We'd spent yesterday exploring one enormous facet of Udaipur, so what was left? Plenty.
We caught an auto-rickshaw up to the Monsoon Palace at a Lonely Planet-approved, but high, price. Little did we know that we would have to tack on an additional 20 rupees to get the rickshaw into the park and 50 for a "parking fee." We have a feeling we were duped there. Whatever.
The Monsoon Palace is set high up on a promontory (except that the surrounds are lowlands, not sea), giving it a striking look from Udaipur proper. It was used as a hunting lodge and monsoon palace by the maharana way back in the day. The surrounding lands, a protected park, are rugged and bewitching. I wondered how easy it was to hunt, given that there's absolutely no ground cover and the slopes of the mountains seem somewhat impossible to easily navigate. I guess it worked, though. The Monsoon Palace itself is, in a word, ugly.
Travis said that I should call it "unrestored," but I prefer not to skirt the issue. The whole building is in need of a good whitewashing and some project or point of interest that could truly draw people in. It's in such beautiful land and on such a prominent spot, and has a pretty little lawn and a great view of Udaipur and the countryside, I don't think it would be hard to make it a must-see spot for tourists. But that hasn't happened yet. There is a little courtyard with tables and chairs, so I think there's a little restaurant there, and it might be a little more interesting at sunset. But only for the looking out, not for the looking in. Lonely Planet recommends going up there for sunset, FYI.
Our next destination was Bangore-ki-Haveli, a nifty house-cum-museum. The special thing about this house is that it is home to the world's biggest turban. I had envisioned a turban the size of a room, but figured it would just end up being slightly overgrown. I was not, therefore, disappointed with what I found. It was enormous and pink and looked either like brains or a weird snake. Actually, most of the Haveli seemed dedicated to turbans. It was a turban heaven. There was other cool stuff. Some rooms were furnished as they would have been when the house was inhabited, and there was a pretty courtyard with balconeys and balconied windows overlooking it. They even kept one room unrestored to show what it looked like when they started their work. And some work it must have been, believe me.
There were musical instruments, jars, kitchenwares, and stuff that looked like original wall paintings, even if they weren't. We also got to see photos of other famous parts of India, a weird little shrine completely surrounded by sun-flowers with or without faces, moustaches, or religious symbols. They were also an array of colors. I only took a picture of one. You have to see to believe. The shrine had blinking Christmas lights on it. Next we walked through an underground maze containing interesting old photos of Udaipur. This gave into a display of seriously weird modern Indian artwork. Seriously. Weird.
But the crowning glory was the last room containing world points of interest and other random objects (including a nine-headed cobra) carved out of polystyrene. That's right. There was a foam Taj Mahal, Big Ben, Eiffel Tower, and Statue of Liberty. All in the same room with a sad-looking peacock and a car. What will they think of next?
From here we walked to our restaurant, but before we found it we were gathered up by a very friendly shopkeeper who sold miniature paintings. We really didn't want to go into his store, since we were hungry, but we were admiring the artwork displayed outside (we were all in the market, you see, and Udaipur is known for its miniature paintings) and the shopkeeper took a shine to Emily. So it would go to follow that I was the one who got suckered into entering the shop. But it wasn't bad. He gave us each a free little painting (Emily got a camel for love, and Trav and I each got an elephant for luck) because he liked us and hoped we would remember him and come back to his store after shopping around some more. I don't think any of us thought we would actually go back, but we did. But I'll tell you about that later.
So we found our Lotus Cafe, which, said the Lonely Planet, had games. It had one game. We whipped out Em's cards and played hearts while we waited for our enormous and delicious thalis. And don't get a pineapple lassi. It's a little...too weird to be good. Stick with banana. We also took the loft, which was beautifully painted and hung with tye-dye and had cushions on the floor. And was maroon and purple with a great big yellow mirrored lamp hanging in the middle. Sumptuous.
From here we had yet another ridiculous walking adventure, because what looks like it should be a relatively simple walk invariably (in India, at least) turns out to be a bewildering jumble of streets that seem not to be on any map. First we were relatively successful. Then I stopped to admire some pretty special umbrellas/sun shades and asked the shopkeeper how to get to the Car Museum. He pointed down the road, so we kept walking until we got completely confused, so Emily took charge and asked someone for directions. We generally avoided this because in the past it generally meant someone trying to get money out of us or tell us we needed a rickshaw at an extortionate price. But in this case it worked out, and the friendly shopkeepers gave Emily very precise directions, which we double checked a couple times as we were walking. When we finally got to the place we had no idea exactly what to do. You see, what we were looking for was 22 automobiles parked somewhere inside a hotel.
The Maharana of Udaipur has a classic car collection with a couple other random cars thrown in for good measure. It is housed at the Green Hotel in an impressive semi-circular garage in a courtyard that also boasts a completely circular restaurant. The cost to get in to see the cars was quite expensive, but because of the trouble we went to to find the thing, I wasn't about to turn around and call it a day. So we got our entry tickets that come with a free soda at the restaurant. Emily opted out and sat in the shade while Travis and I explored.
One by one all the garage doors were opened to us and we walked around the Mercedes and Rolls and Ford (yes, but it was from 1924), admiring the shiny fancyness that we could never afford. Other than the fact that the cars are generally just neat and rather old (several 1930s cars...), the museum has a couple selling points. First, like all of Udaipur, it boasts a connection to the Bond film Octopussy. The Rolls Royce used in said film is parked in all its shiny black glory between two other of the Maharana's personal Rolls Royces. We decided that it's not actually a Bond car, though, because as far as we could remember, James Bond didn't drive it - the bad guy, Kamal Khan did. But it's still cool, and we might be wrong cause we didn't really watch the movie with 100% of our attention. The other point of attraction is (are, since there are four) the Maharana's sun smart car, a solar powered car that won some sort of competition. All four of them have the thinnest solar panels and look a little like golf carts. Actually one looks like a dune buggy. But we are meant to be impressed by the Maharana's interest in solar technology and cleaner driving. And the cars are pretty nifty. The we had our free sodas and made our way to the sunset.
We were doing a very good job of getting to the sunset point until we came upon a mysterious intersection, and time was running out. What happened next I really can't say. Travis and Emily took care of business while I watched an old man feed a bunch of monkeys out of his hand, and there were baby monkeys, and they sucked their thumbs. It was really very cute. The old man offered me a cracker to feed the monkeys, but I shied away. Getting close was good enough for me. Other tourists were bolder.
Then I was bundled into an auto-rickshaw and we scooted down the road to catch the sunset along with a bunch of Indian tourists and bonnet-wearing camels (they were for camel rides down the street, but I don't know what the bonnet was for). Much to Travis's dismay the sun, which was too far to the right of the floating palace last night, was now too far to the left of the other palace (there are the two floating palaces, you know - the white hotel one and...the other one). It really was a strange thing to see, and Travis's consternation as to how the sun could possibly move that much in 24 hours was rather entertaining. I did feel bad that he couldn't get his sunset photo, though. Bad sun!
We debated when to eat, considering that we had a show to see at 7 and a bus to catch at 9, but we'd had such a late lunch (this always seems to happen...it's really impossible to eat at normal times...I can't tell you how many two meal days Travis and I have had), we weren't hungry, but we didn't think we'd have time to eat between the show and the bus. We were a little right, but it worked out. Instead of eating first, we decided to go shopping first. Emily when her own way jewelry shopping while Travis and I searched for the perfect miniature peacock. We ended up in a shop we really shouldn't have been in at all, where I fell in love (just like I knew I would, because when I want something I know exactly what it is and won't have anything else) with an absoluely gorgeous, intricate miniature painting. It was 15,000 rupees, or $400. Not in our price range. But I wanted it sooooo badly. And nothing else would do, so eventually, after looking at every peacock they had to offer, Travis and Emily dragged me out of the store.
This is when we decided to go back to the nice man's shop. At first Travis just wanted to go there because he had set prices posted in certain places, and we wouldn't be stuck again. There was a different man there at this hour, and he was more entertaining than I can describe. He started by pulling out all of the little paintings, like the ones that we'd gotten earlier, and we looked through piles of them as he told us the prices and then revised them because we were his lucky first customers of the evening. But none of the little ones were satisfactory, so we pulled out more and more and looked through a zillion elephants. There was a dearth of peacocks. I found another one I liked, but it was 400 rupees and Travis wouldn't approve the $10 purchase because he thought I was settling, which I was, but it was still a nice painting. We got an elephant and one of the camel-elephant-horse paintings. We had wondered why there were so many of these three-in-one works and why it was always these three animals. Eventually we learned that the camel represents love and stands for the city of Jaisalmer (and Jodpur, depending on who you talk to), the elephant represents luck and stands for Udaipur, and the horse represents strength and stands for the city of Jaipur.
Perhaps because our storekeeper friend was bored, he started doing those reading a person from their hands things. We had said that Travis is an engineer, so he said that you can tell those engineer people because their pinkies come above the first knuckle like on their ring fingers, and, sure enough, Trav's do. Mine don't. Emilys kind of did, too. Then, because we were all awed, he said that he could tell me that I had a certain line on my hand because I wear glasses. And I did. And he saw it on Travis, too, even though he's not wearing his glasses. So then he started reading Trav's palm, and it was highly entertaining. We learned that Travis thinks too much, and he's very nice (at this our fortune teller shook his head and said, "That's bad."). We'll also apparently have three sons (insert scream here) and Travis will have one wife who will make his life very very happy (insert self-satisfied sigh here). He was also ordered to wear a ruby on his right ring finger to order his life better and make him not think so much because it's not good for him. Travis interprets this differently, but I think Emily and I heard the same thing and I'm nearly quoting.
After Trav's fortune was finished I ordered our friend to do Emily's, and he did. Emily's first son will be inordinately nice and will never leave home. But she will fortunately have a husband who, along with her, will do lots and lots of travelling. But when she turns 45 she'll have a mid-life crisis. I think I would too if my three sons never left. At this point we were running late for our show, so I didn't get a palm reading. Very sad.
The show was put on at Bangore-ki-Haveli. It was billed as an evening exploring Rajasthani culture, with emphasis on dances from around the state. What it turned out to be was...an exploration of how crazy people can get. Like, why would you dance around with a flaming pot of oil on your head? Or step on shards of glass with six water pots also on top of your head? I'll begin at the beginning. We were welcomed with a Rajasthani welcome song that was accompanied by a drum and accordion-like piano. Then there was the relatively normal peacock dance, in which the one woman spun around and contorted herself amazingly in a beautiful dance while the peacock was almost wholly superfluous. Then came the pots of fire. These two women spun around and danced in circles and sat down and stood up, all with flames atop their heads. I didn't know whether to be impressed or horrified. What would happen if one of those pots fell?
Next was the bell lady. She had finger cymbols strapped to various parts of her body, including her toe, calf, upper arm, and hands, and she sat and whipped her hand cymbols around so that they hit the other cymbols in a mesmerising and musical tinkling arm dance. She was seated the entire time and got faster and faster as time went on. Then there was the puppet man. After he finished I said more puppets, less dancing. The girl puppet did crazy hip dances and moved around in a highly entertaining manner almost mocking normal dancing, while the man puppet was magic and popped off his head to play with it in his hands, then on his feet, and finally his head fell on his butt while his arms and legs danced around. It would have been so perfect for little kids. It made me feel like a delighted child.
The next to last dance was a circle dance with 9 women, all with their heads completely covered. They whirled around and moved their hands just the way you think of when you think of Indian dances. Then came the water jar dance. Dance? Maybe. Talent show? Probably. It started with one pot and ended with nine. The woman danced around, adding pots and doing tricks for us. With two pots she lay down and picked up a hankey with her teeth without dropping her pots. With three she danced with her feet on the edge of a cake pan, making the cake pan jump around, and still the pots didn't fall. With six pots she stomped around on a pile of glass shards (in bare feet) without losing her balance. At nine pots she was pretty much running around in circles, but the pots didn't fall, and we cheered loudly when she was liberated from the thing coming off her head that was taller than she was.
We left the show and got dessert for dinner (it is invariably spelled desert here, though), ran back to get our bags, and got a rickshaw to the bus stand. We were later than we were told to be, but it was okay. Then we had to walk about three blocks to where our bus was actually parked and find our beds. That's right, we were travelling in style - sleeping style!
Don't get too excited, though. It was pretty much the bumpiest bus ride of all time. Possibly worse than Bolivia.
Erin
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