The Wandering Two: Further Adventures of the Wandering Four in Indai

The spelling of India in the title of this post is a typo made on purpose. While in Jaipur, the Pink City, mom wanted to buy a magnet. We found one she liked with a beautiful painted elephant on it and bought it for Rs40. It wasn’t until later that we noticed the “India” painted on the top of the magnet was actually spelled “Indai”. Typical. Mom just laughed and said it was so Indian and she didn’t mind the misspelling.

After Agra we wandered to Rajasthan, first stopping in the ‘Pink City’ of Jaipur. I had been there in 2008 and really enjoyed the shopping there so wanted to bring mom, Nura and Naveed there. We stayed in a great guesthouse that had a huge family suite for us all to be together and the Peacock Rooftop Restaurant with views of an old fort and the city and neat peacock decorations all over. One day we went to visit the Amber Fort/Palace. It is situated high in the hills surrounding Jaipur, was built in 1592 and was once the capital of Rajasthan. It is really beautiful and we had fun wandering around, climbing up and down stairs and wandering through passageways and the view was amazing. Naveed said it was his ‘most favoritest place’ ever because there was a snake charmer and he got to watch a cobra dance and giggled like a 5 year old. That evening we ventured to Chokhi Dhani, a reconstructed traditional Rajasthani Village. It was sort of like a theme park, Indian styles. We got to sit on cushions on the floor and eat a traditional Rajasthani thali for dinner which was delicious! Then there were elephant rides (which of course we avoided), a ferris-wheel-type contraction, dancers, singers, magicians etc. It was quite the interesting experience and definitely one of the best meals I’ve had in India!

Our next day in Jaipur consisted mainly of shopping. We did visit the City Palace and the Hawa Mahal then spent the rest of the day bargaining and head wobbling and lugging home bags filled with pashminas, skirts and dresses, a table cloth, some keychains, jewelry and other goodies, including a box of yummy Indian sweets.

The following day we had a flight to Udaipur which kept getting delayed and delayed and delayed (thanks Kingfisher Airlines…) but we finally made it to our final stop, Panorama Guest House in beautiful Udaipur. Udaipur is located near Lake Pichola, the Taj Lake Palace is on an island in the middle of the lake and the buildings are all gleaming white and really beautiful unique architecture. It was Shiva’s birthday the day we arrived and we heard the celebrations long into the night. The next day we decided to take a boat ride on the lake. It took us a long time to find the place where the boats went out from but we made it and went on a dodgy little speedboat with 8 other Indians in a 20 minute circle around the lake.

We did a lot more shopping in our couple days in Udaipur and also took an Indian cooking class from the wife of the owner of our guesthouse. She was lovely and we had so much fun learning how to make the food and then eating it all for a delicious lunch! We learned how to make chai, potato pakoras, dhal, aubergine potato curry, potato pulao, onion tomato raita, chapattis and halva. It was one of my favorite experiences of the trip and hopefully when we all go home we might actually try to make the foods and invite you over for a traditional Rajasthani feast!

Our last day with mom and Nura in India was spent visiting the City Palace in Udaipur, and yes, doing some last minute shopping. They flew back to Delhi and then home meanwhile Naveed and I’s flight to Mumbai was canceled with no prior notice from Kingfisher and no other arrangements made for us. We ended up buying the last two seats on another airline to get us home 5 hours later than planned and $450 poorer! Boo!

Anyways, we’re back in Pune now. Looking forward to seeing everyone back at Deep Griha and our friends here in the city. There’s a lot of new volunteers here so the house is full. We’re not sure exactly how long we’ll be here, still waiting to hear from some universities but for now just enjoying being back in India! We are looking forward to having more visitors (aren’t we lucky to have such wonderful friends and family who come halfway around the world to visit us!?) in Armand and Telia who arrive next weekend in Mumbai!!!

Love,

The Wandering Four/Two