Post #81 - December 31, 2012 - Udaipur, India

What we did: arrived in Udaipur by bus, chatted with family, New Year's Eve party
Budget: 3500 Rupees/$70; Spent: 3860 Rupees/$77

Another terrible bus ride. Sigh. This time, it wasn't the cold that killed us, it was the reckless driving and the uncomfortable beds. We felt like pinballs all night long as the driver swerved this way and that, presumably around traffic, pedestrians, and miscellaneous wildlife. On more occasions than is right, I thought the bus was actually going to tip over.

We arrived in Udaipur at 6am, entirely unrested and unhappy. We grabbed an auto-rickshaw and were at our hotel in a matter of minutes. Thankfully, a hotel worker answered the buzzer and we were even given our room early. We would have been absolutely miserable had this not happened. We had essentially worn the same clothes on the bus as we had on the camel safari, and we were tired of smelling like camels. We each took hot showers and then climbed into bed for a short rest.

At around 9:30am, Jeff called his parents over Skype. They had just taken Chris to the airport a couple hours before. It had been several days since Jeff had talked to his parents and they had a lot of catching up to do. It was great to speak with them and see them again!

Patty joined the conversation around 10am. After the call, we had breakfast. Jeff was able to eat a bit more today, but felt sick again after eating. He should really learn his lesson! We spent much of the morning researching places we wanted to see in Udaipur, where in India we could meditate, and generally just recovering from the previous night.

In mid-afternoon, we decided to leave our hotel to look for a place we could celebrate New Year's. We had called our first choice and they said they were full, but when we went there in person, they said they could reserve a seat for us. Unfortunately, a $10 cover charge per person was to be applied to our bill. We didn't have to leave a down payment, so we thought we would check out some other places in town.

We walked to a touristy area in search of one place in particular. The restaurant was inside the palace, which is a major tourist site here. The meal itself is 10,000 rupees per person, or about $200. Too bad it was full. We were both totally in the mood to drop nearly three days' worth of budget on a meal.

After we discovered this, a crazed group of monkeys randomly scared the hell out of everyone standing around the entrance to the palace. One monkey even jumped down what must have been more than 15 feet onto the top of a car and another into a group of people. People were screaming and scattering in all directions. No one got hurt, but it was a pretty aggressive display from those things. We will definitely be wary of those monkeys from now on!

We wandered back down the winding streets to our hotel where we wrote a couple blogs, until it was time for dinner. When we arrived at the restaurant we had been to earlier, basically we were told that we would have to come back at 9:30pm, even though we were told specifically to show up at any time. He even had the audacity to look annoyed and say we were wrong and that he had told us to arrive at 9:30pm. We think the server knew he screwed up but didn't want to look bad in front of his boss. We are learning that in the restaurant industry in India, the customer is always wrong. It's really annoying. We left without making too much fuss, but wish we had made more of a scene. There's always next time.

Actually, being turned away from this restaurant turned out to have probably been the best thing that could have happened to us. We went to another hotel recommended by our book and its rooftop restaurant was starting to fill up with both foreigners and Indians. They had a buffet meal an awesome DJ and a nicely decorated rooftop all for 450 Rupees, which is not a bad deal, especially considering we were going to have to pay 500 Rupees just for the privilege of experiencing New Years in the other place.

We met two guys from Switzerland at the party who were quite nice. The first guy we met, named, we think, Alois, talked like a parrot and pretty much ignored Patty, so she sat by herself for a while, until his friend, Joel, happened to come by and they started chatting. We ate dinner with them and other people they had met, although we didn't exchange too many words with anyone else. The music was very loud and it was hard to hear anyone who wasn't directly next to us.

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After dinner, the Indians took the floor and were showing off their moves. The way Indian guys dance is pretty hilarious. Their dancing style would be considered pretty feminine in North America, but they sure enjoy themselves. They were dancing for hours! Patty and I joined in at some point in the night. It was really fun, actually. One guy in particular would encourage us to dance in a more Indian style, which is not something traditional as you might think, but really just going crazy to music and doing whatever comes to mind. Patty also had a good time danging with several Asians who were going crazy to the music.

As midnight neared, we could see fireworks being launched from the tops of buildings all over town. Some were big, others small. Even the hotel we were staying at was sending up fireworks from another level above us. Once midnight came and went, the music stopped and the celebration began winding down. We hugged strangers and wished them happy new year. We left around 12:45am and just headed back to our hotel. We were invited to go find someplace else that was still open, but we weren't really interested. Bed sounded much better! Man we're getting old. We need some inspiration from the Chihuahuas, they keep us young.

Post #80 - December 30, 2012 - Jaisalmer, India

What we did: Camel ride to Jaisalmer, shopping, overnight bus to Udaipur

Budget: 3500R/$70; Spent:1330R/$27 

Woke up to a cup of masala chai - tea. It was boiling hot and very tasty. The family's very cute dog snuck into our hut several times throughout the night but we shoed it off. During the night while we were sleeping he found his way to our hut again and slept at our feet most of the night. He too was trying to find a warm place to sleep. Made us miss Pacolino.

Neither of us had the greatest sleeps ever, but we were rested enough. We enjoyed a breakfast of boiled eggs, toast, bananas, and oranges. Jeff still didn't feel like eating much, but had a couple bananas. While we were eating a man showed up and played a beautiful flute-like instrument for the baby boy. The people we were staying with are so tough. It was freezing in the morning, but they were up way earlier than us working and wearing less clothing than us. What babies we are.

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While Jeff was off taking pictures of camels, an older lady, who I'm not sure how she's related to the family, approached Patty and asked her for our blankets saying it was very cold for them living there. Before we left, Patty ended up giving one blanket to her and the other to her son. It looked like they really appreciated it, and they certainly needed them. It is a bloody cold place!

The ride back to our car ride was shorter than yesterday, but it was very nice. It was colder because it was morning, but very enjoyable. Camels are beautiful creatures. Jeff spoke with our guide for some of the ride back. He explained that this was their busy season but they had not received much business so far. He was a proud man and tough one but he was also very kind to us. His nephew Wassid who was also on the trek with us was tough too. He didn't smile much and was difficult to read. On our way back we saw two kids on camels running through the desert chasing each other. It looked like fun. What a different life they live here.

We rode for about an hour, hopped in a taxi, and drove back to the hotel. We had a couple things to do before we left, including buying a thick blanket for tonight's overnight bus ride to Udaipur. We were not going to allow the past to repeat itself, so we set out immediately in search of a blanket. In the second shop we were successful, though we had two bad experiences at shops. One guy completely ignored Patty's questions and barely made eye contact with her. He was trying to sell us a big fancy blanket for 5000R ($100). The price was absurd. We explained we only needed a simple blanket for a couple times use and that price was out of the question. Patty explained to him that the hotel owner had told us that we could get a decently warm blanket for about 1000R. He then proceeded to say the hotel was misguiding us. Patty piped in and said "oh but you're going to tell us the truth right?". He listened to her after that. Patty then said "we're obviously in the wrong store" and then we walked the heck out of there. The guy we ended up buying the blanket from wasn't much nicer. He was grouchy and threw several blankets at our feet and would not budge on the price of 500R. We made an offer and he refused to budge. Patty then just walked out and he called back to Jeff. We ended up getting the blanket for 350. The vendors we encountered in Jaisalmer up until that point were definitely not the nicest folk. 

After this, we grabbed some lunch at the Italian restaurant we had been to a couple days prior. The meal was OK. Nobody in India seems to know how to make authentic Italian. It always has a hint of Indian flavour. Jeff ate too much and felt ill after.

We rushed back to the hotel, packed up our things,  and got in trouble with the hotel manager for being late (we had told him we'd only be an hour!), and rushed out the door. There was a moment of panicking when we couldn't find our bus tickets, but they turned up inside Patty's suitcase. 

We arrived in plenty of time for the bus. It was scorching hot inside. The bus operators wanted us to check our bags and pay a fee for it, but we snuck our bags on a hid them in our sleeping compartment. Before entering the bus a worker made it sound as if we had no choice but check our luggage which was not true since on our last bus ride we had no issues loading them on the bus with us. Two Asian women saw that we had our bags with us and we're pretty upset that they were forced to pay to check theirs in the trunk. 

The ride began warm, but cooled off quickly as the sun began to set. We stopped at a number of places along the way, but all we bought was some chips and a Sprite. At one of the small villages we stopped at a bunch young boys were selling street food served in newspaper to the travellers on the buses. On the bus across the street from us there was a lady who wanted to buy something from one of the boys. The 1st boy had handed her one of his items but it looked as though she had already decided to buy from the 2nd boy. She tried handing the 1st boy's item back so that she could pay for the other's boys items. But the 1st boy insisted she buy from him. The 2nd boy approached her with a bag of things and she paid him while the other boy started shoving him and the lady was in the middle of it all still holding the money. Somehow the 2nd boy got his hands on the money she owed him. This quickly escalated into an all out brawl between the two. We were terrified that one of them was going to get pushed onto the road.  On two instances the boys began fighting and had to be broken up by a mob of other guys. Patty felt bad for the 2nd boy who was crying and had done nothing wrong so she called him over and gave him some money. Sad seeing these boys so desperate.

Early in the bus ride, we watched a movie called Dredd, which is a remake of Sylvester Stalone's Judge Dredd from a number of years back. It was ultra violent, but actually quite enjoyable. Unfortunately, our computer ran our of batteries with only five minutes left in the movie! But the final climax had mostly finished so we weren't too upset. 

After the movie, we took out our blanket, which turned out to be extremely warm, and turned in for the night, hoping against hope that we would have a more restful night than our previous overnight bus!

Post #79 - December 29, 2012 - Jaisalmer, India

What we did: Camel Safari
Budget: 3500R/$70; Spent:3135R/$63

Jeff was still feeling ill when we woke up this morning. We weren't sure if he would be well enough to go on the Safari today. Jeff slept most of the morning trying to rest and get himself well enough. At around 11am the hotel manager knocked on our door basically telling us we needed to leave the room as the checkout time was 10am. Poor Jeff was not  feeling well enough to stand so I packed up our stuff and we were out of the room 30 mins later.

The hotel gave us a room to stay in until we made a decision about whether to go on the safari or not. With less than 3 hours before we were supposed to leave for the safari Jeff rested in the room and I rushed to the chemist with the hotel owner's son on the back of his motorcycle to get some medication for Jeff. I thought there was a good possibility I would fall off the back of the motorcycle because he was going so fast. Thank god that was not the case. We got him two pills and some drink crystals with electrolytes to prevent dehydration.

Jeff slept for the next 2 hours and I caught up with my family on Skype.

At 3pm Jeff decided he was feeling well enough to go on our safari.

I ran to get a chocolate croissant I was in love with for the road, and at 3:30pm we left.

The ride took about 20 minutes. We got a cute driver. We stopped along the way to take a picture with him. His English was not very good though and he was driving like a crazed maniac and blaring Indian music most of the ride.

We arrived at a meeting point on the highway and were so excited to get up on the camels. Three camels and two guides, an older man and a young boy were waiting. We took many pictures of the camels. It's amazing being on a camel's back while it is standing up. They are so tall!

The guides took the camels by reins and we were led for more than an hour through a desert-like area. We saw many goats, camels, and cows on the way. There were also many tents and huts where countless locals call home. Near the end of the ride we passed through sand dunes. They were beautiful and looked like silk from a distance. The scenery was surreal, as if it was right out of a Hollywood movie set.

We arrived near some huts, dismounted, and observed the setting sun. It was kind of hazy, so sunset wasn't that spectacular. There were three hut-like things with no roofs, no running water and no electricity. They only consisted of round base structures tall enough to block the cold wind. One of these would be where we would be sleeping and the other two housed the family that would be looking after us.

We sat with a husband and wife and their baby son for some time. The father explained that they move their home to the sand dunes in the winter time because the sand provides much more warmth than the hard, gravel terrain they usually live in. Remarkable how little these people survive on. We weren't offered drinks that night even though 6 bottles of water were included in the cost of the trip. We quickly realized why. The family most likely hopes to keep them for their own use since clean water is so difficult to come by in this area. They brought us some baked potato chips that were quite tasty. They must have been deep fried, but didn't have the greasiness of typical chips. Animals were running everywhere. The young goats got into all sorts of trouble, including trying to get food from the shelters. Even after being beaten back with a stick, they would try a couple minutes later.

Dinner came and it was rice with mixed vegetables and a bread. It was excellent. There's nothing like homemade food. We had earlier watched the wife make the bread herself. It was a good thing we had brought our blankets with us, because it was very cold even just after sunset.

After eating, we were led to our hut, which was basically just a wind block and shown our bed. It consisted of only blankets, but the thickest I've ever seen. Boy does it get cold in the desert. Two blankets we used as a matress and three others we put on top of ourselves to keep us warm.

We fell asleep under the stars, talking about how crazy it is that we were actually doing this. It wasn't romantic but it was a wonderful and humbling experience. 

Post #78 - December 28, 2012 - Jaisalmer, India

What we did: explored city, trip planning

Budget: 3500R/$70; Spent: 2160R/$43.20

Jeff woke up not feeling well today. He wasn't doing great before bed and was worried it was his time. Looks like it might be.

It was a chillier day than usual day in Jaisalmer. The air was crisp and because of the wind, the sun didn't provide much respite from the chill. I ate some porridge with bananas for breakfast and a delicious croissant from a German bakery down the street. Jeff’s stomach was feeling iffy so he decided not to eat anything and only had some lemon ginger tea. We sat on the highest rooftop under the sun overlooking the city. It was beautiful despite it being chilly.

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Afterwards we went back to the room and Jeff slept for a bit while I did some research on possible options for meditation retreats in India. It has been a lengthy search indeed. I’ve spent countless hours looking into where to do a meditation retreat and still haven’t decided on one. Though I have certainly narrowed down the options and now we have a clear idea of what we’re looking for. We don’t want anything too intense. There are some very interesting ones that no doubt provide quite an experience, but basically they involve 4:30 am wake up calls to meditate, and that’s all you do for 10 straight days, and all in complete silence! Plus, they separate men and women for the duration of the stay. It’s just too much for us. I’d like a more balanced approach otherwise I think I could go insane. The search continues.

At around 1pm we decided to head out to town. I still needed to buy a hat for our desert safari. We went looking and found nothing. We came across another cute bakery selling fresh goodies and we bought two cookies. People on the streets are constantly yammering at us. It’s almost always the same conversation that goes like this: “hello, hello, where you from?”…. “Oh Canada, the French part?”, “oh, so how long are you here for?”… and then they entice you into their store where they every so patiently could show you every single product that has been packaged away on their shelves. Indian people have quite a charm about them. They’re very friendly and warm. And almost all our interactions have been quite pleasant aside from yesterday’s spectacle. I’m getting tired of answering the same questions with the same sincerity and smile, but it’s quite cute because Jeff is always the same with all the vendors. He is so sweet, makes me feel kind of guilty! What a sweet man I married.

Jeff’s condition didn’t overly improve during the day so after some walking we went back to the hotel and Jeff slept some more until dinner time. It was about 5pm when we set out in search of a highly recommended restaurant from our book. It was outside the fort in a hotel which was also known as a haveli. A haveli is a traditional, often ornately decorated residence. Many have been converted into hotels but have kept their décor and style. This place was quite the haveli. It was beautifully rustic and historic but well kept. It felt like being in an antique museum but with a much more homey feel. As nice as the atmosphere was, the food was a bit of a let down. I ordered pasta and Jeff and I both had soups, but nothing was what we would call “good”. It was decent I guess.

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After dinner it was it was pretty cold. We made our way back through the streets which are always filled with people, and motorcycles, stray cows and dogs...anything you can imagine, really. We’re always dodging something whether it’s people, potholes, cow dung, or motorcycles. It’s hectic that’s for sure. We found me a hat for under $3 that looked exactly like the one Jeff bought for $6 inside the fort, except in a different colour. The markup is gross in some touristy places. We bought some chips and chocolate for a movie night and headed back to our hotel room to relax. We watched the newest Spiderman movie and quite enjoyed it.

Jeff is not doing so great. Seems he has the same thing I had. Hopefully it’s a milder version and he is better tomorrow for our desert safari otherwise I’m not sure what we’re going to do about the tour.

Good night.

Post #77 - December 27, 2012 - Jaisalmer, India

What we did: streets of Jaisalmer Fort, Jaisalmer Palace, shopping
Budget: 3500R/ $70; Spent: 4640R/$93

We got up this morning and were excited to head up the hill to our new hotel. We packed our belongings, which seem heavier these days, and off we went. We grabbed breakfast on the roof of our hotel which over looks the city of Jaisalmer. The location of our hotel is amazing. It's inside the walls of the fort of Jaisalmer. The fort itself was built on a hill and has two different walls surrounding it, one at the base, and one around the fort. Jaisalmer is known as the gold city, likely because it looks like a giant sand castle from a distance. We both agree it's one of the most amazing places we've been all trip. Truly amazing. Our new hotel is the cherry on top. We got a great deal for our stay here, and the coolest thing about it is that it used to be part of the palace originally but it was later given to the family who runs it now for their past service to the monarchy. The view from our hotel rooftop of the palace is stunning. It's our second day having breakfast up there but our awe hasn't dwindled.

After breakfast we were really hoping we could catch up on our blogs and book some of our trip. Wifi was not cooperating with us, and then the electricity went out so we changed plans and headed to the city palace.

It cost us 600R/$12 to get in but was very much worth it. India stirs our imagination unlike anywhere else we've been. It gives me the feeling that I had hoped I would have our entire trip. I feel constantly inspired in India, like I don't want to waste a single minute here. I want to see it all. It's very special. We took a ton of pictures from inside the palace and the audio guides we were given were excellent. Unlike the ones in China, we could hear and understand the narrator, plus we could also replay the information! What a concept. The palace was in excellent condition. And many rooms were still furnished with original pieces. The info provided by the audio guide was fascinating. It talked about how throughout history the people of Jaisalmer never accepted defeat and instead performed a ritual called Jauhar. When defeat was imminent all the men would fight to the death and some sort of bell would sound and the women and children would get dressed up in their best clothing and kill themselves. It's essentially a mass suicide. It was done to avoid capture and dishonour. This happened "two and half" times. It is said that the half Jauhar was considered accomplished only in part because the people did not have enough time to properly perform the rituals. The women and children were not given enough time to prepare and therefore simply killed themselves. Another particularly interesting fact we learned was how this wooden horse was used to teach children in the royal family how to ride a horse in good form, notice the wheels at the base:

Our favourite parts were the king's chamber, and the ladies quarter which overlooks much of the city.

After this, we decided to grab a drink and some momos from a place our book recommended called Free Tibet. Funny we almost went into another place called Little Tibet. Everywhere here in India there are knock-offs of restaurants and hotels. We found the real place and enjoyed some veg momos. Momos are like Indian style Chinese dumplings. They're quite good.

From there we went in search of hats and blankets for the Camel Safari we'll be going on in 2 days. We found Jeff a hat and bartered it down to $6 which was still probably very overpriced. The mark up inside the fort is apalling. The vendor originally wanted 800R ($16)! We continued on outside the fort walls where we were hoping prices would be more reasonable, and they were. For instance, a hat I looked at for myself inside the walls was 500R to start off and I found the exact same one outside the fort that started at 150R. The hats weren't very nice though, even for $3, so we didn't buy one for me.

I noticed some nice kurtas (long shirts) for Jeff hanging in a nearby store and decided to go in. This decision led to one of the weirdest experiences we've had on our trip so far. It started out normally enough, with the owner sitting us down and showing us his stuff. While we were thinking about some of his kurtas, the owner began showing Jeff some of his pants, which were made of a very thin cotton. He told us they were 600R each. Before we had made any decisions we asked him whether he had any blankets. He brought us several blankets that were supposedly 100% wool. His original asking price per blanket was 1500R, which was way more than what we were looking to spend on blankets. We told him that the kurtas didn't fit Jeff well and that his prices were too high. He asked us how much we'd pay, and we told him we'd pay 600R for two blankets and 200R for the pants. It was at this point he began giving us a guilt trip about needing to make money to feed his family and that we were being greedy because we had so much money. We felt very uncomfortable and decided to just leave the store. He basically began to beg us to buy something, and when we insisted that we were leaving, he offered the pants for 250R. Jeff agreed to this, although I think I would have said no to any price, considering how poorly he treated us.

We left the shop feeling pretty unhappy with the whole interaction. I think we both just hoped we'd never see him again. Unfortunately, this wasn't to be. We wandered around the shops for about half an hour before heading back toward the fort and coincidentally passing by the man's shop once more. He saw us walking by and ran out of his shop to talk to us. He offered us the blankets for about 1000R, we can't exactly remember, but I was insistent on our original offer of 600R, not even really wanting to do any more business with this guy. He looked extremely flustered and finally said 800R was his best price and then stormed back into his store saying that we have five minutes to decide and that the offer will not be on the table tomorrow.

At this point we were so shocked by his odd behaviour that it was an easy decision to just keep walking back to our hotel and forget we'd ever met the guy. About halfway to our hotel, unbelievably, the store owner ran up to us and basically started scolding us for not buying his blankets. Finally, after 30 seconds or more of being lectured, Jeff turned to him and simply tried to rationalize with him. He started off by saying the blankets were just too expensive and that we only needed the blankets for a one-time use. He explained that it had nothing to do with the shop-owner, that we had liked his store, we had liked his products, and that we had even enjoyed our experience with him, but that we simply did not want to pay that much for blankets. He further explained that just because we were foreigners, didn't mean that we had an unlimited amount of money to spend. Of course, much of this went in one ear and out the other. After Jeff was done talking, he came back with a price of 750R. We were so frustrated to be in this position, we finally offered 700R and we shook on it.

As we walked back to his shop, the guy looked distraught. He walked well ahead of us and threw his hands in the air and put them on his head. We could not understand, if he was so unhappy with the deal, why he accepted our offer. We arrived back at his shop and chose the blankets we wanted. To be honest, they were nice blankets and we were pretty happy with the price we had finally received. However, when we went to pay, he insisted, and even swore to God, that we had shook on 750R. Again, we couldn't believe what was happening, but firmly insisted that we agreed on 700R. He finally relented and took the 700R. I guess when Jeff was paying, he had put down his hat and the pants he had bought earlier, and we ended up leaving the store without them. Jeff realized he had forgot them just as we left and turned to go back in, when the man handed him just his hat. Jeff just shook his head and walked past the owner, who quickly went to grab the bag for Jeff that he mysteriously somehow had now noticed. What an awful experience. We were so happy it was finally over.

And it was over, although we joked that he probably cursed us. We didn't end up buying anything else today. We were pretty tired so we decided to head back to our hotel just have dinner there. We asked the owner's son what he recommended on the menu. He suggested a popular local dish made of some sort of desert plant. Let's just say we won't be asking for anymore recommendations from him. We were hungry so we tried forcing it down our throats, but once we were done eating we realized how unappetizing the dish was. Can't remember the name but hopefully we never order it by mistake again!

After dinner we headed to our room and killed several mosquitos before getting to bed.

Post #76 - December 26, 2012 - Jaisalmer, India

What we did: Bus ride to Jaisalmer, Hotel/Safari booking, explored streets inside fort, post office
Budget: 3500R/$70; Spent:3570R/$71

If there is a hell out there, today we experienced a small sliver of it. Except for us, instead of scorching heat, our own personal little hell on earth consisted of freezing cold. I am, of course, referring to our bus ride from Jaipur to Jaisalmer. I have never in my life been so cold for so long. It was almost absurd how cold we were. I said to Patty yesterday that either the bus will be super extravagant or it will be horrible. Unluckily for us, it was the latter.

The bus ride started out innocently enough. It was chilly, but nothing we couldn’t handle considering all the layers we were wearing. I was even mocking the horn of the bus, which sounded like one of Dan’s bird calls and we were both laughing hysterically trying to mimick him. Slowly but surely, though, as night set in, the chill turned to cold, which turned to frigid. What made it worse was that there were two windows to the outside that kept spontaneously opening. This, in combination with the sliding door to the rest of the bus spontaneously opening, resulted in a nice stiff wind blowing through our cabin. This meant us closing and re-closing the same windows over and over everyone couple of minutes and all night. We tried piling our backpacks in such a way so to block the wind, but this didn’t have the desired effect, either. We decided on a strategy of piling up our bags and closing the windows tight whenever necessary. Needless to say, we didn’t really sleep on our 13-hour, overnight journey to Jaisalmer.

Though, I think, we must have dozed off for an hour or two at some point in the night, because I remember looking at my phone at 2:30am and then at 6:30am, which came pretty fast. We shivered together in silence for the rest of the ride into Jaisalmer. Except for me occasionally mocking the bus’ horn. Patty remarked that she couldn’t believe I could have a sense of humour after a night like last night. Honestly, I couldn’t either.
It was a strange night on that bus. There was a lot of suffering in silence on both our parts. Neither of us vocalized it, but I think we took our suffering as an example of what people here experience on a daily basis. Looking out the window, there were fires burning with people huddled around them. Who knows what sorts of conditions these people went to bed in. Who knows the suffering, besides the cold, they endure on a daily basis. I felt like a pampered child who knew nothing of the world. Though the cold did not lessen with this realization, it altered my experience of it. How could I complain when this short experience is the life of so many? Of course, I could not. Taking the good with the bad is simply part of life. Something I would do well to remember.

Just before our arrival time, a young man knocked on our window to let us know that the Jaisalmer bus depot was the next stop. He began talking with us and he asked us where we were staying and if we had already paid. I knew it was fishy immediately, but I kept talking to him. Interestingly, he turned out to be friends with the owner of our hotel, Abu, and he actually called him to come pick us up. I was skeptical until I saw the name of our hotel on the white all-terrain van that came for us.

A two-minute drive later and we were at our hotel. Abu is an odd character. He's like a character out of a movie. He was on tablet the whole ride to the hotel and was using it as a phone and a camera. He seemed like a high roller. Come to think of it he looked and acted like a brown version of Hansel from the movie Zoolander; down to earth, quirky, and stylish. His English is pretty broken, and he explained that he hadn’t finished school or ever been to an English class and that he grew up very poor. He's quite a success story and has made a much better life for himself. He had learned English from taking people on camel safaris around Jaisalmer. That seems to be where his heart lies, and the hotel seems to be just a consequence of this. Oddly, he didn’t really try selling his safari tour to us. He had just come back from a tour, so perhaps he was tired. He talked mostly about himself and his visits to Bangkok and meeting “ladyboys”, he called them. He assured us no one could tell the difference. As I said, quite the character.

We waited about 10 minutes for our hotel room to be ready and then took our things there. I took a somewhat warm shower after running the water for about 10 minutes. Unfortunately, hot water wouldn’t even come out of the shower head for Patty. A boy knocked on our door to give us two cups of masala chai. Nice touch, but the cups were kinda dirty. We drank them anyway. This is when we decided we were going to change hotels tomorrow night. We got changed (I put on my linen pants for the first time) and set out into the city.

The fort in Jaisalmer is absolutely magnificent. It sits upon a hill with sheer cliffs all around, except for the single entrance. It is very much middle-eastern inspired which makes sense since it is only about 100km away from the border of Pakistan. There is some very beautiful stonework. Most of the buildings inside the fort have been converted into hotels, shops, and homes, but the streets remain authentic with many people living inside the walls along with many stray dogs and cows. It is a truly remarkable place.

We headed straight for the hotel we intended on staying at, and were only really sidetracked once, when Patty spotted some chocolate croissants sitting in a window. It cost about $0.80 and was amazing. It was very obviously fresh and they did not go light on the chocolate. We will be back again tomorrow.
When we arrived at the hotel, called Paradise Hotel and situated within the fort, we asked about a room for tomorrow night. We were shown first their best room, which was large and had a spectacular view, but beyond our price range. We were then shown another room that was smaller, but with an equally stunning view. Again, a little bit too pricey. Finally, we were shown a room on the main floor with no view at all, but for a price we were willing to pay. The main things about this hotel are that it has wifi, a rooftop restaurant with a view of the fort and surrounding area, and its location.

We talked to the manager about also booking a safari through the hotel and he told us about theirs. It seemed like a good safari, except the price was a little high. At the end of the spiel, Patty asked about a discount on the room because we were also booking the safari. In response, the manager offered us the 1500 rupee room for 1300 rupees. Patty’s response? “1200 rupees and you’ve got a deal!” The manager turned to me and simply smiled. I said, “I know, she’s a hell of a negotiator”. He agreed with me, and then agreed to Patty’s price.

While we were at it, we also booked our bus trip to Udaipur. Yes, again we will be taking a bus, and again it will be at night. This time, though, we will be prepared with blankets! We will not freeze again!

We ate breakfast at the rooftop restaurant of the hotel and then hit the road. Our first stop was the post office to send home my suit. We started walking and then eventually picked up an auto-rickshaw. When we arrived at the post office, it turned out that we needed to get our parcel wrapped by someone from outside the post office. India strikes again! We inquired where we might do this and we were told to head to a market just down the street. Once there, we had no idea where to go. After asking three or four different people and wandering down the market aimlessly for 10 minutes or so, we were delivered by a kind gentleman to a small, family owned shop. The guys first price was an outrageous 200 rupees. We offered 150 rupees and then he accepted, except that he told us to come back in one hour. This, of course, was unacceptable to us. We were not going to leave my suit! So I offered 200 rupees to the guy to do it now. Ugh. That was a whole new level of bartering for us. Anyway, the guy agreed and began wrapping the stupid thing.

When he was done wrapping the parcel in the white cloth that all parcels in India absolutely MUST be wrapped in, we headed back to the post office. It seems that we arrived just as it was closing and we must have been their last customers. We didn’t have any trouble shipping the suit, although it did cost $22. India has some serious issues with shipping stuff.

After this, Patty was seriously exhausted and wanted to head back to our hotel to rest. We took another auto-rickshaw and in no time we were back in our hotel. Jaisalmer is a town of only about 60,000 people, so it doesn’t take long to get anywhere.

We rested for the next couple hours, drank some much needed water, and sorted out where we were going to eat dinner. We decided on an Italian restaurant suggested by the book. We are getting a little tired of Indian cuisine so it was time for a change of pace. The restaurant is just inside the fort’s walls and has a beautifully decorated inside seating area. Although it was strangely warm tonight, we decided to enjoy our dinner inside.

We ordered a coke, two soups, a lasagna, and a pasta dish. They were all quite good. It was a little on the pricey side for India – nearly $12. The different in the cost of food between Canada and India is absolutely insane. Just the two soups in Canada would probably have been more than $12! We chatted for a while and then decided to head back to our hotel for an early night. We will be changing hotels tomorrow and we want to do that as soon as possible.

On our way into our hotel, a manager called us over to fill out some papers. On the way into the office Patty didn't hear the manager’s warning about a mess on the floor and Patty ended up stepping in some kid’s puke. She was absolutely disgusted and I have to say her reaction was pretty hilarious, though I shouldn't laugh considering my experience in Hanoi. The manager’s reaction was simply, “It’s OK”. We've noticed that no one here in India really cares about the cleanliness of their feet or shoes.

And, I suppose, in India at least, caring might actually drive you mad.

Post #75 - December 25, 2012 - Jaipur, India

What we did: Bapu Bazaar, walked streets of Jaipur, overnight bus ride to Jaisalmer
Budget: 3500R/$70; Spent:2004R/$40

Once again, our day in Jaipur consisted of shopping, shopping, and more shopping. Our day began around 9:00am with a call from Patty’s dad over Skype. Since we were still pretty groggy, we thought it better to wake up a bit and call back at 9:30am. We checked out today from our hotel so we packed a little bit before heading up onto the roof. We ordered breakfast and then Skyped with Patty’s family who were celebrating Christmas Eve and Elena and Chris' house (Patty's cousins). Sounded like they were having quite the feast. Made us miss home a lot. It was very nice to hear from everyone and that people are actually missing our blog right now! We are still trying to catch up from the days we spent in Delhi with no internet access. I feel bad for Patty’s cousin Chris Caligiuri: I think he is truly lost without our blog. Don’t worry Chris, we’ll catch up in no time!

After talking with Patty’s family, we called my parents and brother Chris over Skype. It was so nice to talk to them and made me long for home. It’s tough being away from home over Christmas. I keep thinking about the food, the coziness, and the warmth of home. And by warmth, I mean in sweat pants, hoodie, and wrapped in a blanket. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to speak with my brother Ivan and Izabela and little Marky. I hope to be able to speak to them soon! 

    

After breakfast we decided to see if my suit and linen pants and Patty’s kurta were ready. After about a five minute walk, we were greeted by Luis and welcomed inside. He wished us both a merry Christmas, both in English and Spanish, and then brought me my stuff. I tried on the suit first. I am extremely pleased with how it turned out. The material feels fantastic and it fits like a glove. He offered to ship it home, but unfortunately that would have cost $50, so we declined. Next up, my linen pants. Once again, the pants were a perfect fit. They weren’t exactly the colour we were looking for, since there is some brown in there, but I was very happy. We had low expectation for how nicely Patty’s kurta would turn out, but it actually came out quite nice. It’s pretty simple, but the colours are beautiful. Here is a pic:

We had a nice chat with Luis before heading out the door. We decided to go to the post office immediately to ship my suit home. We jumped into an auto-rickshaw and went straight there. Unfortunately, as we were arriving, the post office was closing. They must have had only a half day of work today since it’s Christmas Day. We set aside our disappointment and headed back out to do some shopping. We decided to walk to the major bazaars from the Post Office and stopped in some shops along the way. We came across a beggar that was sitting outside one of the shops at the bazaar. We remembered we had one of my t-shirts in our bag that we were looking to get rid of so Patty went up to him to give him the t-shirt. At first I don't think he knew what it was. We continued to another shop and as we came out we saw him taking off his old shirt and putting on the new red one. Although this pic doesn't show it, he was very happy and that made us happy. Several store workers were outside smiling at watching the whole thing.

We remembered how much we enjoyed walking through the streets rather than getting rides. It’s kind of unfortunate in India that rickshaws and auto-rickshaws are so cheap it makes walking nearly pointless.

We had a strange number of people, mostly locals, tell us “merry Christmas”, but it was mostly in good spirit, I think. Once we got to a bazaar, we began looking around. The goal today was pillow covers, sunglasses and a hat for me, and a couple packages of bindis. We probably went through one thousand pillow covers in the couple hours we were in the bazaars, but no luck. Patty is pretty particular! She wants some pillow cases to match the painting we bought in Hanoi. I can’t even remember what the painting looked like so she’s getting no help from me! We were, however, successful in picking up sunglasses for me and some bindis. Patty is becoming hilariously good at bargaining. Even I can’t tell whether she wants anything, anymore. On one occasion, we left a shop and I asked her why she bought a scarf because it looked like the vendor practically forced her to buy it; she then told me that she absolutely loved it and that she wanted it all along! I had no idea my wife could be so sneaky!

We were getting pretty hungry by late afternoon so we returned to the restaurant we had gone to with Arno, the guy from Belgium, a couple nights ago. It is a beautiful restaurant during the day. It is on the top of an old city wall overlooking a bazaar. The sun was shining, but it wasn’t too hot. Unfortunately, our food wasn’t quite as good as the view. It wasn’t bad, but the two dishes we bought were a little too similar to each other, and similar to the ones we had bought a couple nights ago.

From here we decided to start walking back to our hotel. On our way we grabbed an ice cream cone that turned out to be pretty good. We came across a funny sign on our walk. The word "rajputana" is used often in Rajasthan. The word "putana" is a swear word in Italian. At the very least I think Patty's sister and Dan will find this pic mildly amusing:

People continued to say “merry Christmas” to us, until finally one guy kept talking to us and told us about a Christmas festival that was happening tonight. We are both very wary of people being too nice, and this guy was definitely being too nice. He was getting all deep about life. He told us he was a social worker and an artist and then showed us a business card which was his attempt to prove he was a social worker. It was all a little too staged, especially in retrospect. He then offered to pick us up on his motorcycle to take us to this Christmas festival and was ready to give us his cell number so that once we got back to the hotel we could call him to pick us up.  He pressured us to go with him a couple times during the conversation. In the moment so much is happening, it can all get a bit overwhelming. You're trying to be polite with your responses while gauging the person and keeping your guard up. It was creepy how good of a talker he is though. I’ve noticed that some people like to use a line like “why don’t foreigners like Indian people” to make us feel guilty for not stopping to talk to them. This guy had by far the most conniving approach. It was all very psychological what with his social worker profession and business card, making us feel guilty for not stopping to chat with him. He had so many lines to make us take our guard down. He even apologized for perhaps seeming too friendly. Afterward, Patty said she got a really bad vibe from the guy that she just couldn't shake off. Although I didn’t feel quite as strongly about it, there’s no doubt that 99.9% of the time, people are trying to get something out of you rather than actually help you out. It’s sad people like that make it very difficult to trust anyone. It was also concerning that perhaps our younger more naive selves may have actually taken him up on his offer had our train ride to Jaisalmer not been that night.  

We took an auto-rickshaw back to the hotel and then changed into warmer clothes in the storage room/wifi lounge. The hotel owner’s son then invited us to the roof to see what they had done for Christmas. Turns out they had decorated it nicely, and even set up a tree! OK, it was a pretty sad looking tree, but it did make it feel like Christmas. We’re desperate, OK!?

The owner’s son told us that his wife had prepared a cake so we had to wait for it to be served. Unfortunately, our bus was leaving in less than an hour so we were getting a little worried. He rushed the cake so that we could have some before leaving. It was a pretty simple chocolate cake, but very tasty. All the staff and family came up to cut the cake. It was really sweet. What a nice place! We’re really happy we stayed there.

We pretty much ate and ran. I’m pretty sure the owner’s son had arranged a rickshaw to pick us up, although he didn’t even mention this. He was an outstanding host. The rickshaw was waiting outside and it was bigger than usual so it could accommodate our luggage. The ride took less than 10 minutes. The bus depot was a hole in the wall, but at least the bus we were going to take looked decent. After picking up some waters and photocopying our ticket, we boarded the bus with our luggage. We had booked sleeper seats side-by-side. The beds were arranged above the normal seats on the bus. We clamored into our bunks with our luggage via ladders built into the bus. A nice touch was that there were sliding glass doors with curtains that gave us some privacy. Unfortunately, unlike in China, we were not provided with any sort of bedding.

Once we had our things arranged so we could comfortably lie down, we pretty much just closed our eyes. We were surprisingly tired after a not-so-busy day!