the set price for 2 people) and were guided around the area. By about the second instrument though, we noticed we had about 5 local people siphoning off our tour. Towards the end, it got so they were even asking questions to our guide and he was answering every question as if nothing was wrong. When it came time to pay at the end of the tour, I gave our guide 100rp and thanked him, and of course this started a whole argument of why we had to pay a 2-person guide fee if there were actually 7 of us on our tour. Our guide tried to say that the locals don’t have to pay (which is not true), so after some heated negotiating for a set price tour, we settled on 150 and were on our way.
Next day we headed out of the city to the Amber Fort, which is the main attraction in Jaipur. Sitting atop a hill about 7km outside the city, it is quite an impressive sight. Opting to skip the guide, we found ourselves pretty well informed by the information plaques all over the fort, and even got to cool off in an air-conditioned Starbucks-esque coffee shop at the end, where we enjoyed some strawberry slushee drinks.
The highlight of the fort though was towards the exit, where there was a snake charmer playing for two cobras and for a tip of 10 or 20 rupees, you could don a turban and flute and sit down right next to him as the cobras swayed hypnotically back and forth. I’ve never been that close to a cobra before in my life.
After a 3-4 hour walk through the Amber Fort in the hot, humid heat of Rajasthan, we happily headed back to our air-conditioned room and took a quick nap before our big plans for that night of going to see the new hit Bollywood film – “Ready”.
For those of you who don’t know Bollywood – it is India’s version of Hollywood films and it has it all. Bollywood movies contain every genre wrapped up into one nice, neat bundle so that in one movie you can get your romance, action, comedy, drama and suspense all within a 2 hour sitting. Think that’s not impressive? There’s also song and dance as well, and just watching the local audience erupt into a wild frenzy of cheers and applause when one of these music videos comes on is reason enough to go see a Bollywood flick.
And here’s something that they do here that they don’t do anymore for movie theaters in the US – there’s an intermission. Isn’t that great? Just a quick, 10 minute break to refill your drink, use the bathroom or just stretch your legs. Where was that during Titanic, or Lord of the Rings? You would think cinemas would be falling over themselves for another chance to sell you another Sprite or refill your popcorn, yet in this strange paradoxical world, India is actually on to something. But I digress.
Although we couldn’t understand what they were saying, the movie was an experience nonetheless. Was the acting amazing? Of course not. Were the special effects worthy of an Oscar? Never. But I will rate it “E” for Experience and am already looking forward to the next hit movie “Singha”, which stars a karate-fighting cop up against a powerful drug lord. Try fitting a musical piece into that plot line Spielberg.
Next day we headed to Pushkar, which is about two hours by bus from Jaipur, and I must say, I wasn’t impressed. Travelers talk about how much they love Pushkar because of the shopping and how laid back and relaxed it is. While the shopping could maybe rate mediocre on the India shopping scale, and it was more laid back than the big cities, let’s be honest – the real reason 90% of travelers come here is to smoke easily obtainable weed.
Since Lyndi and I don’t smoke weed, we passed our time by strolling through the bazaars and visiting the waaaaaaay over-hyped Brahma temple. Yeah, yeah, I know other travelers reading this – it is the only Brahma temple in Rajasthan, but when it’s all said and done, unless you’re a temple junkie or expert, it really is not that impressive.
Here’s a highlight of Pushkar though – there’s a midget cow there. Yep, a midget cow that just roams the streets like the other cows, but this one is miniature. We did end up seeing another one in Udaipur, but I credit Pushkar as having that because it needs the good publicity for the non-smokers.
Our visits to Jaipur and Pushcar ended well, as we met a really nice local who we chatted with at the train station while we all waited for the train to Udaipur. It was nice to talk to someone just to talk, not so they could sell you something or take you to their cousin’s shop.
That will always be one of my major issues with India – the touts and scammers make you so hypersensitive in talking to anyone, that you probably do miss out on some really nice, genuine people. The problem is, that for every 10 people, 9 of them have ulterior motives, so unfortunately in rating a country according to its people, India springs to mind touts, scammers, dishonest drivers and guides, and starts to leave the good honest locals on the backburner. So back off touts – and maybe next time the tourists will be more apt to talk to you and hear about your great money-making scheme to get gems to their home country.
