So where've you been? 35 Rajasthan
I forgot to write about what Rajasthan was like: middle of the desert / middle of a heatwave - hot.
I went to Jaipur (pink city), Jaisalmer (golden fort), and Jodhpur (blue city). When your eyes are turned blue-squinty-green from overhead billion wattage sunstroke, all those colours fade to roughly similar sweat soaked bleachy white.
Glancing at my diary, I'm reminded of keeping a bucket of dirty water in my bedroom to tip over myself at intervals through the night. It was the only way to get cold water, too, as water in the bucket was chilled more efficiently than the water in the hot sun-baked pipes from the roof still.
Until I realised hot showers lessen the shock, and warm your body up to a temperature where the dry desert air starts to feel refreshing. For five minutes at least.
People sleep on rooftops to get cool - at night in Jodhpur, the temperature would drop to 38 degrees, and - praise to someone or something - there'd be a breeze. There you are, lying on hard mud ground in your PJs, trying to sleep on your elbow as a pillow, and you'd be slapped awake by a full bucket of sand gusting into your mouth.
My favourite windows were the diagonal cubby hole windows in thick fort walls in Jaisalmer. They'd be covered with a tiny, 3 by 10 inch glazed window in bright jewel colours, inside, set at random heights into cow dung baked mud walls. The light would flicker and spin slightly, as the birds nesting in the cubbies shifted, trying to escape the dry heat.
There's obviously a strong hippie tourist trail in Rajasthan in the summers, and budget hotels actually advertise themselves as making less insistent sales pitches on camel safaris than anyone else. In a heatwave, though, the place is empty, everything's shut, and you have the view to yourself. Like Varanasi, it was the sort of place locals drag you into their homes and beg you to stay for dinner. One family (who were feeding me for a day or two as they built a backpacker restaurant by throwing up cement illegally on top of the fort walls) pointed out that a safari in June would be "camel suicide".
I went to Jaipur (pink city), Jaisalmer (golden fort), and Jodhpur (blue city). When your eyes are turned blue-squinty-green from overhead billion wattage sunstroke, all those colours fade to roughly similar sweat soaked bleachy white.
Glancing at my diary, I'm reminded of keeping a bucket of dirty water in my bedroom to tip over myself at intervals through the night. It was the only way to get cold water, too, as water in the bucket was chilled more efficiently than the water in the hot sun-baked pipes from the roof still.
Until I realised hot showers lessen the shock, and warm your body up to a temperature where the dry desert air starts to feel refreshing. For five minutes at least.
People sleep on rooftops to get cool - at night in Jodhpur, the temperature would drop to 38 degrees, and - praise to someone or something - there'd be a breeze. There you are, lying on hard mud ground in your PJs, trying to sleep on your elbow as a pillow, and you'd be slapped awake by a full bucket of sand gusting into your mouth.
My favourite windows were the diagonal cubby hole windows in thick fort walls in Jaisalmer. They'd be covered with a tiny, 3 by 10 inch glazed window in bright jewel colours, inside, set at random heights into cow dung baked mud walls. The light would flicker and spin slightly, as the birds nesting in the cubbies shifted, trying to escape the dry heat.
There's obviously a strong hippie tourist trail in Rajasthan in the summers, and budget hotels actually advertise themselves as making less insistent sales pitches on camel safaris than anyone else. In a heatwave, though, the place is empty, everything's shut, and you have the view to yourself. Like Varanasi, it was the sort of place locals drag you into their homes and beg you to stay for dinner. One family (who were feeding me for a day or two as they built a backpacker restaurant by throwing up cement illegally on top of the fort walls) pointed out that a safari in June would be "camel suicide".
posted by Lectrice at sábado, junio 10, 2006
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