India Part 10: Bikaner

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  Bikaner, Rajasthan, India
Tuesday, July 1, 2008

Hi Everyone

Welcome to our India Trip part 10: Bikaner. Bikaner is one of the 3 great desert kingdoms of Rajasthan as well as Jodhpur and Jaisalmer with all 3 succeeding because of their location for passing trade. It's another old walled town with yet more ABF's, ABP's and ABRH **(see footnote for explanation!).

After a 6 hour drive with Arif, this was the last journey we were to have with him. We had all got to know one another over the last 10 days, sharing magic tricks, learning about each other's countries, and me entertaining everyone with my bubblegum during most journeys!

We got to Bikaner and the whole place is just one massive road works! ALL roads are being dug up, all traffic was even more chaotic with JCB's, tractors and wheelbarrows absolutely everywhere. Our Hotel was right next to the Fort. The road completely surrounding the Fort was also being dug up. Our Hotel was a stunning 100 years old with turrets, ancient rat runs and secret stairs. Inside were more artefacts and dusty heirlooms then Indiana Jones' Temple of Doom!

After checking in, we swiftly checked out the Hotel bar. It was like going into a dim Aladdin's Cave. It was rammed with more dust-laden artefacts making it a Krypton Factor Challenge to get from the small bar to the big widescreen surround sound tv and digi-box at the other end!! We drank beer and watched this American film until the manager came to tell us that our air conditioning unit was going to be fixed for us and we would be able to return to our room in half an hour.

Hotel Bar / Aladdins Cave

Excellent! 2 hours and several beers later and our room was still teeming with sweaty Indians trying to fix the air con. The pair of us were showered in sweat as the air con in the bar was as effective as us blowing on our own arms to cool down.

Dinner was revolting yet, amazingly, only our first disastorous meal since we've been in India. My food was ok, edible. David's request for boneless mutton curry came with a thousand bones and one tiny bit of mutton that he couldn't cut!! The rice was a joke. We complained at length about our food and the wait for our air con to be fixed and after a small Geneva Convention Board Meeting, we got free beer!

Our air con was indeed working...slowly cooling down the room with the gentle hum of a tractor driving down a country lane. We then realised our double bed had two single sheets covering the mattress and one single dirty and stained sheet that simply overlapped the top edge of the smelly, dirty quilt. When I had calmed down, I chose to sleep in my clothes and we covered our pillows with my pashminas.

David and I became hysterical as we tried to sleep. We just looked at our room and howled with laughter. Our room was like a museum. Rammed full of British Empire framed newspaper cuttings, old tobacco boxes, gilt-framed paintings of Kings and Queens, flags pinned to the wall, mottled gilt-framed mirrors hung wonkily while sparkly, feathered Indian costumes hung up for decoration. We had a 4 poster brass bed that was very nice apart from the filthy stained curtains around it and the filthy stained curtains that acted as doors to rooms and alcoves.

Our Museum room

Everything was just so filthy. We even had a tiger and a deer skin pinned to two walls surrounded by rifles!! David said "I don't care about flaming Tiger pelts on the wall, just get some clean sheets that fit the frigging bed!!" So funny! We both said it was like sleeping in a museum and that tomorrow morning, there would be tourists walking past our room taking photos of us asleep.

The next day was our last day in Bikaner before we headed off to our sleeper train for the Himalayas. So, we visited the fort - a short walk via a death trap road. Stunning Fort. Nuff said.

The Hotel transferred us to the train station which was a wonderful place. It was quiet, hassle-free and rather empty - a lovely change. To get from one platform to the opposite one, why use the overhead stairs when there is a perfectly good railway track you can cross with all your luggage?? Makes perfect sense. Women with sari's, children and old men all gymnastically juggled luggage and tracks to 'get to the other side'. David and I had the overhead stairs all to ourselves!

We were quite lucky with our train. None of the windows were smashed and the scum caking the windows wasn't so bad this time..we got to see the outlines of people at least. I opted for the ground floor berth for this journey as last time my rear end up the ladder was of much fascination to all men and children! Sleeping on the ground floor though was still not as pleasant. I had paranoid delusional thoughts of men creeping into my bunk and interfering with me! So for the first half an hour I lay cocooned behind filthy curtains obsessed with being raped in my sleep.

This is what we had to sleep on!!

When the lights finally went out though it was quite nice with the rocking of the train and the smell of piss emanating from the public toilet. I miss the UK dreadfully!!

The next day, the sun was up and at Kalka we managed to get tickets for our connecting 'toy' train (tiny rickety thing) to Shimla in the Himalayas. It takes 6 hours!! We met an English couple who had only arrived in India 2 days ago and were going to cycle around the Himalayas. We asked them if they'd done much cycling before and the guy said "yes, 2 weeks around Spain". Ooooooook....?! Then a guard came along and told us we all had to move out as it was a ladies only carriage!! The toy train was rammed full. Do we get in with the bearded turbans and their homes in a hankerchief tied to the end of a stick or do we brave it with a carriage full of men with gaping eyes at the sight of us?

It's quite disconcerting in India. Men are so tactile with one another. Best friends from 5 to 100 years old hold hands quite openly and put their arms around each other. It's nice for men to be so open with their emotions. We came to the conclusion that perhaps it was due to the lack of bodily contact with women before marriage so a good hug from your best friend is very necessary we assumed.

The train journey was l-o-n-g and slow but the views of the Himalayas were breathtaking as our little toy train chugged slowly up through the mountains with a 2000 metre drop beside the track!! We saw villages dotted amidst the rocky slopes and the mountains stretched out beyond you.

FINALLY!! Finally we got to Shimla train station after a 7 hour journey! (1 hour delay!). We were now 2,200 metres above sea level. Woohooo!!! Read our next blog to find out what happened to us!!!

Love Lois & David xx

**ABF's: Another Bloody Fort; ABP's: Another Bloody Palace; ABRH: Another Bloody Rotten Hotel.

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In the night they come alive!

Another Bloody Fort

Fort tiles

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