Jaipur

We've spent the past two days in Jaipur (also called "the pink city") and gained a lot of new experiences in regard to always assuming the best intention of people approaching you. But more to that a bit later.

Jaipur has a lot of nice sights - 2 forts (Amber fort and Tiger fort), a palace, an observatory (which is really nice and interesting) and much more. Although the city is nice the traffic is very similar (if not worse) then Delhi and the air is accordingly polluted (which is not surprising when knowing that in the 1950s Jaipur had approx. 300'000 inhabitants and now they are close to 6 or 7 million.

Besides of the sights our guide also brought us to a cloth shop were we had ourselves tailored suits and shirts made - for at least a third the price we'd pay back home.

Nevermind, now to the fun part of our visit: on the first day we walked through the streets in the evening looking for something to eat, etc.. Once that was done we decided to go back via "tuk tuk" - the first driver wanted a too high fee and the 2nd one was more within our expecations. So we set off and, the usual question on where we are from came up. When we said Austria he started to talk about his childhood in the SOS Kinderdorf in Jaipur, how thankful he is for that time and so on and so forth, offering us in the end a tour to the Tiger fort, monkey temple and the SOS Kinderdorf for the next afternoon.
Despite all experiences before we said ok - knowing that there might be some background thoughts on his side but how worse can that be? And he sounded very honest/ convincing although that the fact that he "studied" Biology (but wanted to work in tourism) and had enough time at hand on short notice was, well (...)

So, the next day he really showed up on time with a friend and we set off to the places promised (which were all very nice - especially the tiger fort offered an amazing view of the city (and gave a way better idea on its current size).
After an obligatory stop in some shop we went to the Kinderdorf and the people there showed us how it works, what the offer to the kids, etc. - it was very impressive and good to see that such organizations exist and do their work out of believe instead of monetary reasons (which is not fully true as, per our "guide" direct donations in the kinderdorf do not fully (or not at all) reach the children.

Nonetheless, during our drive in the tuk tuk through town both our new "friends" started to talk about a financial problems of the "Biology student" (my apologies, I am still very bad in remembering names) who, by coincidence, was very close to being kicked out of university as he was not able to pay his fees for the coming months (and as another coincidence had it, his deadline was the next day, 11:30).

So, after all the driving we went for a few beers in a bar where no tourist has been before (I assume) and things became more and more instresting (e.g. being proposed to not donate to the SOS Kinderdorf but to give the money to the "student" directly as he is a very good guy, one of the best students of his university (the head of the university even called him at 09:30 in the evening begging him to make sure to bring the money on time) &&& &, in addition, for him friendship is the most important in life (in his own words: "I have beat my wife yesterday from 1 - 3 am because she talked bad about about my best friend and that I cannot accept (and, as she is a good wife, she understood, accepted her punishment and hopefully learned her lesson" (...)).
He even invited us for breakfast in his "home" the next day which we gladly accepted - although we somehow forgot that our driver was to pick us up at 9am from the hotel and we would (or should...) not be in Jaipur at 10:30...
The next day started quite badly as seemingly the food from the night before and our digestive system had no good interest in getting to know each other very well - thus myself (Matthias) was having quite some problems on two ends whereas Thomas was a bit more lucky.
So, our plan was to go to the cloth shop, verify the last changes to the suits ordered, have them shipped back home and head for Agra approx. 40minutes later.
Unfortunately we did not leave the shop before 11 and, due to construction works, we have had to drive through the city and past our hotel....and well, the student and 2 more of his friends were waiting there at the road, saw us and started following us (and as they new the city very well they were faster and once just stopped in front of our car with their tuk tuk....
we just drove past them but it was still a strange experience somehow.

Pics from Jaipur (again, no preselection...): https://picasaweb.google.com/108376587121284252497/Jaipur?authkey=Gv1sRgCLLu7c_Hg53dnwE#

Things we've learned:
o Indian use dried cow and camel pupu as we use wood (e.g. for heating a stove) - assume this leads to some special flavors of dishes
o there's no need to be paranoid in India - but never telling the truth on specific details (such as next destination, ...) to new "friends" can be a good thing to do (it is also some fun to play along their little role play - be it just to protect yourself ;)

Pushkar

Our next stop en route was Puskar which is an holy city for hindus as well as a very spiritual place for aging hippies (we did not fully believe that in the beginning but once we saw the tourists walking around we somhow started to believe - was quite intresting)
The city itself is rather small but has a lot of temples and "ghats" and legend has it that Brahma (one of the numerous hindu gods) once threw a flower upon that area and a lake was created.
For tourists it can be a quite dangerous place in regard to some fraud and, despite roughly reading the lonely planet advice, I (Matthias) was clever enough to give too much money to a priest (assuming he was one...) - but the good side of it is that from now on my whole family, friends and, last but not least, myself as well will indulge in everlasting happiness, wealth, and much more. (In case this won't happen I hope this priest will spent his eternal life in (hindu) hell, being forced to eat beef. Inshallah!)

Besides that we have witnessed another hindu wedding (since our trip started we have seen at least one per day) and despite them being very intresting due to being complete different, they can also be painful if the celebration/ "wedding march" takes place just opposite your hotel and the music on the street won't really stop before 1 or 2 am (didn't happen in Pushkar though but e.g. in Bikaner we have had this pleasure).

The complete set of pics from Pushkar (again, no censoring has been performed) can be found under https://picasaweb.google.com/108376587121284252497/Pushkar?authkey=Gv1sRgCLSYvOr0usqDxgE.

Unfortunately our trip through Rajasthan is coming to an end - but in a few days awesome beaches (for pronounciation purposes the non-spanish version is (currently) intended) are awaiting us...

cheerio
meerio

From Jodphur to Udaipur

Yesterday we left Jodpur and went to Udaipur, where we stay(ed) for 2 nights (highly recommended as the city is very nice and has an interesting mixture of calmness as well as crazy traffic.
On the way here we stopped at a famous Jain temple in Ranakpur. The temple was amazing - it is built of thousands of pillars of which none looks the same and is in very good shape.

After that the drive took us over something I'd call the highlands of northern India (amazing to look at when driving through as the whole scenery got a lot greener than in Jodphur or any city below.

Udaipur itself is surrounded by two (artificial) lakes and the hotel we're staying here offers a perfect view on the lake  which is, especiall in the evening when the palace, e.a. are lit very nice (I'd be calling very romatic if I weren't travelling with Tom ;)).
Thw city itself dos not offer too many sights (and most are very similar to what we've seen in the cities before) but its location as well as the many roof top restaurants are ideal for getting some rest and kick back with a lassi or such..In addition you also need rest from the traffic as it is rather crazy - the roads are very narrow (only one car fits at a time) and the amount of motorcycles, cars, tuktuks,... leads to a constant background noise of horns all around you (as well as is a killer for  the air to breathe due to the roads).
When strolling through Udaipur today midday we by luck also bumped in the Australian we met a few days back and joined him for a short tour up on a little hill, to a nice park, etc. and spent the rest of the day rather relaxed in some cafes, etc..
(will update/ enhance this post as soon as I remember more to write about :))

Pics of Ranakpur as well as Udaipur can be found under the following link: https://picasaweb.google.com/108376587121284252497/FromJodphurToUdaipur?authkey=Gv1sRgCJTG8u6E69nYUw


P.S.: Apologies but I've missed that comments where not possible without logging in - I have just fixed this prob.

Jodphur

gonna try a bit longer update this time so
today we went from Jaisalmer to Jodphur (which was another 5hrs drive) and I gotta say that we are now used to the road conditions in India (cows building there own roundabout next to a roundabout, goats and camels crossing the road, tuk tuks and rikshas,...) and we are not any more amazed (or slightly shocked) by anything we see (e.g. pigs strolling around in Jaisalmer city, little girls making pipi on the streets - just to name a few).
Jodphur, also known as "the blue city" is very nice (see pics of the city, fort, hotel and martial arts trial under https://picasaweb.google.com/108376587121284252497/Jodphur?authkey=Gv1sRgCK7-2d-LmdiNiwE#) but it is the 2nd city with a fort in the row (although in Jaisalmer approx. 50'000 people live in the fort whereas in Jodphur the fort is just a tourist atraction) and we kinda start getting enough of forts - lets see what the coming cities bring.
Jodphur is also very famous for its spice market and the prices are...well, lets say decent when looking at very good chai tea, vanilla or Safran. (that also equals to an a bit extensive shopping tour but well...).

The nice thing about our trip is that we keep bumping into the same people during our tour - for example an Australian guy we met the first time in Mandawa and met again in Jaisalmer.
I think I have roughly mentioned that tourist, as in many other countries are kind of seen as "cows that are to be milked" when they do not bargain etc.. He is a quite good example as he tends to see the very good in all people approaching him, without assuming that they have any "hidden" agenda...which leads to e.g. paying 4 times the price for a small bottle of cheap whiskey (although me gotta say thx again) compared to locals.But after about 3-4 weeks in India he starts to realize that people sometimes to tend to screw him over and gets a healthy portion of paranoia...

All in all India is treating us quite well - the tour we're taking is very well organized, hotels are better than expected and our driver helps us in getting not screwed too much when buying stuff(the liquor stores in Rajasthan are called "English wine and beer store" which is kinda funny as I'd assume that English wine (so it may exist) tastes like Austrian wine in the 80s...), the food is amazing (and luckily spiced for tourists in all places so far) and Matthias has been eating only vegetarian in the past days without complaining (although he sometimes has some strange mimics when seeing well-fed cows...).

so, the next 7 days we will keep travelling in Rajasthan until we finish our tour in Agra and afterwards we'll head south until the 12th..
But as we still have quite a few things to organize for the coming trips I'm afraid I'll do some further updates...

P.S.: comments are highly appreciated!! ;)

Jaisalmer

Time for a new update...in the past 2 days we were in Jaisalmer and the desert next to it - yesterday doing a little camel safari (which was...well, okei-ish) and sleeping in the desert and having a tour of Jaisalmer and its fort today.


We had expected a little more of the camel safari but we realized that we/ the travel agent we decided to trust had only booked the most touristic tour available - which was camel ride of approx. 3hrs (of which 30-40min were in the desert), looking at a sunset (which was hidden by clouds) and having a dinner that did not take place in the desert but in a camp (calling it resort would be an insult). After that we decided to sleep in the dunes - hoping to see a nice sunset and having a more comfortable sleep than in the rooms given to us.
All in all it was a nice night - especially as we were, according to tom, guarded by a dog sleeping next to us - except for the cold wind starting around 3am and the rain kicking in at 7:15 (--> no sunrise to be seen).
After some Chai tea we then set off to Jaisalmer and had a look at the fort (we had a very good guide who gave as a lot of background, etc..) as well as took part in some commercial activities (our part was more to say "aha...intresting...etc.") as our guide wanted us to see specialties from the region (e.g. silver jewelry) - luckily these shops also put no pressure on us)

ah - and during the last night in Bikaner Thomas and myself were again asked for photographs - this time without insults ;))

The pics from Jaisalmer can be found under https://picasaweb.google.com/108376587121284252497/Jaisalmer?authkey=Gv1sRgCKajgbmElO3HXg# (please note that there has been NO pre-selection on any pics due to lack of time (or so)


Lessons learned cont.:
o The English also brought the concept of roundabouts to India - although they have extended it with possible obstacles such as cows or camels
o The electric wiring at the Schillerhof in Graz seems to have been done by an Indian

Cheers,
Matthias & Thomas

Our trip started - current stop: Bikaner

So we are now at our 2nd stop - Bikaner.
As said we have hired a driver who takes us around and so far this was a very good choice as it makes life a lot easier (at least for us :)).
The first stop was Mandawa - this city was initially not on our list but proposed by the travel agent as there are many old wall paintings (called Havelis) to be seen there, etc.. Getting there from Delhi took quite some time (approx. 7hrs by car) but the city and the hotel was nice and we met some other travellers from Chile and Down under.
Pics from Mandawa: https://picasaweb.google.com/108376587121284252497/Mandawa?authkey=Gv1sRgCMDG59mWksHV6AE#
We first tried to explore the city ourselves as we were confident that our lessons learned in Delhi reg. people approaching you would be sufficient. Unfortunately we were proven wrong and, after just 2min, had 5 kids following us (and this number kept increasing and telling them to back off did not help at all). Thus we got a guide in the end (whom we paid peanuts (not lit.) and told the jerks to stay away.

Today morning we left for Bikaner - another 4hrs on the road. Before going into Bikaner we visited a famous temple named "Rat Temple". As any temple you are only allowed to enter barefoot which, well, allows you to walk on dried rat pupu and pipi and thus giving you the full experience once the first rat runs over your foot.
Afterwards we vistited an old Fort which was quite impresive and well preserved - astonishing fact is also that, according to the book it only took 5 years to build (surprising when looking at its size)

Pics from Bikaner: https://picasaweb.google.com/108376587121284252497/Bikaner?authkey=Gv1sRgCPjD9o-W4ubm9wE#
Upload of further pics is currently in progress - link will be posted as soon as available


things we've learned - continued:
o "bat" or so means "go away" in Hindi. doesn't work when said by a foreigner though (and might cause misunderstandings once we are in Thailand)
o Girls from Chile drink their beer with lemon and salt (and it tastes surprisingly good - not sure if that's a sign for the quality of the beer)
o  Camels have a 6th sense and find the way home all by themselves - thus the driver can sleep (they even step aside when a car approaches)
o Roadside restaurants can be good - but you need to know which ones (and not rely on looks)
o 10 rupis for 3 cups of tea are OK - when giving 10 rupis to an employee of a fort as a little sign of thankfulness you are laughed at

conspiracy theories (so far only one - to be continued once more are apparent)
o the smog in Delhi does not come from the traffic but from the cows
https://picasaweb.google.com/108376587121284252497/Delhi02?authkey=Gv1sRgCI-BrcOhq4_73AE#
https://picasaweb.google.com/108376587121284252497/Delhi?authkey=Gv1sRgCKi0gJWM3bab1wE#

2nd (and last) day in Delhi

So, today we have "aufgeschlaut" ourselves on how to *really* get around in Rajasthan while, among others, saving our time and nerves.
In a nutshell we went to an official tourist office (getting there was a pain as numerous people tried to convince us that the map and lonely planet are lying) but in the end we managed to somehow get there and organize a route with a car & driver & hotels that fits our interests as well as budget and gives us flexibility.
In short, the plan for the next 12 days is as follows:
- 1 day Mandawa
- 1 day Bikaner
- 2 days Jaisalmer (incl. camels and night in desert
- 1 day Jodphur
- 2 days Udaipur
- 1 day Pushkar
- 2 days Jaipur
- 1 day Agra
- Flight from Delhi to Goa

In addition, we have learned the following so far:
o Matthias looks like Tom Cruise (although he is waaaaaaay taller and better looking)
o Kingfisher (Indian beer) tastes like Dutch beer but comes in bigger bottles
o If you ever want to educate your dog send him/ her to Dehli
o Noise and crazy traffic is something you get easily used to

so far so good -  in the south we do plan to plan ourselves without relying on people possibly not fully telling the truth... :)

Delhi

So here it is - the first entry in this blog which (possibly) will last for the next 10 weeks.

We (Mr. Thomas P. and me humble self) arrived in Delhi today morning and went directly towards our hotel (pictures of the suite will follow as this pc doesn't let me upload pics to blogspot, picasa or facebook...
For a start it is safe to say that we cannot break out, the floor is clean (mainly due to the shower en suite to the room) and no cockroaches (or anything similar) in sight.

After getting our room we started off into the city (weather is rainy, not nice) and realized that people here are...well, special (not in the special special way but they do try to convince you that they are the only honest ones and the only ones wanting your best experience,...which is normal in touristic areas but their pertinence is kinda unique...)
this means that our patience is receiving some good training (which is though after just arriving and having to adjust, etc.) but well.

After some hours at such tourist offices (again, you cant really get rid of them) we decided to not fully believe and went to the tourist office in the train station. wasnt too helpful (also due to our not really preparedness) but while we filled out some documents (the english did a great job in teaching bureaucracy and the concept of queuing) we were allowed to witness a freak-out session of an English girl (who somehow was not familiar with the above concepts). Thus she got into a fight with a native and before one could realize what is going on she slapped him in the face - ending up in a fight at whichs end she threw his glasses to the ground and stomped on them shouting "don't call me bitch you fucking moron, don't call me bitch because this is what happens if you do..."

So during these hours we realized that there is some (small but still) need to put our head around the destinations in india and the best way of reaching them - currently we do consider to not use too many trains in the north but rather rent a car with a driver and do some kind of "package tourism"as this would save us a lot of time and nerves and allow us to adjust a wee bit better...we'll see how that turns out ;)

besides that...traffic is amazing here...we had a pickup service from the airport and the way to the city was...well, looking forward to Bangkok :)

so, that's all for now - guess it's long enough already...

cheers