The Greatest Light Show On Earth

The Road To Jaisalmer, 17th March

UDAIPUR KEY WORDS

Boat Ride
LAKE
Picturesque
Slight Drought
Gnocchi
ITALIAN RESTAURANTS
Flavour Discoveries
ILLNESS
Unsolid Movements
MOST
Relaxed
Wealthy
Sunsets
Octopussy
Rooftop Showings Every Night At 007pm
Hilaious
Intensive Laughing
LESSONS IN
Dance Music In Hotel Rooms
Ricky Gervais Podcasts
Sitar (Major Scales With Bends)
Indian Government (Random Hotel Room Searches)
PHONE
Credit Disaster
Motorcycle Ride
W i n d i n g S t e e t s
Vodaphone Arguments
GRAFFITI
Colour
"Holy CCTV"
"Holy ATM - Open 24hours"
CITY PALACE
Maharaja
Maharasclut
Gardens
Plush
TAILORS
Scarfs

*

Jaisalmer, 20th March

I am sitting alone outside the entrance to the smouldering Jaisalmer Fort old city, with regular interruptions from two or three women who seen to be both salesmen and musicians. For the first time in a great few days I have both the energy and time to write. I have been very tired, the road is starting to work at my legs.
I arrived in Jaisalmer in four days ago, I think. Travelling here was difficult, I lost my seat to a 4am intruder out of my ignorance and kindness, slept on the floor, rode at the front of the coach with the drivers family for a while, and eventually got half on my seat back through knackered assertion of authority which was very nearly lost in translation.
From Jaisalmer we moved deeper into the desert, in which I spent a day and a night. At around 11am of the 18th, I met both my individual camel and guide. My camel was twelve years old, rugged , just darker than the colour of the surrounding sand, sexually frustrated (so I was told), the owner of a tounge not far off the length of my leg, and called Holiedaye. The bulbas tounge reguarly surfaced accompanied by a kind of yelp/burp, of which I was informed was a show of sexual dominance. In contrast to this, my guide was only ten years old, cheerful, and perhaps the son of one of the guides. Collectively, we continually forgot eachother's names, so he quickly decided he was called Johnny, and I was called Alex.
Riding a camel is just like it looks it should be. Partially uncomfortable, incredibly relaxing and addictive. They are beautiful, beautiful animals, of whom I have so much respect. The guides were equal in my respect, as they prepared, lunch, dinner and breakfast for us, a campfire and humble conversation.
We rode only for around 40 minutes at a time, but regualar breaks were useful because of the heat and the camel's welfare. This also allowed us to stop at various tiny villages meet a few curious locals. There was a five minute interval in which we were sat inside one the guide's house, while his family of six sisters and a single younger brother stared at us while giggling.
We made camp at the edge of a long, rolling set of dunes, ate basic food, made chapatis and drank (as per usual) Kingfisher brand beer. I became especially friendly with one of the guides, and he explained his love for the desert, his job and his guests. The massively wide miles of sand, the continuous horizon in sight always, the clutches at life through sand and rock - goats, occasional trees, sparse settlements, this was his home, and he would be nowhere else.
I felt nevous before the trip, the ethics of a white boy from England, dressed in all white, riding an innocent animal into another communities home for my own pleasure. Yet the way the guides enjoyed looking after us and their camels was humbling. While we provided much needed livelihood, we were much more than money in their pocket, but friends immediately.
The stars, also, were something else. Not only have I never seen so many stars in one night sky, but never with such clarity. The contrast between the exploding balls of light and the vast nothing was arresting in it's forfrontalness. As the moon rose around 3am, it was obvious what a shit name "The Milky Way" is for a galaxy.
After returning to Jaisalmer city, I had the most stressful day of travel booking yet, thinking of it now, I'm sure the veins near my temples exploded a few times. For some reason most of the trains in India are jam-packed right now, and this made the already difficult journey to Amritsar into a frightful near imposible one. It tires me to think of the details of the booking saga, let alone record it in words, but the upshot of it all was a coach booked for 4pm today, and a collapsed body at 4pm yesterday.
I can feel India starting to test me now, but the people less so. The haggling ceaseless, the hassle continuous, the hecticness inescapable, but the smiling more so, the generosity more apparant, the hospitality essential and always.
I've just been offered a Chapati by the women who've been interrupting my writing. She's playing a Jew's Harp and smiling, so I might join her.

Golden Triangle (Parts I, II and III)

I'm in the outskirts of Jaipur as I write this one, been a very quicked paced few days, here are a few disjointed and collected memories.

Delhi, 8th March

The train station was heaving this morning, a slow moving, sloth like crowd which had busy legs and stationary bodies.
* * *

Katy and Joe have both arrived, on consecutive days. Both times I travelled the round trip to the international arrivals department, and on both visits I was driven by the same driver. He was a cool young Delhi born man most probably born in the mid-eighties. He loved Delhi, worn looking jeans and his wife to be. The wedding is today. He was clearly very delighted with this fact (as you would hope) and also very clearly, charmingly, in love. He had not seen her for some time (as far as I understood) and told me that when he thought of his wife, and missed her, he would look at his ring and imagine her face. All very well, but I think what confused me was his own confusion between the pronouns "her" and "him".
The confusion lasted the entirity of the drive. I was surprised by his frankness on matters of sexuality, especially due to the illegality of homosexuality in India. There was then a short amount of time when I believed the wife in hand to be the wife in hands father, but this idea went out of the window when he announced "My wife: he is very beautiful!" with a knowing raise of the eyebrows.
* * *

Just finished a bowl of Dal, glass of limeade. Sitting in the Ajay Cafe, in which yesterday I met a fresh faced 24 year old from Falmouth called Jimmy. Jimmy is a sound engineer who's been travelling for four and a half months recording the audio of India, and is just about to fly home. Us, Jimmy and an Argentinian woman named Sofia spent the evening sharing stories, talking music and drinking on the rooftop into the night.

* * *
I've diverted slightly. Joe and I made our way through the heaving station and outrageous lies about closed ticket offices and booked our tickets to Agra, 11.30am tommorow.
We also went to India Gate, a stunning but boring structure, which was surrounded by persistent postcard-whallas and Harry Enfield-like charactertures of English tourists.
* * *
I'm going to finihs my chapati now.

Agra, 10th March

As I write, I sit on the floor of Agra Cant station, and as I look about my person I see pigeons, STD's (Indian Newsagents), French travellers, insects, bussinessmen, mothers, fathers, friends, children begging, children playing, children begging and playing, children coloured in bright purple-pink paint.
It is Holi in India, and today has been a long day. I awoke 12 hours ago and made my way to the East Gate of the Taj Mahal, merely five minutes from our hotel. 40 minutes, 750 rupees and one sunrise later I saw the coined "teardrop on the face of eternity". The Taj lives up to it's fame not only due not only to it's genius architectural design, it's colossus size and amorous white glow, but also because of it's beautiful grounds, it's pervasion of scale, and it's undeniable power of love (and it's original owner's undeniable love of power). It is the greatest building I have ever witnessed, apart from perhaps the (deceased) pier of Weston-Mare. Yet despite all this, it leaves you when you when you leave it's grounds. The surrounding area of Taj Ganj is so distant in style, life and granduer that the Taj Mahal experience is like remembering a film you have watched, like catching a glance at a celebrity.
After this we ate at the most epic building in Agra, which is only a stone's throw away from the Taj itself. Joney's Place, apparently a travelling institution, made us all very happy, full (marmite on toast was involved) and resentful that we'd spent the walking round that building and not at the cafe.
In the afternoon we visited Agra Fort, a vast Moghul construction, which made Penhow Castle look like Welsh Lego. In all seriousness it is an amazing place, but like at Penhow Castle, I was left feeling a bit bored and dry by it. Saying this, I think there has been too much for my eyes to explore today and they are slightly full up. Our only other day in Agra was preceded by a cinematic train ride from Delhi, a seat in the open door, a playlist full of Debussy and Talking Heads and a selection of friendly and interesting locals.
Arriving in Agra AI got my first sensual attack of the rich, noisy, astonishingly devoted and collectively fascinating world of Islamic India. Calls to prayer, classically Arabic architecture, the celebration of Mohammed's birth and the green dress of young Muslim were intricitly woven alongside the Hindi Holi music and young Hindus everywhere.

Jaipur, 11th March

I have nearly scrubbed all the paint off my face and torso, nearly being the optimum word here. The famous pink city of Jaipur celebrated Holi today, and painted the town a brighter shade of pink.
Surfacing tp disjointed drum patterns and dancers in the garden, we stepped out showered from our door to the sight of our hotel manager smothering aggresively bright pink, purple, red and green paint on our faces.
This particular hotel manager, a carbon copy of the many personality traits of Basil Fawlty, is by far my favourite so far. Last nights arrival from Jaipur train station was greeted by a huddle of Lithuanian tourists, Basil himself, his son (nevous and eager behing the desk) and an extremely angry Londoner claiming he'd been over charged. His particular words being "I don't have to stand here and lie to you for an extra 150 rupees, you said 60!".
AT this point I retreated from my attempt to check in, and when I returned 20 minutes later I saw the Lithuanians conducting a long drawn out conversation with the son regarding visa numbers and the manager pacing up and down the front lawn, right hand on head, temperature rising and anarchically throwing frustrated kicks around every couple of seconds or so. All, as usual, turned out well. He just walked past actually, saying something about a pair of dogs called Bin Laden and Saddam. !
So following our depature from Krishna Palace around 11.00am we were invaribly stopped by the minute, plastered up, hugged, assaulted by gangs of children, water-pistoled, "Happy-Holi"ed and eventually driven to a party at the Pearl Palace hotel (not a plush as the name suggests), in which buckets of water descended from the roof onto paint-covered partiers and a buffet accompanied by rum and Kingfisher.
After this rather succesful gatecrash we made our way back to the hotel, and as mentioned previously, WASHED.

We Serve Relationship

Returned to Delhi now, a few memoirs of Rishikesh for yer:

Rishikesh, 3rd March

At 7.00pm tonight there was a religious ceremony on the east bank of the Ganges. Thirty odd children, aged between roughly 8 to 16 years old were organised, legs crossed, around a small fire. Hundreds of other observers gathered around, while huge, soulful mantras rang out distorted from carefully placed PA systems. The children, dressed in orange garments, held looks on their faces I have yet to see any boys hold before. Such intensity, love and maturity spread across so many cheeks, so much devotion in those lips, such concentration in all those eyes. One boy in particular managed to attract my eyeline so often I felt more and more intrigued by him by the minute. He sat in front row of the devotion, left arm to the Ganges, right arm to the collection of tourists and believers. As the strong, subtle, repetitive rhythm of tabla arose from the speakers, all but a few of the numerous bodies failed to clap to it, creating a ramshackle accompaniment. This particular child though, his claps so graceful, his timing all but impecable, his jet black hair at perfect odds with his young skin, this child had god all over his eyes.
Being here in Rishikesh has not persuaded an agnostic such as myself any further towards a position of belief, yet it is enough that a gos is here for every inhabitant of Rishikesh. The landscape, which is very clearly conscious, spans the imagination. The ginormous, rolling hills and the purity of the Ganges' flow, the omnipotence of Rishikesh's landscape, it says a lot about the look in that boys eyes.
Humourous is the flip side. Rishikesh is awash with new age spiritualists with 'aims' and 'goals'. My favourite of which we met on the first night, bags on backs. "The aspect I enjoy the most", told a softly spoken American gent "is the yoga". He continued underneath the banner for the 8th International Yoga Festival "I don't so much like my teacher though. Although he is very wise, he seems to confront my innerness". At which point, without a formal farewell, he drifts of into the dusty darkness. I will mention at this point that Rishikesh survives mostly on the tourist revenue from it's many Ashrams.
Another good one was at my first rooftop cafe, that of "Will it be real brown bread, or fake brown bread?".
Psuedo-Spirituality aside, Rishikesh is a very kind, calm place. I only wisj I could learn more, without the tell-tale paranoia of intrusion, which governs a lot of my behaviour here. Tradition has the habit of exclusion, especially when you have an polite English brain plonked above your neck.

Delhi, 6th March

Back in Delhi now, in an exceedingly good mood thanks to a lovely train ride with Hari and the arrival at the Ajay Youth Hostel.
The hostel, tucked away in a sidestreet from the Main Bazaar, Pahar Ganj, is populated by late night pool players, relaxed attitudes, cooling fans out of Apocolypse Now and fairly decent prices.
With Rishikesh behind us, there was a couple of things I neglected to mention:

1. The Evening Recital Of Indian Classical Music

This was a quaint rooftop affair, accompanied by colourful dancers and a quiet, appreciative audience. The event was unofficially centered around a very serious, seriously talented Tabla player, who spent most of the performance with one eye on the mixing desk and the other on the crowd's line of vision.
To his right was a small, disinterested player of drones who looked up maybe once from his relentless, yet important task. To this tabla player's right was a handsome, prodigal looking man with a beautiful ability with his flute, to which his melodies slipped hand in glove with the pure night sky.
Between songs the musicians would quietly request to comprehend the depth and religious nature of the music, this carried out in a sincere, sweet manner, much like the delivery of the whole performance.

2. Green Hotel / "Hotel Work In Progress"

When we arrived here to slightly higher prices than quoted in the Rough Guide we were kindly told that this was due to renovation. To be specific, renovation of the entire hotel. Through a week of raucous drilling and incessant hammering, the iceberg moment was perhaps the loud bang on our door, followed by a quick nod, the hammering of 4 coat hangers to our door, another short nod and then a bewildered, boxer-shorted version on myself left to return to the toilet.

3. Engrish

Simply the fabulous manifestations of the English language, too many to actually meaningfully remember any of them except the slogan on the front of The Madras Cafe menu.

WE SERVE RELATIONSHIP

4. The Money, The Bridge, The Biscuits

Our final experience in Rishikesh, just previous to a taxi ride to Haridwar station, took place on Ramjhula bridge. As we crossed the Ganges, eyed hopefully by both the numerous monkeys and Rickshaw drivers, a blissfully ignorant Hari stopped very briefly to admire the beauty of one of the monkeys. The mistake was to due to the packet of vegecrackers in her right hand. All hell broke loose in an instant. The plastic bag containing the crackers was taken, the humans were left with nothing to do but gape, the monkey victorious. I'm sure the cheeky beauty gave a quick wink when he slid down the side of the bridge, bag in hand. I assure you - television executives and advertising firms would have taken the rest of the day off.

* * *
Apart from that, Delhi seems calmer, the streets less stressful, the people increasingly lovely, the time increasingly valuable, the trip increasingly unfathomable.

Toodle Pip
xx

First Impressions of Earth

I'm sitting at the window seat of a "cybertime cafe", with a view of the Ganges, attempting to recollect what how I've been operating. From the beginning,

Delhi, 25th February.
Delhi is a numb explosion.
Understanding a rocket bomb is easy, it's physical attributes serving as evidence to it's destruction and form. But a culture, it's labyrinths, flowers and dangers have to be learned. Never have I so much understood the force of freedom that a hometown can give, and has done to me for all of my life up until this very point.
This is a world, more specifically the world, in which I can draw on near to nothing to explain. How to walk, where, how to eat, how to talk, how to avoid talking, when to trust. Just about the only thing I am sure of is when to sleep, and again to wake. Even this proves difficult, as tough air conditioning and full flung blinds block out all natural light, and all natural darkness. From the moment of my departure, I've been kicked onto the other side of the jigsaw of centre and self. Bristol, normality. In London I was nobody. In London I was the most meaningless person in London, in Delhi I am the single most examined specimen in my eyes sight. This, of course, is because I am new.
Minority, the way this word sounds, the way it reads and speaks, makes sense only in Delhi. That is, except for the millions of Indians who live in it's realms.

Delhi, 26th February.

We leave Delhi tomorrow at 3pm, to Haridwar briefly, then swiftly to Rishikesh, which in Ringo Starr's words was "just like Butlins". That piece of information, admittedly, was discovered in my Rough Guide.
Today my head became a working vessel and I began to understand. This was the consequence of a hard days workand a huge, well-needed mwal. This morning saw recieve back 8,500 rupees, (around 100quid) which was robbed blindly from us yesterday with hard persuasion, quick tounges and a GOVT OF INDIA TOURISM sign on the door of the office. It is incredible how well politeness, when served with a cold glance, can aid matters of lying. We were dealt this art yesterday, and used it ourselves today to get our money back from the theiving bastard.
After the great moment of justice I found my way inside New Delhi train station, filled out a numerous number of forms and sucessfully reserved our seats on the 15.20 to Haridwar. We read, then ambled down the main Bazaar past interlocking lanes of Rickshaws, Auto-Rickshaws, children, sleeping dogs, cats, innumerable motorbikes and a beautiful selection of cows.
Sonu Chat House presented us with healthy amounts of Vegetable Thali, with the heat of the spice on the magic cusp of unpleasentness, but actually tasting delicious for the self same reason.
Today is my first day in India, although my body arrived a good 36 hours previous.

Rishikesh, 28 February.

It is morning in rishikesh and the the Swargashram town reveals itself to be a very beautiful place. I open the expensive curtains of our room at the Green Hotel to modest surburban settlements and large Ashrams decorated with intricate simplicity. The background to this is a platter of dense, green mountains. A monkey is loitering on a rooftop as the distant sound of music rolls over this still picture, only interupted by occasional motorcycle horns, indistinguishable voices and the continuous roll of drums.
The journey from new Delhi to Haridwar was an easy one, and the train class we took (CC) was very much like that in England, with the added bonus of the ability to adjust the seat right back into the cigar smoking American football coach position.
While the journey from Haridwar to Rishikesh, I'm sure, nearly lost me my life. Hari, myself, a controlled but lovely Finnish man and a quitely confident, yet quiet Japanese woman from Tokyo with an endearing nervous disposition to smile when spoken to, had met on the train.
We had established the wasiet option was to share a taxi together, and soon enough we found a man eager to drive us, and eager to charge us 700 rupees for doing so. Now this driver had a look so funny that in hindsight it fills me with dread, but nevertheless we had jumped in.
Haridwar was full of light, colour and the smell of roadside nut-cookers. We skirted around it's Friday night traffic and began to realise that we were to be victims to sod's law, namely: pick the driver that all the other taxi drivers hate. Halfway through the centre of Haridwar, our driver stops the car and begins an argument with a motorcycle driver. This is while traffic racks up both behind and infront of us (our car is in the middle of the road) and we begin to recieve piercing looks from the rightly impatient drivers around us. The argument ends, and our driver throws his arms up, and mutters in Hindi as if to say "They should all be made to take their test again."
Outside of Haridwar we are on the long roads to Rishikesh. These are mostly populated by huge multicoloured vans, with neon like triangles above the windscreen and BLOW HORN written in bubble writing on the back. All of the trees are to the side of the road are painted with red and white stripes. Glastonbury comes to mind. Taking the liberty to narrowly avoid colliding with both the trees and the vans, our driver moves a good 20MPH faster than anything else in sight.
There are only two lanes on the road to Rishikesh, the left hand lane (for driving) and the over-taking lane (for near death experiences). As if the last thirty minutes of the Blues Brothers, the chase intensifies, at which moment our Finnish friend looks into the back and shouts "Do they serve double-whiskys at your hotel?!". The woman from Tokyo has been shaking the whole way with her scarf placed over her mouth. To make matters worse the driver, who has now picked up on our concerns, has taken to repeating "no rules, no rules" with a laugh far to similar to that of Ed, the mad hyena from the Lion King. Restbite is given when he drops off for petrol, and eventually we're there. Having already given him 200 ruppes for his petrol, we leave him screaming for more with 550 ruppes in hand at Ramjhula bridge. We then walk our hotel, as I begin to laugh again, through quiet streets and animal filled alleys. Hari cuts my hair, and then we sleep.

* * *

Rishikesh is an amazing, relaxed and kind place. The last few days here have been like the sort of holiday in which when asked what you have done, you might reply that you finished your book.
The food is beautiful, as are the people. It is such a pleasure to be in a vegetarian country where the menus are endless, the streets full of extraordinary animals of such calmness and the sky dotted with rare, but authoritive birds.

I'll right again before I travel back to Delhi.