"we like chapatti"...

So the morming after Jasson and the boat tour, we got kicked out of our beautiful, verranda apartment at 8 in the morning, by the devilish landlord(who had hung a list of 10 DONT'S on the wall... no sign of any 'do's'!) and trekked to the bus station where the devil had told us it would be no problem getting train tickets (blates didnt want us to use his phone- tight arse!) only to find out you can't book on the day of the train, "but train is at 10.30, in Madgoan...get a bus you can make (the 40 km trip in an hour in a tuk tuk) it". We legged it! Arrived at Madgoan, qued for our 'general' ticket, qued again for our upgrade... which was "not possible". GREAT. BUt on the bright side we covered over 1500 km for 3 pounds... on the down side we had to spend 36 hours on a hot plank, with no air conditioning, no food...and with lots and lots of starring men! It was an experience and a mistake we are not going to make again. However, we have learnt not to judge them by the stares- they got up and gave us seats, moved so that we could lie down and offered to buy us food and drink(that we couldn't even stomach...considering it was doled out of buckets, dirty hands and old newspaper used as plates... oh the pain!)- bearing in mind these people could just scrape together the money for the train ticket, their generosity is pretty incredible.
The night was pretty horrendous, partly because, the whole way from Goa to Mumbai we had decided that the majority of people would vacate the carriage(if you can call it that!).... they didn't and, partly because of a ten hour delay (and we dont get tanoys in 'general' class- we had no idea what was going on). But the next day was ok despite LOW blood sugar. In our bordem, we started a game of 'spit', and within two minutes we were SURROUNED by eager onlookers... the language barrier proved to be quite a hinderance when trying to explain the intracacies of this card game. The crowd scattered after a while... but quickly re-emerged (in force) when India had a low point and shed a few tears(suprise!), they were very sweet and when Alice tried to explain the problem (hunger, fatigue and homesickness), they interpreted the rubbing of the tummy as cramps- and fell about laughing... sweet boys!
Arrived in Jaipur at about 11.30pm, to be immediatelty hounded by a very persistent tuk tuk driver. Alice cunningly switched on the French, "Non, je ne comprend pas", to which he replied, "ahh, oui je parle francais". Ohhh fiddlesticks, the plan was foiled. This man, he knew the hotel we were staying at and that there was meant to be someone picking us up (thanks dad/ Neil)- it was all a bit too close for comfort and we had to try pretty hard to lose him. We met our Krishna Palace pick up; a very friendly... maybe too friendly man.
Our first day in Jaipur, after the silence of the Goan roads was a shock to the system and very hectic... Alice suspected EVERYONE- she got out of the bed on the wrong side that morning! We spent hours booking tickets (we learnt from our mistake) then headed to the Old City and the City Palace in the afternoon. All rather picturesque... having taken an audio tour around the Palace we could tell you everything there is to know about the Indian Polo team but anything useful-... not so much! After being ripped off royaly in the bazaars we headed to Om; the rickety, revolving restaurant. Amazing views, but the food was pretty bland...!
For 200 rupees(3 pounds) we hired a tuk-tuk driver for the day, "I show you beautiful places", that he did. 5 minutes into the tour he turned around(ignoring the oncoming traffic- a common habit in India), with a massive grin on his face and said "you like music?", expecting bollywood tunes we said sure...we toured Jaipur to the Vengaboys- quite an experience! At one point he said " we like chapatti" we had no idea what he was talking about and thus ignored... then the next song came on- "we like to party, we like, we like, to Party". the penny dropped. He came up with a few words of wisdom that day; "no wife, no life", "no college, no knowledge", and his observational skills were imaculate- "the french they say "ooh la la", the americans they say "oh my gaad", and the british say "oh how lovely" at the beautiful views and buildings. He took us to see the Glass Temple- 90 million pieces of glass, various shops(which stank of commission), The Amber Fort; where they were filming a Bollywood film and a wall collapsed, Tiger Fort. Along our way we saw thousands of camels, made friends with an elephant, and charmed a cobra... it was a cultural day. Oh and India got attacked by a cow... and has now developed a very inconvienent phobia of them... comsidering you cant walk down the street without bumping into at least 10... "the headbut really hurt, and he stood on my toe!- if he wasn't sacred i would have kicked him!" was deciphered between sobs and the raucous laughter of the villagers.
The next morning we headed to Jantar Mantar- the amazing Astrolgical observatory, constructed in the C18th; holding the biggest sun dial( it was massssive) in the world, with a fascinating tour guide and a middle aged gap year tragedy from Czech. Then hopped on the bus and arrived(rather promptly) at our current location of Pushkar... this place is sooo chillllllllllllled... maaaaaaaaaaate! We though Goa was bad- everyone seems to be on a pilgrimage, on drugs(no alcohol or meat allowed) and taking themselves far too seriously (and the cows are EVERYWHERE), and boy dont they sing(into the night, and in fact the morning and actually the whole bloody day)- but thier souls are alive which is what, we suppose, truely matters.
It is a beautiful little town and it has been a relief to be out of the manic cities. Lots of shopping has been done; it has burnt a little hole in our pockets. we have seen a wedding party dancing through the streets- health and safety to the wind- there were fireworks going off all over the shop... sporadically amoungst 100's of people!..shortly followed by a power cut. Oh how we love India!

Next installment coming soon, Happy Valentines Day! X