Zachster

Here’s what I’ve gathered about Jodhpur. Being that this is the second largest city in Rajasthan (under Jaipur), I think it’s a relevant discovery. Tourists are lured to the town by the fort so they can be sold handicrafts. That’s it. That’s the whole purpose for the city existing. Yes there are other industries, many to support the local community, but the majority who produce handicrafts overwhelms any other population. Of course not all handicrafts are sold locally. Many are exported to other tourist destinations in India, and some make their way internationally. And the local craftpeople are also contracted out by western companies to produce handicraft-style products. But I see no justification for centralizing this industry in this region other than the tourist draws of the forts and palaces.

Certainly, during the Mugul period (1100 – 1800), it was important for everyone (except maybe the farmers) to live within the city walls. That was how you got protection, and participated in the community. But with independence, the new cities sprung up outside the fort walls. This seems to be the most prolific building period in the cities I’ve visited. These buildings are what are used for all local businesses. I thought I was being judgmental in finding them ugly and dingy, poorly kept and fallen into disrepair, but Gandhi saw the same thing as a common trait of his people. He cites the poor upkeep of Indian dwellings as a cause for marginalization of his people in South Africa. He frames it as a side-effect of other priorities, and seems to dismiss it. But he did not get to see the long-term consequence of the neglect within India. To me, there’s such a stark contrast between the aesthetic value of the rural villages over the cities that I cannot imagine anyone wanting to live in the cities. It would be like giving up central park east to go live in the subway. I know there’s a lot going on here that’s over my head. I do not understand India, and doubt I’ll make any progress in the few days I have left. Suffice to say it is very difficult to run a country with so many people. Looking at it as an outsider, it doesn’t make sense. Whenever I don’t understand how a business works in the US, I explain it away by saying it’s a front for drug dealers or the mob. I’m tempted to similarly write off India that way as well. Can you imagine my audacity? Stay tuned to see if I make the leap.

Anyways, today in Jodhpur I saw the fort, and the old and new cremation grounds. While the Mugul emperors (Muslims) burry their dead, the Hindus burn them. So Mumtaz Mahal’s body is in the Taj Mahal, but the Maharajah bodies are burned up and their ashes laid to rest under giant monuments called Cenotaphs. Before Jodhpur was founded as a city, the local Maharajah had his seat of power in Mandor. This was the capital of the princely state of Marwar. The region had no easy access to water and only 38cm of rainfall a year. It should never have been a city, but thrived due to its proximity to trade routes. It was the place people traded in their camels for horses on their way somewhere more temperate. Marwar means Place of Death. Mandor had been the capital for some reason despite being on low ground and difficult to defend. So a new city was built up in the hills by a Maharajah named Jodh-something-or-other, hence Jodhpur. But the family cremation grounds remained in Mandor for a few generations longer. The Cenotaphs started out pretty huge, but gradually got smaller and more similar. By the time the grounds was moved into Jodhpur, they were built identically. The fort only had a few rooms open to visitors. Much of it has yet to be restored and doesn’t quite match the scale of the fort in Jaipur. But there are more museum displays and I got to see some bad-ass weapons. That’s about all I can say for Jodhpur. We left after a great lunch and made it to Osian in about two hours.

I know I’ve complained a lot about how vacant my hotels have been. I warned my travel agent that she was booking me into places I wouldn’t fit in. I called the local tour company today to reiterate the issue and got nowhere. I guess this just isn’t a region that’s easy to travel alone. When I got to the desert camp in Osian and heard I was the only guest in the whole place, my heart sank. I had figured this would be the most crowded of my stops. I don’t have a good sense of the relative prices of each hotel. I booked everything together. But this place had a strong Medieval Times vibe to it and seemed like a place that would be popular with younger tourists. I was told one couple would be arriving later in the day. Partytime. Excellent.

The camp is a little recreation of a fort comprising a number of walled courtyards and gateways leading out into open desert. There are two plots of tents out in the sand. Each one is built on top of a cement platform that houses the infrastructure for the electricity and plumbing. The tent is supported by a metal frame, and then covered by a thatch roof to keep more of the heat out. But whereas my first hotel was really a little house with a tented roof, these are real tents with zip down doors and netted windows. The cement platform extends out from the front into a patio with a sofa and some chairs. With very low expectations, I’m left in my tent and suddenly realize this place is amazing. I’m completely alone in a desert oasis. What I first perceive as complete silence gradually transitions to a cacophony of nature. There are birds, and bugs, and goats, and either dogs or coyotes or something. It’s not loud, but it replaces the eerie silence I first detected with a comforting background track. I explore the tent for a few minutes, walk around the grounds, and then it’s time for my camel ride. At first I was disappointed that I couldn’t hold the reigns myself. The elderly man leading me down the path and out into the desert moved much like the camel: slow, steady, persistent. But once we got out into the open and I turned on some music I got lost in the endless sands. He snaps me out of my trance to point out a pair of desert deer in the distance. As opposed to the multitude I saw in Ranthambore, desensitized to tourists on safari, these tear off into the sand, kicking up long trails of sand behind them. They look rocket powered. I’m out on the sand for an hour, but feel like I could have gone five. I may look into camel caravans in the future. It sounds like something that exists.

I walk back to my tent on wobbly knees and spend the rest of the day reading on the sofa. As the sun sets a boy comes by and lights some candle lanterns for me. I haven’t had much time to read since the train and it feels great to be outside away from the cities. The sun winks goodbye over the horizon. I probe with my long lens, looking for that mythic green spark but see only the pink echo of a day come to a close. I read for another hour, pushing my eyes to make the most of the dimming sky and flickering candles. Folk music starts up in a nearby courtyard so I mark my place and go off to investigate.

The other guests have arrived and they sit on cushions drinking sodas out of glass bottles while a folk band rocks out with some sitars and drums. They’re two ladies (I find later are) from France, touring Rajasthan since Saturday. They look like sisters, but I’m pretty sure they’re sharing a tent like mine: one double bed. I’m brought some tea as the song ends and when it starts up again, two girls in folk costumes come whirling down the stairs and stomp out eastern rhythms a few feet in front of me. They’re backlit by the fire, but I can see their silhouette strike out this way and that. The costumes are quite unlike dewali day saris or belly dancing costumes I’ve seen. They’ve long flowing skirts with long pants underneath. And the tops are layered with cloth and tied to the arms so they billow out in the wind. The effect is that the dance is not as much about the dancer’s body as the way the body moves the costume. Arms and legs move in lockstep to produce unexpected shapes under the costume, like fingers twisting into shadow puppets in time with the music. They finish up with some rapid twirling with such abandon that when the music stops, they lurch to a halt; dizzy, disoriented. A few more musical acts come out, and the girls join the band every two or three songs. I attempt some low light photos and try to catch the spirit of the performance.

I drop a few comments on the performance to the other guests sitting nearby. They correctly read my attempts at socializing for the desperate cry for attention it is and they kindly invite me to join them for dinner. It’s such a relief as the prospect of sitting awkwardly at the other end of the dining area from them, eating alone, was giving me the howling fantoids. We have a very nice conversations about the places we’ve seen in India. I’ve been to Delhi, they’ve been to Goa. I was already having a great time here, but their kind companionship made this my best night since I left Habitat. Dinner was just aight, but I finished it off with a little Old Monk rum and bid the girls goodnight.

So here I lay. In my pajamas. Under the covers. In my tent. In the desert. In India. An ocean away from the people I love, but feeling very much at home. The stars shine bright in the sky, twisted just a bit from the ones I know. The dogs howl to each other across the sands. Some sound like threats, and some like yearnings. Fires dot the horizon showing me I am not alone out here in the darkness.

Riding a camel

After another great breakfast at the hotel, Parminder and I hit the road for Jodhpur. We have trouble communicating sometimes, and the drive I thought would be three hours turned into six. I don’t mind time in the car, but would have brought a box lunch if I’d known how long it would take. Between the major cities is an unending stream of farms, towns, and open wilderness. There are no rest stops, and there are no quality restaurants. Luckily I had some muffins from the day before and a new set from this morning. I had one. Parminder had six. His fear of western foods does not extend to muffins.

Jodhpur is about 325 km west of Jaipur. A good portion of the way took us along a three lane highway littered with toll booths. We make good time, but there’s not much to see. But driving in India is always entertaining. I’ve written about the incessant honking and open disregard for proper lanes, but I don’t think I’ve talked about the trucks. Rather than big-rig trailer trucks, India has fleets of cargo trucks with large open pickup beds. Goods and materials are loaded up to the brim, and sometimes covered with tarps. When the trucks are hauling animal feed, or some other grain-type material, the beds are filled with giant sacks into which the merchandise is packed. These bags overflow the beds and are lashed to the sides by dozens of ropes. Often packed taut, the sacks swell under the ropes. The effect is like a growing air balloon emerging from the truck, almost full enough to take to the skies. I call these trucks muffin-tops. The face of the trucks are painted bright colors and decorated with hindu symbols and other pieces of flare. They look exactly like Optimus Prime if he were a Mexican wrestler. The rear of the trucks are festive as well. In addition to being painted with their company affiliation, they all bare the phrase, in bold decorative type, “Horn Please”. This is in reference to the need for these trucks to hear you coming from behind lest they change lanes and push you off the rode. The irony of this phrase is not lost on the people as I saw a girl’s T-Shirt with the face of a truck on the front and the rear on the back, complete with the bold “Horn Please”. I’ve yet to see the phrase on booty shorts. That might be to provocative. Some of the trucks bare the additional slogan “Use Dipper at Night”. I’m pretty sure that’s instructing us to use our brights, but I can’t help but feel dirty every time I read it.

Rajasthan is mostly desert, so much of the drive looks like Palm Springs. I expect to see signs for the outlet malls around every turn. There are even gnarled trees, clawing their way out of the ground that look strikingly like Joshua trees. Parminder tells me they’re called Babur trees, and in addition to being used for animal feed, they’re harvested to make a local toothpaste. When they’ve been cut back close to the trunk and they’ve just started to leaf again, they look especially like Joshua trees. It’s a beautiful drive. I put my music on shuffle and doze for much of it.

Parminder wakes me to point out the roadside shops selling mammoth marble slabs. It’s quarried from nearby hills and sold especially here. There’s so much marble around, being carried, cut, and polished, that the air is thick with the dust. It’s a purgatory of marble and we cannot see more than two car lengths in front of us. We drive slow. I see stacks and stacks of marble similar to what you see at Home Depot for countertops, but also giant blocks of marble as big as our car. These remind me of the corner pieces I saw at the Maharajah’s palace the day before. Indian masons did not use mortar, so whenever possible, columns and arches would be cut from a single piece. Further, symmetry was paramount so pieces meant to mirror each other are cut from the same block as well. These are the blocks I’m seeing. We pull over where souvenirs are cut from these stones and I pick up a few pieces. They’re heavy for carrying back home, but if those blocks can be moved from the mountains to the palace, I can lug my trinkets through customs.

Having skipped lunch, we arrive at the hotel at 2:30. I’m irritated we didn’t have a place to stop and eat, so I leave Parminder to fend for himself and escape into the fortress of tourism. This is more of a traditional hotel than the last two. Those were very private and designed to keep guests separated. This has large common spaces, accentuating the fact that the hotel is empty. I sit out on the patio and have a light lunch. I read my book by the pool. I have the whole place to myself. The only other person poolside is an attendant whose job it is to keep the pigeons from landing at the edge of the pool. There are twelve of them. They perch at the edge of the water and dunk their heads. They drink and douse themselves. The attendant is great at clapping his hands, and stomping at them to get them to fly away. To the other side of the pool. This goes on continuously for about thirty minutes. I tell him, “I think you should give up. You can’t fight nature.” He chuckles and says, “Yeah?” in a knowing way. I ask, “Do they do this all day?” and he says, “Yeah?” in a knowing way. I ask how long he’s been doing this. Again I get, “Yeah?” which is sounding less knowing to me by the second. I return to my room to read. Maybe this is why the pool is empty.

The guide (J.D.) picks me up at 6pm to take me on a tour of old Jodhpur. This involves walking around the local market and discussing the local culture. It’s as chaotic as Delhi and I’m surprised he takes tourists into the madness. He’s not very protective and I have to dodge tuktuks and motorbikes. We just walk and talk and he points out some of the local businesses and the odd places people live. The city is about 500 years old, so the streets are narrow and twisted. We make a few dozen left turns and end up back where we started. I’m surprised that he hasn’t suggested any shops, but then I realize this was all just preparation for guiding me to the calm atmosphere of a textile warehouse. All the guides have arrangements with this or that shop. I don’t know how it works, but they must get some type of kickback from the merchant for bringing in new customers. Considering what I do for a living, I can’t judge too harshly, but I feel vulnerable not having someone on my side when dealing with the salesmen. I have no idea what these things are worth. They could be of the lowest quality and fail as gifts. I leave the textile shop without buying anything, though they do have some beautiful designs. But what am I going to do with rando swaths of fabric? I do buy a few things at a spice shop, but I haggle a bit and walk out feeling a distinct chill from my guide. This happens every time. I suppose I should pay what they ask and be done with it, but I can’t bring myself to surrender.

I make peace by asking a lot of questions and insisting on taking him (and Parminder) to dinner. J.D. recommends a place called On The Rocks, which in addition to having an ample bar menu has a great atmosphere. It’s all artificial, but the restaurant is set in a stone grotto with fire pits between every few tables. The food is fantastic and we have a great time. It was one of the least awkward meals I’ve had since leaving Habitat. We talk about how the local economy works. J.D. makes me feel bad for not spending money at the textile warehouse. It sounds like there is a lot of trickle-down to the lowest levels. He says a majority of the 1.5mm people in Jodhpur are employed in the handicraft industry. They either work in factories, or from home. I learned at the warehouse that they employ about 20,000 people in 8,000 families. Housewives will work a few hours a day on textiles whenever they can find the time. They embroider individual patches that are then assembled at the factory. The logistics of all this is kind of staggering. There are so many people, each working on their own portion of thousands of different pieces. All those people need to be trained, instructure, supervised, paid. And I just know they have a pen and ink system for keeping track of it all. I asked the guy how many pieces of fabric he had in his warehouse and he looked confused and gestured at everything around us saying, “All of these.”

We have very little shared culture to base our conversations on, so dinner is mostly me asking questions. But it’s a good time, and J.D. warms up when we started talking about the work I did with Habitat. I still have a lot of doubts about the value of that work, but it’s nice that people appreciate the intent to help. I get the sense they’re confused about why we’d do that type of work also. The consensus is that we should have been teaching the children english and computer skills. It’s frustrating that these are two things I happen to know something about, yet spent two weeks digging and hauling. Not that this is an easy answer. Coming up with a curriculum to introduce the slum kids to english and technology is no easy task. It’s something I have to think about for a while and see if I can find a way to contribute.

I’m back at the hotel for about twelve hours when I leave for my sightseeing around Jodhpur. There’s a fort and a palace, and then it’s off to Osian for a night in the desert.

Breakfast was a tasty buffet of fresh fruits and some scrambled eggs with black truffles. Not too shabby. I brought some extra muffins along for the guide and my driver. Parminder (the driver) had eaten a good portion of the lunch I brought along the day before. I got the sense he is avoiding spending money on food while on the road and that the muffins would be appreciated. I think their western nature scared him off. He says he only eats simple lentils and rotis. If I were raised on that type of food I would feel the same way. It’s practically all I want these days anyways.

We headed into the center of Jaipur pretty early to tour the Amer Palace. I’d told the guide how much I like animals, especially babies and he brought me first to see a five year old elephant. I was worried he’d be the size of a house already, but he was only the size of a Winnebago. I stood next to him to have my photograph taken and he took my hand in his trunk. It felt very nice and secure. He’s strong, but I could have pulled away if I needed to. I know this because when he brought my hand to his mouth, I did just that. The handler assured me he would not have bit me, but he sure looked like he wanted to take a nibble. If I ever do lose a hand, I hope it’s to a baby elephant.

Speaking of such things, I asked my guide about the cobra, and he confirmed it probably was not dangerous. The charmers milk the venom out on a regular basis. Even if I did get bit, it would not have been too poisonous. They sometimes also take the fangs out, but he wasn’t sure if that was done. There’s a lot of pressure on the charmers to keep the snakes for only a few years and then release them before they are ‘too dumb’ to return to the wild. That cannot be done if the fangs have been removed. I certainly like the sound of the release. I feel a lot of guilt over my enjoyment of subjugated animals. It’s not as bad as taking their pelts, obviously. But elephants were not put on this planet to march in line, taking tourists up a mountain to an ancient fort.

After petting the baby elephant, I rode a giant elephant up a mountain to the Amer Fort. It was very bouncy. I tried to sit with dignity, but it’s difficult. I suspect the most comfortable way would be flat on my back, but I wasn’t willing to make a scene and try. There were about thirty elephants going up and down the mountain shuttling tourists. Their faces were painted and their backs saddled with riding platforms. The drivers sit on the neck and do not seem to have any reigns or other means of controlling the elephant. They have some sort of poking stick, but I only saw one driver using it. I suppose there’s not much room for error here. The path is very narrow with just enough room for two to pass each other going opposite ways. The departure and arrival do require some maneuvering though. Perhaps there’s some switch or cane that I missed.

The fort is magnificent and I enjoyed having a private guide I could grill on the details (it didn‘t hurt that he was dressed like Indiana Jones). The more I heard, the more I realized that what I was seeing was not an accurate representations of how these forts and palaces were run during their time. They’re very impressive in their soaring austerity. They resemble great museums or other monuments. But what’s lost is that these were homes, full of lush comforts and the trappings of life. All along the walls, floors, and ceilings are iron rings where lavish carpets and drapes were hung. Courtyards could be tented off, and their many levels flooded to cool off the day. Flowers and essential oils would float on the water to keep things smelling pleasant. Musicians and dancers would perform under Islamic arches. Peacocks would wander the grounds, mingling with the court, the ladies in waiting, their staff, their staff’s staff. It’s impossible to combine all the little details in my mind and lay them over the purely architectural representation available to me now. I had forgotten that these forts and palaces were home to royals with their politics and intrigue and were on level with Versailles in their splendor. It gives me new appreciation for all the steps my hotels take to replicate this part of India’s past. All their flowered pools and frescoed walls are not mere design elements, but an attempt to reproduce the splendor of the palaces.

Next it was off to the Maharajah Palace. With my new perspective on the fort, I realize the relationship between these two buildings is more of summer home/winter home than residential/political. The palace offers a number of delicate spaces suited for holding court and hosting festivals, but otherwise they offer similar services. Both are ably defendable, and in Jaipur aided the Maharajah line to remain unbroken since the twelfth century. Even today, the latest generation of the Maharajah line lives with his family in the palace. They have a private wing split from what’s open to tours, but even their private courtyard was on view today. In exchange to opening their home to tours, they receive the admission fees and can use them to maintain the extensive grounds. Done through a trust, they also avoid paying taxes on much of their income.

The Maharajahs had been ordinary Rajahs prior to the arrival of the Mugul emperors. But when India fell to the Islamic invaders, these local kings took the political route and married their daughters into the families of their conquerors. In doing so, they were granted the superior title of Maharajah and given authority over vast regions. Families like these in Jaipur integrated Islamic design and customs into their houses, but retained much of their autonomy. The only time Jaipur was lost to Islamic usurpers was for a period of about three months when the Maharajah’s son-in-law took power. While it sounds like the Mugul emperors were on good terms with the Maharajahs, he still arranged for the Maharajah to leave town for a period and then supported the son-in-law in claiming the throne. It sounds like a bloodless coup, or maybe just a game of king of the hill where the weak boy claims victory after everyone else has gone home. When the Maharajah returned, his son snuck into the palace through a secret passage known only to its longtime residents and evicted the son-in-law at knife point. Evicted him from the country. So beyond those three month, Maharajahs have ruled Jaipur for thirty generations. On the other side, the Mugul emperors were able to keep the population under control by acting through these royal proxies in managing at a local level. It seems to have worked well for everyone, and the Mugul period is spoken of fondly by most Indians. It’s not until Auranjeb took power and levied huge taxes and reigned down much violence that India seemed like a conquered nation. And once the British took over, they reverted back to a more traditional Mugul style. They setup puppet leaders, and appointed many new Maharajahs when it made political sense. Now there are over five hundred Maharajah families living in India. They don’t all have estates like the city palace, but they seem to occupy a special place within Indian culture.

The most impressive part of the Maharajah’s palace was the observatory. Before I arrived, I assumed it was a facility for star gazing. There are many high hills in Jaipur and low light pollution. It would be an ideal spot and I was looking forward to seeing some ancient optics. But Indian observatories from the fifteen hundreds are a bit more passive than that. Because of the important role Astrology plays in Indian spiritual life, it’s very important to have detailed information on the date and time a person is born. And for the ancient world that means sundials. One large courtyard at the palace is dedicated to dials of various shapes and sizes. First is a dial for gauging the exact time based on the position of the sun. A cofactor must be determined daily to compensate for the time of year, but after that, the dial is accurate to within six minutes. Not content with that, a larger dial was built, one that still holds the world record, that is accurate to two minutes. A more complex dial casts the shadow of a medallion into a convex hemisphere set into the ground. Along the surface of the cave is etched the paths of all the constellations across the night sky. Where the cast shadow intersects with a constellation line tells us which sign we are under at any given time of day. With that information we can head over to any one of the dials for each individual star sign. I’m not sure what those dials are meant to reveal. They were closed for repair. I watched as masons stripped aging plaster and reapplied in flat and even sections. The whole facility has an ultra-modern look to it. The accurate measurement of shadows requires the structures be constructed with mathematical accuracy. The arches are more arched than any I’ve seen in India, the edges more crisp. When I first walked in, I assumed it was a modern art installation, but my guide assured me this was as it appeared four hundred years ago.

After all the sightseeing, my guide took my to the obligatory handicraft shops. At least this time I got to see how the carpets are made. My favorite part was watching the guy blowtorch these meticulously crafted tapestries. This has the double effect of sealing the knots and burning up all the loose and trimmed threads. After this, the carpets are vigorously cleaned to get rid of the burnt parts. seeing all the work that goes into one, I’m not surprised they’re so expensive. I do wonder if maybe it’s a craft that’s had its day.

I also saw how fabrics are printed, and even got to stamp a four color print of an elephant. The vegetable dyes are stored in large ink pads and the patterns are lined up manually by ancient artisans. Before being immersed in the mineral bath, the stamps are unrecognizable. Most of the dyes come off a murky brown. But after soaking for a few seconds in the acidic formula, the colors shine bright. I suspect there’s something similar going on in those color changing magic markers you can buy at the mall.

Dinner is the most awkward time of the day. No one else eats alone at my hotel. Last night they brought me magazines. I’ve thought about inviting out fellow tourists I meet around the sites, but that seems like it’s opening a whole mess of issues. So tonight I invited my driver to join me for dinner. He readily accepted and recommended a restaurant owned by a friend of his. The food was up there with the best I’ve had in India, but the meal was no less awkward for the company. Instead of sitting alone in silence feeling self-conscious, I got to sit with this Indian man in silence feeling self-conscious. It didn’t help that we were the only two people in the restaurant. Tomorrow night I’m in another five-star in Jodhpur, but after that it’s a dessert camp for two nights. I think I’ll be more comfortable there. It is the land of my peoples.

I wont leave you in suspense. No tigers today. I left the hotel in Ranthambore defeated. By whom, I cannot say. Maybe the tigers? Maybe the men who took their skins and filled them with sawdust and set them on display? Maybe my own pride that I should be a man who’s seen these giant cats in the wild? I did get to play with some elephants for a while. The hotel’s had two sisters as pets since they were babies. I fed them sugar cane and rubbed their trunks. I think they liked it. I can tell because they didn’t stomp me to death. Beyond that, Ranthambore was actually pretty fun. If I never knew there were tigers around, I’d have nothing to complain about. The hotel is up there with the best I’ve stayed in. I took another yoga class and got a tasty lunch packed for my drive.

Before I hit the road for Jaipur I got a tour of a local village. It was nice to see the real India that spans the gap between Delhi and Bawana. My guide took me to the family home of a mother of a friend of his. She manages a few acres of guava, mustard, wheat, and other miscellaneous crops (tomato, onion, garlic, etc). With about thirty members of the extended family living in the village, they work the land themselves and sell it at the daily vegetable market. Aside from the shrewd shoppers who wait until the end of the day to pickup leftovers at closeout prices, they make a good living. They earn as much as 50rs per day just from the milk their cow produces. That’s only one dollar US, but must only be a fraction of what their crops produce. I overpaid 100rs for ten guavas and the matriarch didn’t seem blown away. The money goes towards school for the children, dung fuel for the stove, and the variety of conveniences around the home (a bed, some dishes, etc). The main farm house is about as big as a Bawana home, but that’s where the similarities end. The whole thing is plastered and washed clean white. There is no trash around. No flies even. The children seem happy, but less amazed by the visit of a stranger. They’re more interested in hearing my guide (a local boy made good) talk about his plans for the future than in ogling me and my pale strangeness. It’s not modern living, but if this is how people outside the cities live, I’m surprised more don’t stay rural.

The three hour drive to Jaipur showed endless kilometers of villages like this one. Acres of mustard gilded the landscape in a thick coat of electric yellow. It’s not unlike Nebraska corn, but turned up a notch in the hue and saturation. My driver tells me about his land (not too far from Bawana) where he grows crops for his own use. I ask about how much mustard he could possibly need and he tells me how it’s used to make cooking oil. Sounds spicy.

It’s nice having the driver. I can bounce questions off him and grill him for words in Hindi. I doubt I’ll get far, but it passes the time. We cover a few hundred kilometers and I see all sorts of stuff. Aside from the comparison to Nebraska, I also see badlands like in south dakota. Channels are cut through the land by the torrential monsoons leaving pillars of rock and clay to bake in the sun. As the channels flood and then dry, they sprout thick carpets of green green grass. The effect is stunning as these verdant rivers rush in serpentine lines off into the horizon.

I see two boys playing teeter-totter with a hand pumped well. They alternate jumping up and setting their weight to the pump, forcing it down as the water flows. It reminds me of the girls at Hotdog on a Stick, jumping up and down on the lemonade machine.

I see a deer, at least four hundred pounds, dead in the center of the road. Hit by a truck in the nighttime, it will stay there until nearby villagers take the initiative and drag it off to be buried. Seeing this giant animal, and then dog after dog by the side of the road, I ponder the rift in perceived value between this beast and that. How long until great hulking deer like this one are as scarce as tigers?

As we near Jaipur, the farms thin out and then disappear. They’re replaced by the ubiquitous strip malls that lined the road between Delhi and Bawana. Eighty percent of them seem to sell nothing but prepackaged snack food, hanging in long ribbons of mylar wrappers. The rest are barbers, cement sellers, motorcycle shops. This urban sprawl puts Los Angeles to shame. Goats and pigs share trash piles. It’s pandemonium.

Arriving in time for dinner, I find my hotel to be another five star monstrosity ill suited to solitary travel. I don’t mind being by myself, as long as I’m around other people who are by themselves. How stupid does that sound? Regardless, I feel out of place and kick myself for being passive with my travel agent regarding the places I’d stay. It’s pretty much all I can think about as I’m enjoying my gourmet meals or soaking in my sunken tub. I know. I’m ridiculous.

The only other thing I’ll mention about the hotel is that at dinner there’s a trio of Indian musicians playing folk music. A girl comes out to belly dance, but in a conservative outfit (sensitive to Islamic culture maybe?). The dancing looks a bit like she belongs in a Bollywood chorus, and would be boring if it weren’t for the giant lit burner on top of her head. She spins and dips and the flame spins and dips with her. Sputtering up and down, but never side to side. It’s hypnotic. I have this brief daydream that I will see her wandering the city, dressed in street clothes, but still with the burner on her head. Her dance ends, and she and my fantasy vanish. I finish my dinner and head off to bed.

Mustard fields along the road to Jaipur

The main reason for going to Rathambore is the national park. It had been the exclusive hunting grounds of the Maharaja, but in the nineteen fifties the government declared it a protected area. In the eighties it became an official wildlife sanctuary and all human use was banned. The focus of the park is the tigers. With only six thousand left worldwide, (half of them in India) the forty odd tigers roaming the three hundred square kilometers don’t represent a lion’s share or anything, but I guess it’s significant density. Or maybe not all the sanctuaries allow sightseeing tours? I’m not sure, but I got booked here to see some tigers, so that’s what I’m trying to do. I had a morning safari (6:30am – 10:30am) and an afternoon safari (2:30pm – 5:30pm). Not to kill the suspense or anything, but I saw, on average, zero tigers per hour. I began the day not concerned at all about spotting one. The park is beautiful and there’s tons of wildlife around. Here’s a list of what I saw:
Spotted Deer
Sambar Deer
Gazelle
Antelope
Wild Boar
Hanuman Monkey
Peacock
Spotted Owl
Kingfisher
Eagle
Vulture

Many of these spottings included eensy babies. So yeah, it was a good time. But by the end of the second safari, I was deflated over not seeing a tiger. It’s built up by the guides so much, yet seems to happen so rarely. A couple in my group was on their fourth and final trip and had yet to see one. They left heartbroken. I don’t see any lessons here, other than the obvious one for increased conservation. India’s doing it’s part. They spend about $8m USD a year and have almost doubled the tiger population since 2000. But it’s not easy. They are beset on all sides by hunters and poachers. These locals who know the land well are funded by the manically selfish who are so blinded by their own greed they’d burn down our future to light their egos for a single moment.

Battling these forces does not always have the desired effect. We were cold on the trail of a pair of young tigers who had been spotted a few days earlier. Our guide told us how they lost their mother at the tender age of twelve months. Park rangers had come across the slain body of a cheetah, abandoned in the jungle. They took the body for autopsy and after determining it had been killed by a tiger, brought the corpse into town and burned it. This is important. The corpse must be burned, and it must be seen being burned by as many people as possible. Any shadow of doubt cast on the park suggesting animals are being sold to collectors would obliterate their efforts at quashing the market. They’re fighting tooth and claw to show their people that the tigers are an invaluable resource, even though the sale of a single pelt would change a hunter’s life forever. Imagine trying to convince every person who owns a diamond to bury it back where it came from and walk away. Now imagine those people are starving. It’s a tough fight.

But back to the tigers. Burning the cheetah seemed like the right thing to do. But when the tiger came back and found his kill missing, he figured the nearby tigress had something to do with it. I like how my guide put it: “Currently, she is dead.” With their mother gone, the brothers lost out on some important training in tigering. A year later, they’re timid and poor hunters. We saw a few tracks, but nothing else.

I’ve got one more safari tomorrow morning and then it’s on to Jaipur. I hope I’ll keep my spirits up if the tigers remain in hiding. I was pretty bummed earlier today, but a private yoga session, a fantastic dinner, and a lava rock massage set me straight. No cat is going to turn me into an Ahab.

Today is about transition. As a team, we head over to The Park for their breakfast buffet. I might prefer my last meal in Delhi to be more meager. We’re all heading home, or off to exotic tours and will recuperate in due time with missed foods and posh comforts. I would like to leave Delhi with the taste of overcooked egg in my mouth, as a closing note on a slow sad song you want to remember forever. But there is clear support for the clean variety of The Park’s spread and it’s nice to spend time as a group. After, Maryanne and Katrina and I circle Connaught place one last time looking for this and that gift we meant to pick up. The girls got one hand each hennaed by trainees in Bawana as a parting gift from the project. Today they want to get their other hands stained by professionals. We said our goodbyes as I left them to sit for their application. But I was lucky to get to see the completed work an hour later as I was finishing up at the hotel. The trainees have a lot of work ahead of them.

The goodbyes were heartfelt. Good people do Habitat and I’m proud to be in the group. Someday I’ll stopped being surprised by how impressed I am by the folks who share my tastes and interests. Even family. Someday.

Rup met me at the hotel and helped me catch my train. I think I could have figured it out myself, but it would have been more stressful. As it was, I was handed off by him, into the officious embrace of the first class attendant. It was like a solid catch in an egg toss… Yes, I’m the egg.

As soon as the train left the station, I wish I’d booked more travel on the rails of India. I

We rose in darkness and climbed the few steps onto the bus in silence. Every day we rode this bus to and from bawana; an hour and a half each way. The ride home, with our tired muscles turning to stone felt twice as far. But today we embark on the five hour journey south to Agra. We don’t know what to expect. No one talks about the ride ahead. We eat our box breakfasts (eggs, always eggs) an pass back bananas and oranges. I brought a pomegranate from the day before. I slole an hour of sleep with my scarf wrapped around my head; protection from the looming sunrise and the chill.

I took the easy way out and escaped into a few movies I brought alone. First was The Ugly Truth. It’s rare that Hollywood is so honest in titling their product. Almost refreshing. And a more creative title than “Crap”. I almost finished Funny People also. I’d been looking forward to that and saved it for a time i needed a treat. It was melancholy and fit nicely with the mood my last few days in Delhi fostered. It’s been not just the Habitat project, but also missing my girlfriend that put me in a mood. For a few weeks, Areya thought she might be able to meet me and come along to Rajathan. But with each day it seemed less likely. There’s still hope for Goa next week, so the nervous anticipation persists. It is nice to hope for something though. Keeps the blood flowing.

Rounding out my exploration of tragic romance could be no better story than Shajahan and the construction of the Taj Mahal. Our guide began about an hour from our destination to have time to tell the story and let us wander with it in mind when we get to the tomb. Shajahan was the fifth Mugul emperor. As the story goes, he was browsing the market on the royal day it closed to the public. He came across a poor bead seller who may have been set their as a romantic trap for him. Either way, he fell madly for her with a love that would outlast a lifetime. For some reason he had to marry a Persian princess, but met with the bead seller under secret darkness of night. After a few years of this he was able to divorce her queen and marry the bead seller. Her name was changed to Mumtaz Mahal, meaning crown of the palace. Their love was intense and intimate. Mumtaz traveled with Shajahan to battlefields so they would never be apart. It was on a battlefield where, in the nineteenth year of their marrage, Mumtaz died delivering their fourteenth child. On her deathbed she obtained three promises from Shajahan. He would keep all their children in his heart. He would never remarry. And he would build for her a memorial that would never be rivaled in all time. It was these three promises that sealed Shajahan’s fate, and in turn that of the Mugul dynasty. Grief stricken, Shajahan moved his capital from Agra and back to Delhi. He could not bare the surroundings so full of memories of the love he lost. Inconsolable, it was only his promise to memorialize Mumtaz that brought him out of hiding. Artists and architects from the world over submitted proposals for this monument never again to be matched. What was selected has become the pinacle ofthe Islamic-hindu style. Each piece designed and crafted by the greatest specialists in the world. The Indian marble, hewn 200 km away would never stain and never need cleaning. It’s foolish to spend time describing the structure. I might as well dance about it. Suffice to say, it took twenty thousand laborers twenty years to complete. I compare this to the brick Habitat house I’ve been working on. All in, that took eight people twenty-five days. I’m not sure what conclusion to draw, but the contrast is wide and helps me measure the scale of this epic. Shajahan’s other two promises we’re meant to protect Mumtaz’s children from the threat of future offspring by another wife. It would be common for those children to be favored and one to assume the crown. Keeping Shajahan faithful to her memory insured one of her four sons would inherit the empire.

The youngest, Auranjeb had grown bitter of his fathers spending on the memorial and his new capital in Delhi. In a fit of brutality that would last fifty years, Auranjeb murdered his three brothers and imprisoned his father. Seizing rule, he locked his father first inside his fort in Delhi, and then later at his father’s request in the Red Fort of Agra. There, from his guarded rooms over the Agraford river, Shajahan looked out at his memorial to his one true love. It had been two months since the tomb’s completion.

Shajahan chose the site for the Taj Mahal because it was there where he stole away in secret with a poor bead seller whom he loved dearly. It was two kilometers from that site that he died alone and powerless behind mammoth walls of red sandstone.

Auranjeb’s opressive rule was followed by two weaker kings before the country was lost to the British East India Company. Seeing the Taj Mahal, walking the grounds and taking in the site of so much labor, considering how one love lead to this and that and brought a country into the modern world as a colony instead of a power, I think not only of the cost of love, but also the value. It is a beautiful building to be sure, but also a symbol of what visions can be realized by a singular power. A power undivided and answering to no one. Not just Shajahan’s power over India, but love’s power over him.

We spent our afternoon at the Red Fort, touring from room to room and across the expansive couryards. The red sandstone speaks to me in a way the gold and marble of the taj mahal do not. In the same way I felt about the Islamic tower, this massive barricade of earth and stone holds an honesty of purpose that trumps the make believe of the spiritual monuments. The mosques and tombs are modelled after Mohammed’s vision of paradise, whereas the forts are tied to this world as their sole purpose for being. The mosques and tombs raise us up to the heavens. The tombs anchor us on earth.

Walking the fort was an inspiring joy. It made me yearn for sites like Petra and look forward to my travels in Rajasthan where I’m not only visiting similar forts, but staying in some. But I’m sheepish to admit that my favorite part was the frolicking monkeys dotting the grounds. They’re still so novel to me. I can’t stop staring. I measure their features and behavior against our own, looking for that common thread that ties us. They are dangerous. Our guide was bit as a child. But I edge close for photos I can zoom to a few inches and look into their eyes. I don’t know if they understand cameras, but they do not smile. Often they turn away. One shivered as if my attention creeped him out. But when I do get a good look, I see down a well of sadness and a good measure of boredom. They look out over our invasion of what is now surely their fort, and I see the face of Shajahan looking out at the Taj Mahal.

The ride home was a bit easier. It was nice knowing that our ten hour wager had paid off so well. I also had Funny People to finish and Away We Go to keep me occupied. I found it so sweet and romantic. It made me wonder what sort of tomb Jim-from-The-Office will build for Maya Rudolph when she dies.

I also watched Monsters vs. Aliens. I enjoyed it more when I realized it was a sequel to The Ugly Truth.

Home to the YMCA for the very last time; the team tired from the ride, contemplating our departures, already planning our goodbyes. A quick call to Areya and then a deep sleep.