The Wonders of Rajasthan

Elephants getting ready for the festival of Teej
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I prepared to leave early in the morning to catch the 6a train to Jaipur, the capital of the Indian state of Rajasthan.  Upon checkout, I found a note from the girl who was rooming next door.  She was also leaving on the 6a train to Jaipur and was interested in walking together.  This is how I met Petra, a very cool girl who grew up in Budapest, lived in the states, and is now studying gastronomy (the culture/history of food) in Italy.  Yah - a travel parter!

Snake Charmer outside the City Palace
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Jaipur is a very interesting city - It has a huge palace, home to the state's Maharajah, and is surrounded by 3 forts.  The whole city was covered in a pink wash, from when the English King visited decades ago.  Anyway, we found our hotel - fighting off the "rickshaw mafia" - an adequate name for the hundreds of bike rickshaws that appear every time you try to walk anywhere.  Since Petra and I decided to share a room, the cost was cheap for what seemed to us a "luxury" room - aka having toilet paper and soap.

The band
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We spent most of the afternoon wandering around the palace and the several palace museums.  On exiting around 5ish, we discovered there was a festival taking place - the festival of Teej. The festival takes place for 2 days during the Hindu month of Shraven, and commemorates the day when the Goddess Parvati was "united" with Lord Shiva.  I took so many pictures of all the painted elephants, decorated camels, and dancing women.  We had a grand time.  After the festival we joined the huge crowd walking back to the main town area.  In India it is very common for guys to hold hands.  On our walk back, (no joke) 10 guys holding hands were pointing at us, laughing, and staring.  I guess that's cultural differences for you.

The festival continues
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The next day after a leisurely breakfast, we took a local bus to the nearby forts.  This is quite an experience.  You are packed like sardines, zig zagging through the streets, as you try not to be overcome by the powerful smell of B.O. - but taking the local transit is part of the fun of being in a new place.  It was worth it when we arrived at the first fort.  Beautiful!  We had stunning views of the town below and the green hills around us.  After looking at the first fort, we began our walk to the second.  As caucasian women it is impossible to "fit in" so the whole time in India both of us have been getting a ton of stares.  Often times on our walk to the second fort we would have to let a bunch of gawking guys pass.

Back at the hotel
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The second fort was equally beautiful.  We wandered around for a while, then headed back to town.  On our way to the hotel I stopped and got a henna tattoo.  I'm including a picture in this entry, it ended up looking quite nice!  We spent the rest of the evening reading on the rooftop patio of the hotel.  I enjoyed hanging out with Petra, but we had to say our goodbyes - that evening I was taking the midnight train to Agra, and she was leaving the next day for another nearby town.  However, she told me to look her up next time I'm in Italy ... :)