The pink city of Jaipur

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We had a crazy time getting to Jaipur from Bundi. Our taxi driver for the hour-long drive to Kota was an absolute honkaholic, which was aggravating at 7 in the morning. Then at the train station, we found out why you should always book Indian train tickets via the internet. It was so difficult to just book the seats we wanted in the class we wanted that a nice Indian man took pity on us and took us around to all the different people we needed to see (why were there so many?) in order to get our tickets. Even with him practically spoonfeeding us the tickets, we were lucky our train was running late.

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Once we got on the train, everything was great. Avani had been really looking forward to her first train ride and she loved it. We also met a really nice guy who was attending a government medical school that Sean bonded with. We knew that there was some serious affirmative action in India but he definitely made it real for us. Of the 100 spaces in his class, 86 went to underprivileged students (i.e. untouchables and lower castes) and only 14 were merit-based. He was one of only two Brahmins (the highest caste) to be accepted. We learned over and over how unbelievably competitive it is in India to get a good education and job. He also asked the same questions that every other young guy asked Sean when they found out he's from the States. "Do you like WWF?" and "Do you like Enrique Iglesias?".

There was some of the most unusual and beautifully made jewelry we had ever seen.

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After arriving in Jaipur, we called Indira's cousin Tukai and arranged to meet in a couple of days. Her son Ayush was the same age as Avani and she couldn't wait to meet him.

We checked into our hotel, the Arya Niwas, and immediately started loving it. We had really enjoyed our stays in Bassi and Bundi but it seemed like we were the only people in our hotels there and we were a little lonely. There were travellers from all over the world at the Arya Niwas and it was really fun. We soon found out that almost all of them were jewelry buyers that had shops in their home countries and were on buying trips. We had heard that Jaipur was the jewelry capital of India but we didn't really get it until we overheard five people talking who all knew the current price of gold. Jaipur was also the textile and handicraft capital of Rajasthan so it made for one giant shopping extravanganza.

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We made friends at our hotel with a local Indian jeweler Tinu and his American wife Sasja. They were a fascinating couple who we met every day for breakfast and who told us about their families and their relationship (love marriages are still pretty rare in India) as well as amazing personal experiences with ghosts and djinns and possessed people. They told us about a jewelry market that was definitely off the beaten track; in fact, most of the people we saw in the shops were wholesale buyers purchasing stones or silver in bulk. There was some of the most unusual and beautifully made jewelry we had ever seen and it was lots of fun to look around.

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We had just barely arrived in Jaipur when Sean fell sick again. I had been up and down too, and it made the current ad campaign for Rajasthan take on new meaning: "Rajasthan...it just keeps coming back." Sean rested in bed watching MTV Russia, which took some getting used to. Besides music videos, they had a stripper competition show. It was a fascinating lesson in cross-cultural values and SO different than what we would see in America - Indian TV stations blurring images of alcohol bottles but allowing unedited, unblurred shots of hardcore stripping.

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Sean's illness lasted long enough for him to miss out on going to some historic sites with Indira like Amber Fort, but he got better quickly and we were able to go to Choki Dhani, or what my cousin referred to as "all of Rajasthan rolled up in a ball". It is basically a fabricated Rajasthani village that gives you an introduction to the food, crafts, activities and history of Rajasthan. They served us a great dinner and then we went out into a huge outdoor area that was filled with crazy things happening. There were traditional folk dances; henna painting; fortune telling; camel, elephant and bullock-cart rides; rickety man-powered ferris wheels; bow and arrow shooting contests - it was a surreal night-time scene that was just a blast. It was definitely one of the highlights of Rajasthan for all of us.

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The next couple of days we got to see my cousin and her family. Tukai and Ayush met us at our hotel so he and Avani could play on the lawn. It took a little warming up but soon they were running around like old friends. Tukai asked us the question that is the first one out of everyone's mouth in India when they meet Avani (besides the adoption thing): "Is she in school?" School is unbelievably important in India at a very young age, which makes sense given how competitive it is to get into a good university and to get a good job. Ayush is 3.5 years old (like Avani), in school learning Hindi and English letters (he knows upper-case and lower-case) and numbers, and has homework every day. And Tukai was stressed that he had missed school because he was sick for two days and would be behind in his homework!

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We got together the next night for dinner and this time her husband Dip joined us. They took us to a really nice Rajasthani restaurant - the kids ate for about a minute and spent the rest of the time running around and dancing. This was great because the grown-ups were free to talk without interruption about family and work and wedding horror stories (Tukai had malaria during her wedding which trumped our "luggage got stolen, missed the boat" story).

We really enjoyed our time in Jaipur. It was a great small city that was much easier to get around than Delhi. Avani loved playing with Ayush and it was great being around family again.