By Dan
Thursday 6th of July 2017
Everyone’s got a different angle in India. But they all have the same method. “Hi, where are you from? England?” They say, as they force you into a friendly handshake. “Australia,” I say, my guard already up. I’ve said New Zealand a few times, but I stopped when a man, who was set on moving there, asked me if he could email his application form for immigration.
“Ahh, Australiaa! Aussie, Aussie, Aussie! Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne?” Proud to know all the main cities (sorry Adelaide, Canberra and Perth) “Sydney,” I say. “I have a friend in Australia, he’s in Melbourne,” he says. They all have friends or cousins in Australia. “Oh, what is he doing over there?” I’m now genuinely interested, “He’s working in IT.” Sometimes they’re engineers, or a chef or working in a hotel, but most of the time it’s IT. “Does he like it?” I ask, still aware that this guy will surely be angling for something and wanting to keep the conversation going for the sake of not wanting to become annoyed with this friendly fellow. “Oh, I don’t know,” He says, giving me a red-stained grin, “we don’t talk. Do you like fabric?” And the chance at friendship is forgotten as he spends the next ten minutes following me down the street trying every possible hook, line and sinker to get me to visit his eight-storey clothing warehouse, which coincidentally creates clothing for Myer and David Jones, which is more revealing and harmful to his sales pitch than he will ever know. “Sorry, we’ve already been today.” I lie, knowing there isn’t much he can say to this. He looks at me in surprise. “You’ve already been? How can this be?” He says. “Yeah, we went yesterday, looked at all eight floors, Deepak took us there, we bought two pashmina scarves,” I continue to lie. He looks downtrodden, his hope of getting his hundred rupee commission from us now gone. If I hadn’t received this treatment from a hundred other men over the past few weeks, I’d have felt bad for him. Suddenly his eyes light up, he’s obviously had a brilliant idea. “You come back tomorrow? And I give you 40% off,” he says, knowing there’s no way I can refuse such a sweet deal. “Sure.” I say, and walk away in the opposite direction, knowing full well I’ll never see this man again.
These experiences leave me feeling a mix of emotions. Annoyed at his blatant and rude persistence but also impressed by that same persistence. Sad that he doesn’t actually care about anything but my money but happy that I won’t be giving any of it to him. But mostly Richelle and I just laugh, let’s face it with my olive green akubra, above average height and white skin I’m not exactly blending in. I’m an easy target and probably deserve this treatment from former misdeeds. But in Jodhpur it seemed that every man and his dog was trying to take their cut from me.
They call Jodhpur the Blue City, because where Jaipur has painted its buildings pink, Jodhpur has painted them blue; an indigo wash to be precise. The blue once signified the dwellings of Brahmin, the priest caste in the Indian caste system. But now everyone paints their houses blue because it allegedly keeps the buildings cooler and repels insects. Which begs the question, if they were green would they die? The city is also famous for its great fort, royalty and polo, coincidentally it’s where jodhpurs were invented and where they derive their name.
We were staying in a part temple part hotel called Nirvana home, which was easily the most beautiful place we’ve stayed. However, the service and staff were terrible and we were blatantly ripped off by the management, so I wouldn’t suggest staying there. Although, after my Trip Advisor review they may clean up their act, so it could be worth the dice roll.
Jodhpur was to be our city of extravagance. It has a series of very recently and very beautifully restored buildings, stores and restaurants that bring the old traditional buildings to this side of the century and needless to say we ate at all of the restaurants. Small but delicious meals that easily blew our daily budget and burned holes in our pockets, but hey, yolo.
My stomach has become an experimental cauldron for trying street foods. As I have now begun to accept the frequent visits from the stomach bug, who we’ve named Connie. There’s a great omelette place just beyond the clock tower, where eggs sit precooking in the sun. I would suggest going early rather than later. Nonetheless, the omelettes are on another level and are a great way to save money if you insist on blowing your budget on expensive dinners.
We dedicated one of the days to visiting the fort. This was the highlight of our trip, and once again we splurged and paid for the audio tour. It is well worth it as you’re escorted around the vast building by the jolliest Indian gentleman, whose English is probably better than mine. I imagine him to be fully equipped in polo gear as he leads us through the many rooms. Richelle will agree with me that it’s probably one of the best sites that we’ve seen in India, partly because of our Indian friend, but also because the museum itself is so well curated. Oddly, they have a high wire course around the fort, so if you feel like all the cannons, armour, parapets and miniature paintings aren’t enough of a thrill you could always give that a go.
We also paid a visit to the Jaswant Thada, the memorial for the Maharaja Jaswant Singh II. The marble memorial is almost translucent as it shines in the afternoon sun, offering us a quiet break from the fast pace of Jodhpur. We’ve found in order to get the full benefit of India it’s important to seek out these places of solitude amongst the hubbub, they exist in every town and city and are generally cheaper than the main attractions. The locals are always happy to point this out, for all the swindling, they’re always helpful and conscious of ways to save money.
We spent an afternoon hanging around the Birka Bawari, Jodhpur’s famous stepwell. We watched the young men proving their manhood to each other by jumping off higher and higher steps. Eventually they noticed us watching, which only spurred them on further as a young man prepared to jumped off a roof fifteen metres above the water. Richelle and I both looked on in a mix of horror and awe. For his tight jeans he had some pretty big balls. But the allure of impressing a few white foreigners seems to be irresistible to the young men of India and we watched him jump three or four times without batting an eyelid. Our afternoon of manhood culminated in a young boy running out into the street and revealing himself, in the innocent way only a child can, to Richelle. He wouldn’t leave us alone until we took a photo. Richelle took it very well in what was possibly the proudest moment in the young boy’s life.
As we said goodbye to Jodhpur we watched the sun set on the fort one last time. The shifting hues of blue, orange, pink and every colour in between an obvious attraction for anyone with eyes.