Jaipur and Agra

My first impression of these two cities was that their names are really cool. That was before we left. Since then, I have learned more about them, but I still like their names. Makes you feel like you’re much more immersed in Indian culture when you can say “oh yeah, we just spent a few nights in Jaipur and Agra.” Super badass. Not like we rode a huge orange bus (with “tourist” painted on the windshield) and stayed in fancy hotels…or anything…

The trip to Jaipur was something around 120 miles, and took over 6 hours (stopping time not included). I think I just looked out the window the whole time. The Indian countryside is fascinating, but in a terrible way. The city parts of a city that you would expect in a city are gone, so now it’s just dirty and poor. Shacks everywhere, lots of garbage, then a line of tiny autoparts shops, all selling the same thing. They reminded me of ghost towns, except people live there (human people, not ghosts. And it’s in India, not the old West). Fields of crops were often were kept within a barb-wired wall. It was very desolate, very depressing, and made me feel pretty awful riding in an air conditioned bus with a full belly, clean clothes (well…they weren’t clean, but you get my point. I didn’t bring very many clothes.), and an iPod to listen to.

Jaipur is much cleaner than Delhi. There were pockets of slums and dumps and things, but in general the streets were…reasonable, by Indian standards. Probably dirtier than New York City, but nicer than Delhi. Anyway, we’ve spent a few days here, mainly shopping. It’s a very commerce heavy city, so the salesmen are very good, and they’ll be in your face constantly. They’ll see you coming and get all excited and grab whatever they’re selling and shove it in front of you and start yelling at you in other languages, or very broken English.  Markets are fun, but the shopping in the mall was…extensive (yes mother, I got impatient and groaned a lot, even here in India.)

Coolest part was the elephant ride up to the Amber Fort.

Elephant rides are a lot of fun, very bumpy and very loud. The driver sits on the elephant’s head and just vigorously humps it and yells while it walks slowly up the road.

 (I can't insert a video today, but I think I will be able to later in the week. Check it later) 

On our final night in Jaipur we went to this cultural fair thing. It was like the renaissance fair, but for India. Lots of Indian dancing, Indian eating, and other Indian amusement. 60 cents got me a scalp/shoulder/arm/finger massage (super painful, don’t suggest it. He like…just punched me in the head a lot.) and a camel ride. 20 cents for a bottle of water. You get it, things are cheap here.

Then we spent one night in Agra to see the Taj Mahal. Its…so cool. A true masterpiece, and its just a tomb for the king’s wife. A very nice tombstone.

Now to Calcutta, where I will be for the next four months. Probably going to run out of things to blog about…..