Defend My Castle

In Dunegal

After switching bus in Gujarat I arrived as planned in Udaipur, southern Rajasthan at four in the afternoon. I had tactically stalled in Gujarat for a couple hours in the morning, so as to time my arrival with a cooler evening. However I didn’t take into consideration the fact that Rajasthan never really gets cool during the long summer months. Being predominantly desert, the only thing fierier than the burning heat was the history of Rajput warriors who hailed from the area. The warriors from Rajasthan, the Land of the Kings, were supposedly descendants of the sun. They were renowned for their fighting prowess and ruled here for over a 1000 years. When they weren’t fighting to keep out invaders however they were fighting amongst themselves. It would be this infighting that eventually saw them become vassals to the Mughals before the ruling classes were bought out with the wealth and titles of the British. For the ordinary people of Rajasthan however they saw little gains and the division between rich and poor, is to this day, one of the most pronounced in all of India. Literacy rates have come along way from 18% of the population in 1961, but at 67% it still lags the rest of India.

Why did the elephant cross the bridge?

Arriving in Udaipur I could have been in Agrabah, with sandstone buildings, narrow crowded streets, and overhanging canvas covers. It wasn’t hard to picture the turbaned guards with billowing trousers and even wilder moustaches chasing down Aladdin back in the day. Unlike a lot of the places I had been previously, Udaipur was very hilly with most roads winding up and down and around and around. This meant walking was not only tiring on the legs with the steep gradients but tiring on the mind trying to remember the way you came.

Udaipur Palace

My hostel was quite fortuitously placed right on the side of the massive Lake Pichola. With our own private jetty I could sit out at sunset to watch the hordes of bats that flocked over the lake to fish for eels. Despite the water being choked with weeds and a slimy layer of algal bloom, local kids swam there the whole daylong. From Daiji Footbridge that crossed the lake I had a good view of their antics and the whole of the city as well. It was so built up that it looked like a can of coke that has exploded after being forgotten in the freezer overnight. The buildings were rocketing outward and upward over each other like stone plants desperate for the sunlight and a view of the lake.At the very centre on the highest hill was the City Palace; a myriad of towers and balconies that imposed itself on the rest of the city below. Inside the City Palace’s impressive gates was a less than impressive museum. The museum had quite an extensive collection of mostly underwhelming paintings, an array of antiques you would find at a bootsale and royal chambers bedecked in mirror tiles that made each room more classless than classy. Far more interesting were the views it afforded out over the city and the grim tales of a princess who drank poison rather than let the city be drawn into a war with two rival princes who sought to marry her.

The saving grace about the city being so built up was that the towering stonework offered some shade in the alleys. Going for random walks I could lose myself within a few minutes and explore the cities back alleys. These had open sewers running either side and I saw mothers come out of houses with a dustpan holding a little turd that they dumped unceremoniously into the drain to be whisked away. At other times people cut out the dustpan altogether and simply squated on their doorsteps hovering over the sewer beneath them. Surprisingly the city though smelt relatively clean, the level of litter was lower than many other places I had been but there was still the same number of cows standing looking mildly lost in the centre of that concrete jungle. Old-fashioned steel pumps were set up and kids would take turns pumping for each other to drink. Considering the water was most likely being pumped from the lake I refrained from having a drink despite how parched I was.

After Udaipur it was on to Jaisalmer, right out on India’s western border with Pakistan. The overnight bus to Jaisalmer turned out to be one of the most dramatic I’ve taken out here but for all the wrong reasons. After waiting for over an hour on the bus to show, the tour operator informed me my bus was going to be another two hours late. Rather than wait I paid to upgrade to an AC bus that was leaving then. Another sting was then having to pay for a tuk-tuk to take us to where that bus was leaving from, a charge the operator had conveniently forgotten to mention. It was the cowboy who then tried to charge us to put our bags in the hold that was the straw that broke this camel’s back. I felt marginally guiltily about my choice of words but the guy was quick to drop the charge, take our bags and usher us on. The company certainly had the last laugh though when two hours into an eight-hour journey the AC gave a dusty cough and kicked the bucket. Lying in my bunk I was in danger of drowning in the sweat that poured out of me. To optimize the AC, those buses are designed with no windows but with no AC on top of that it closer resembled a coffin ship. It all could have been bearable until the bus driver tried to pick up more passengers and cram them on to an already crammed bus. My fellow local passengers were even more angry and stormed off the bus, blocking it in and telling them it wouldn’t be moving until the AC was fixed. This was at 4am. Despite the early hours I too had to get and stand on the picket line to force the driver’s hand. It would be half an hour for them to fix the AC, camped on the side of the road though it was hard to tell exactly how there were fixing it as the driver and his cronies were sat in a group chatting.

Elephant Proof Gates

More odd than that though was the music blaring at 4am wafting about the T-junction. India has noise laws so strict it makes the DUP look like Ibiza regulars, so I was keen to investigate the disturbance. In the middle of a road sitting on cushions were a group of ten boys all under the age of twelve and five men singing with drums, chimes and keyboard. As soon as the kids say me they were up and dancing and shouting for me to join in. Happy to oblige I danced my part but as I sat down with them I couldn’t shake the nagging feeling. It was very strange for anyone to be out at this time and I wasn’t sure if it was a harmless campfire sing-along or was there a more sinister undertone, like the singing street kids in Slumdog Millionaire. 

Guess it's moo-ving day

Not wanting to be left behind by the bus I went back to check after half an hour or so. I needn’t have worried, as the bus was standing as decrepit as ever and in no danger of moving anytime soon. We were now waiting on a replacement bus, as surprisingly sitting about doing nothing hadn’t managed to fix the AC. The replacement was now going to take 10 minutes or an hour, quite a strange timeframe but whatever. After another forty-five minutes of waiting everyone was growing restless, thankfully the driver had a solution. If we got back on (the new passengers who had attempted to board had long since ditched for other transport) the AC would start working after 40km. Too tired to even put up a fight to the blatant mix of bullshit and magic, I was just happy to get back on the bus and sweat it out the rest of the way to Jasialmer.

You might think that was it, but oh no, this was the bus journey that kept on giving. When arriving in most destinations by plane, train or bus, a swarm of tuktuk drivers are waiting for the doors to swing open to offer you best price delivery to your hostel. And by your hostel I mean the hostel that is paying them commission to bring tourists. I have seen them use every trick from saying your hostel is closed, it’s fully booked, it’s flooded or a parade was blocking the route. Sometimes they will even drive you to the their hostel and tell you it is your hostel despite the difference in the name written above the door. The best price they are offering is usually about two or three times the normal price and then they expect a tip on top of that.

Walking is a sweaty business

Now I have adopted the practice of barging past them as soon as they try to block me in, grabbing my bags and letting their offers fall on deaf ears. The bus to Jasialmer took the biscuit though, because a tout actually got onto the bus outside of the city, woke me up and started spreading his nonchalant bullshit about prices and destinations while posing as a helpful passenger. I was not too happy to be woken but happy to let him talk as I had been pre-warned this could happen. He seemed to think I was in the bag as he cleared a path when we got off to his tuktuk, that was of course necessary as my hostel was on the other side of town. What he had taken into account was the google maps loaded in my pocket that told me my hostel was a five minute walk away, god bless the smart phone. Once he had got me clear of the other drivers and touts I relieved him of my bags and ditched on foot for my hostel, ignoring his trailing angry curses.

Jasailmer

My first glimpse of Jasialmer castle made it all worthwhile however. As a kid I had spent countless summer days on beaches building the perfect sandcastle. Jasialmer castle was that sandcastle. Rising out of the desert dust, perched like a fierce bird of prey on a rugged hilltop, the fort dominated the skyline. Formidable sandstone walls rose up between curved bastions. A thick scattering of houses sought protection at the base of the hill, cowering beneath the forty-foot walls that rose up unassailable above them.

Walking up the single steep path, under portcullis and through impregnable gates, it was like walking backward through time. The commanding view from the castle wall was only lost to the desert haze. Inside the fort a series of Jain temples had been built dating back to the 15^th and 16^th century. These were some of the most intricately carved temples I have visited, a labyrinth of doorways and arches, staircases and altars. They had 6,666 deities represented there in statues, carvings and paintings. Holy men loitered in every temple to garble out the meaning of each alter for a few rupees despite the signs hanging everywhere that said not to tip the holy men. Religious corruption is not just a western phenomenon.

Jain Temples

I experienced probably the most embarrassing moment of my trip in Jasailmer fort too. Walking through the main courtyard, taking a drink of water, I stepped in a huge cow shit. My feet newly lubricated shot out behind me and I fell face first to the ground. As I was drinking from my bottle at the time, the impact sprayed the water out and soaking me from head to shit covered feet. Standing up shocked by it all I realised I wasn’t alone in the courtyard. Instead seemed to be assembled every man in the city, hysterical with laughter at my antics. Nothing else for it I had to join in with them, but ever since I’m paying a lot closer attention to where I put my feet!

He's hoping no one fires the cannon

From Jasailmer I organized a camel safari overnight through the desert. This began with a 4x4 taking us out deep into the wilderness. On the way we passed village women walking 5km to the nearest well with their huge water jugs balanced on their head. They would complete this journey three or four throughout the heat of the day. Huge wind turbines rose up on the horizon, needed to power the 3000km electric fence that runs the length of the border. Apart from scrub bushes and the odd cow or herd of goat, the desertscape was barren. About an hour’s drive into the desert we came across a handful of mostly mud houses that made up the village. Stopping to let the sun set a little bit more we had chai with a local family who were sitting around us wide eyed and curious. The woman making the chai put a bowl of water down and a goat came over to drink. As soon as it bowed its head to drink she set to work milking the goat, straight into the pot of chai. Fresh from the teat it was one of the creamiest, earthiest chais I’ve ever had. After that we were introduced to our camels. Mine was called Latia and had this rather endearing trait of sneezing and farting unashamedly at the same time. Our guide told me they only tame and ride male camels. Female camels remain wild and bear the young. After four years growing up in the desert the young males can be captured, trained for a year and are then ready to go.

Desert Mud Houses

Following the herd

The camel was knelt down when I climbed on to the saddle. Then came the seasick inducing lurch to its feet. The hind and front knee joints of a camel open in opposite directions. First it teetered alarmingly forward and then stumbled backward as if it was losing its balance before swaying into a balanced position.  From its back the camel is a lot higher off the ground then I gave it credit for, though I felt fairly safe and secure as we trotted off into the desert. The jolting up and down was easy to get used to, though by the second day my groin was aching from the stretching. It was only those stumbled steps as we went up and down dunes that threatened to unsaddle me but Latia was extremely sure footed despite his ungainly gait. We trekked for nearly two hours through that sea of sand spotting fleeted footed antelope, more wild camels, scurrying desert mice and of course more cows. Cresting a hill we came out among the waves of dunes that swept in around us. Dismounting here, through an equally awkward movement we set about making camp. This was basically lifting off the saddles, laying out the sleeping mats and making a fire for dinner. That night we camped out under the haze rather than the stars that were unfortunately lost behind it. Still it was all rather pleasant, until I factored in the wind that whipped up the sand into cutting daggers. We wrapped scarves around our heads but even still the sand was relentless in its assault. Surrounding our sleeping mats, into our mouths and ears and up your nostrils.

The next morning I woke half buried. Pulling myself upright the sand cascaded off me but a thick layer still coated my body and had burrowed right through to my boxers. After a quick breakfast our guide went off in search of the camels who had been allowed free to wonder at night.  

Our sleeping mats buried alive

He was gone almost half an hour and we were almost giving up the hope that he was ever coming back, when we heard gypsy bells ringing. Looking up we some him bumping down the hill in a masterful display of skill, riding one camel bareback while leading the other three behind him. We were soon to be repeating the feat when on the way home he misunderstood me saying I wanted to lead my own camel rather than have one of the handlers holding the reigns. “Sure you can race them,” he said, before jumping up behind me. Not quite what I had wanted but I wasn’t going to let the opportunity pass. With a few cracks of the reigns, a kick of my heels and plenty of “Ya”, the camel broke into a brisk trot and then into a full on pelt. Behind me the other riders were bumping along too. Again it was far from stylish but pretty thrilling racing along the dust path back to the village, a perfect end to the safari.

Jodhpur Clocktower

I was however still washing sand out of my hair and body crevices for the next couple days after in Jodhpur. Jodhpur city was dominated by the massive Mehrangarh Fort (there’s certainly a trend developing here). This was the largest out of all the forts I visited. It had never been captured in its 500 year history. The fort came complete with elephant proof gates, its own secret garden and a huge sprawling parapet. Taking an audio tour of the fort my attention was drawn to a collection of handprints on the wall near the main gate. These belonged to the 20 or so widows of the Maharajah Man Singh who died in 1843. As custom dictated, they joined their husband’s body on the funeral pyre and followed him into the afterlife. Crazy that so barbaric a custom was followed by royalty just over a hundred and fifty years ago!

Mighty Mehrangarh

Jodhpur is called the blue city because a lot of the houses are painted a pale blue. This began as a religious trait of the Hindu Brahmin class but had been adopted by many more of the cities inhabitants. The blue dye is also attributed in keeping at bay mosquitos and other insects. Whatever the reason, the kaleidoscope of colours from the fort walls really is quite some spectacle. Winding my way through the back alleys was fun, if sweaty work. It is really quite a challenge to have to navigate cows, dogs and scooters in an alley where there isn’t room to swing a cat. However I took a wrong turn and went into an alley where the dogs soon made sure I knew I wasn’t welcome. A pack of five or six were snapping at my heels, while others barked over head to alert the rest I was coming. Rounding tight corners to come face-to-face with bared growling teeth was extremely intimidating. Having to jump and spin to get passed them and I was getting disorientated. Happily I stumbled my way out into a larger street and they stayed behind to bark and mark their territory. Frightening to think what could have happened if it were a hapless child in my place. Still there was plenty to see and explore in those back alleys, with each twist ready to reveal some new hidden treasure and every local’s beaming smile to see a gora walking through their world.

The Blue City

After ten days of battling the desert heat I’d had enough for now and was off to Delhi to catch up with Nabeel before heading on to Rishikesh to see mother Ganga.

A Tale of Temples and a Jumble of Jungles - Pt 2

Quarry Sunset

Bedrock/Hampi

Bandipur was the furthest south I was going to venture in my trip, doubling back on myself I headed to Hampi, one of the most unique places I’ve ever been. This was down to a combination of the prehistoric boulders, scattered like a packet of dropped Malteesers and the mystical Hindu temples, powerful relics to the ancient kingdom that prospered here at one time. It was an Indiana Jones temple robbing set in the Flintstone’s hometown of Bedrock. 

The bus left me on one side of the river but the hostels were based on the other. With no bridges and the ferry not running for another couple hours there was nothing for it but to settle down and watch the locals go about their daily routine. Even though it was just turned 7am the river was already bustling with people. Women congregated in groups of four or five to wash their clothes. Boys would then be handed the long saris and with one deft flick they would expertly unfurl the couple metres of silk to dry in the sunshine over already hot rocks. Younger kids ran backwards and forwards splashing each other and shrieking in delight. Men meandered through brushing their teeth and staring at the group of backpackers waiting to make the crossing with as much interest as we gazed back at them. We were sat on steps worn smooth by time, running the length of the riverbank almost as if they were designed for the very purpose of providing a good view to an attentive audience of the river below. A group of chattering kids came running up, exploding with delight to tell us that the elephant was coming for his morning bath. Sure enough over their heads and elephant and his rider were making a ponderous and careful descent down the stone steps, before joining the kids in the river who splashed all the harder.

 

That cool down was needed as by lunch the temperature had risen to a more than mild 43oC, confining most of the day to the hammock. At around 5pm that evening I headed out to the quarry lake, 3km from Hampi. It wasn’t a tough hike but there was enough heat left in the day to make it a sweaty one. Along the way though we came across what could be best described as a semi abandoned warzone. The residents in Hampi (like a lot of the poorer people across India) had never secured proper buildings permits before they had built their houses. This was common practice and after twenty to thirty years of living there they may have assumed themselves to be safe enough. But starting in 2012 the government had started to demolish houses, hostels and restaurants in an attempt to clear out the people and preserve Hampi as a historic site. The latest round of demolition had happened a few weeks before we got there. With no place to go many families had simply remained in the ruins of their houses. All that was left was the haunting image of kids sitting amongst the rubble.

Paddle Turtle Boats bottom left

In an attempt to stop the notoriously poor swimming locals from swimming at the lake, “Beware of Crocodiles,” signs had been daubed over the rocks. Knowing this was merely a myth was some consolation, even still any movement in the water was met with a sharp turn of the head just to be sure. Paranoia levels only started to recede when out of that soapy blue water and up on the rocks to watch the sun sat in a majestic array of ruby reds, golden oranges and hallucinogenic greeny yellows.

 

Up early to beat the heat the next day I spent the morning flitting from temple to temple, with a few royal buildings thrown in for good measure. I must have visited at least fifteen different temples with many more that I had missed out on. The first two beside the riverbank were home to a troop of monkeys who snatched everything from dropped bananas to a beggar’s change bowl. 

Vimanas

Most temples followed a similar style; made up of a vimana or pyramid looking roof towering overhead with every nook and cranny stuffed with a religious idol, grey stonewalls that reached up twenty foot high in places encircled a flagstone courtyard and intricately carved pillars held up the roofs that were then lined with their own statues and carvings. If it wasn’t a benevolent god looking peaceful, it was a fictitious beast snarling down, every inch of stone was worked masterfully to assault the eyes with detail. 

Musical Pillars

Some even had musical stone pillars that chimed when rapped. Others held underground water wells and secret doors. It was hard to imagine there could be any deity in the entire Hindu pantheon that didn’t have a shrine or altar dedicated to them there. As well as the temples there were also the royal stables (though being India they housed elephants not horses), bathhouses for queens, palaces for the men, bazars and guard towers. The work of the craftsmen was faultless and on a mammoth scale.

Afterwards I ignored the rickshaws and cut back to the water crossing along a path that winded over the huge slabs of rock and past a few lesser temples and shrines. This was an adventure all in itself as I negotiated the Jurassic Park landscape. That evening it was up to the monkey temple, 580 steps hewn into the rock face, to watch a sunset lost in the clouds but still offering incredible panoramic views over the valley below. Looking down at the temples I had visited earlier in the day I couldn’t help but think how amazing this scene must have been half a millennia ago when the area was at its peak.

Whats happening in hampi

After Hampi was my first of two 24 hour journeys in the space of two days. This took me through Pune, changing buses at 4.30am, and on to Aurangabad, which would serve as a transit hub for the Ellora and Ajanta Caves. Buddhist, Hindu and Jain worshippers had hewn these from the rock face and they contained altars, shrines and temples, some of which were two or three stories high. Others had ribbed ceilings to echo sound and many supported by huge pillars more akin to something out of a Tolkien novel. The earliest of the caves at Ajanta dated back over two thousand years and were still in pristine condition. The most impressive was the freestanding Kailasa Temple at Ellora, which would have been about the size of a regular church. The masons had chiselled it top down from the mountainside, so in theory it was one massive block of stone and then they carved out the inside to form the temple. Astounding work even before you take into account the fact that it was created with only a hammer and a chisel. From Aurangabad it was another 24 hours then through Ahmedabad in Gujarat onto the hot deserts of Rajasthan

Ajanta Caves

Whilst waiting for my food on my last day in Hampi, a scene unfolded that perfectly encapsulated India for me in one go. Farmers were burning the fields in a very un-eco friendly way of getting ready for next years crops. Whoever was supposed to be watching it hadn’t been doing the most diligent of jobs and the fire spread until a coconut tree erupted in flame. Panicked locals run for a hose whilst others form a bucket chain. The tree is too high and the pressure in the hose too low so that they can’t reach the fronds on top, which are burning like a candle. Even more panicked they start to move all the scooters and motorbikes away in case any falling flaming debris would set them off. The most panicked of all however is the owner of the music store right beside the burning tree, frantic over his thatched palm roof and an inventory of instrumental kindling.

With the spectators standing about watching and a reluctance of motorists to dare pass the fire, a roadblock forms in the street. A farmer with a hay truck is stuck there until a cow comes up behind him truck and starts eating his hay straight from the trailer. Desperate to get away he starts to blast his horn and tries to edge through the crowd, obviously reluctant to watch the cow eat all of his work.  The cow however runs after him, and another cow in the fire field chases after the first cow, neither of which have noticed the fire. They both run right into the middle of it and their frightened moos now drown out the car horn. The cow on the road runs off but the other one is trapped in the corner of the field by the fire and the barbwire fence. Milling about and shouting in fear, barbeque beef is on the menu until it shoulders through the fence, splintering a sign and scatters the crowd of assembled watchers. Meanwhile a man has shimmied his way up an adjacent tree like a monkey, grasping the hose and clinging on he puts the fire out from above. By the time I got back to the restaurant my dhosa and paneer butter masala were out on the table (and probably the best bit of the whole ordeal).

A Tale of Temples and a Jumble of Jungles - Pt 1

Mysore Spice Market

Leaving Bangalore after the wedding I was probably not in the soundest of minds to attempt my first non-AC carriage train ride. For a start there are no designated seats, after you purchase your ticket it is every man, woman and child for themselves. And believe me they know it. There were two stairways down to the platform but one of which had collapsed about five feet from the bottom. Not keen on making the jump down onto a bed of jagged rubble with all my bags, I decided to cue to use the other stairway like a civilised person. Unfortunately civilisation seems to have skipped India in certain places. Instead of people lining up to go down, a writhing, wriggling ball had formed at the top of the stairs. Men pushed kids and all out of their way, feeble protests drowned out by the shouting they were doing into the mobile phone glued to their ear. Women indiscriminately swung the big burlap sacks balanced on their heads like wrecking balls to clear a path in front of them. I almost felt sorry for the kids being pinballed about and trampled underfoot until one of them accidentally/on purpose kicked me in the shins trying to get past. As the momentum surged backward and forward I was lifted me off my feet on more than one occasion by the flood of people on the stairs. And of course all hell broke lose when the unstoppable force of people going down met the immovable objects of people trying to get back up.

Street Cricket

The compartments of the train were laid out with two benches of four facing each other and two luggage racks running parallel overhead. An aisle ran between those benches and the two further single seats that faced each other. It could have fitted fourteen comfortably, maybe eighteen at a stretch but certainly not the thirty people who piled in on top of me. I was pushed closer and closer to the window until I had to open it just so that half my body could lean out. Kids were standing between my legs, guys climbed onto the luggage rack to sleep on top of my bags and about six people squeezed onto the edge of my seat in a perverse game of tetras. That was before the water sellers and other vendors pushed in, adding to the discordance of noise with their own bellows of prices. But once you got used to the clammy claustrophobic press of bodies it was actually quite an interesting experience. The views were spectacular as we cut through part jungle part pastureland and there was no shortage of wildlife to look at. The kids played games to pass the time and even though I had no idea what they were saying their squeals of joy were infectious. Once the train started moving, wind streamed in through the window grills to cool the cabin down until it was quite pleasant. And at 75p for a four-hour ride it was easy to put any discomforts aside.

Magnificent Mysore

My next stop was Mysore, a city famous for its palace, its handicraft and its dhosa. Keen to see all three I went to the Palace first. It was a huge royal complex and is rated as one of the finest in India. The old wooden structure of the palace had burned down during a feast but the new stone building built in its place at the turn of the 20^th Century was lavishly restored with no expense spared. I took an audio tour of the place, which offered a trove of information to match the treasures on display. Unlike some of the other tours I have done it didn’t getting bogged down in complex genealogy trees that would require a pen and paper to even begin to follow. Packed with an amazing assortment of antiques from pre-Colonial and Colonial times, there was something to see in each room. The highlight was definitely the Durbar Hall used to hold court. True to the divisive customs at the time, every caste and gender had their own position in the room. The Raj’s throne was centre, with his closest nobles and advisors placed beside him according to rank, a gallery for guests and invited dignitaries and a balcony for the royal women. Through the pillars that supported the roof the front was completely open to the parade ground where common people stood to observe proceedings. In the vast grounds of the palace there were a number of temples and other buildings previously used by the royalty and it took the best part of the morning to see it all.

The Durbar Hall

On the way out, a local struck up a conversation with me and decided he was going to take me on an impromptu tour of “the part of Mysore that isn’t in your travel guide.” First we went to a market used pretty exclusively by locals and packed with bowls of spices, bags of vegetables and ghastly hooks hanging sheep and chicken. The stench from the slaughter yard was pretty overpowering but I could help but stare with grim intrigue as the butchers expertly hacked them down sizeable into chunks for customers.

After that we were on to slightly more pleasant odours when he took me to the incense and oil shop. Here I watched a woman rolling sticks through a mixture of charcoal, sawdust, water and oils. These were left to dry in the sun for a couple of hours before being coated in their fragrance powders. She would roll 7,000 of them a day by hand, sitting in that room, making rolling cutlery back home in the Wellie look like a gift.  The oils were all natural remedies that would do everything from clearing asthma, to ridding of rashes, to improving your sexual performance. They were adamant that their water lily oil would stave off mosquitos for up to ten hours and was a lot better for your skin than Western DEET based repellents. But after a night of getting terrorized by mosquitos I think my tasty Irish blood must have ben just too tantalising.

Tabletops 

The last workshop I visited was definitely the most amazing, with Mysore’s carpenters renowned throughout India. They showed me the whole process starting with a plain tabletop and cutting out the designs using a stencil. They do not use any paint throughout the entire process but instead build the inlays through different types of wood. The different wood types provided the full palette of colours they needed for their designs. These were painstakingly carved and sealed into the tabletop. Next the whole table is sanded down and varnished. Then legs are intricately carved and fitted following a similar method. Overall it can take the team of ten men up to a year to make one of the larger banquet tables and would cost in the region of ten to twelve thousand euros. They have quite a long waiting list so get your orders in now!

Dhosa

The dhosa in Mysore is famous in southern India for its authenticity, with some of the restaurants dating back a couple centuries. Slathered in ghee (Indian lard) it had the greasy feel of a good takeaway. The restaurant had five tables of four but each seat was filled. As soon as someone stood to leave another took his place. The waiter came out with an endless stream of the savoury crepe like pancakes and dished them out to whoever had an empty plate. Dhosa after dhosa, until I too could take no more and was replaced at the table by the next guy.

ConAirBus

The evenings in Mysore were mostly spent chilling on the hostel rooftop with the owners looking out over the city. The Zostel guys gave me a great tip for my next destination, Bandipur National Park, as well. Rather than pay £25 for a 4x4 to take me on a two-hour tour they told me to stay overnight with a local at a converted hunting lodge for £7.50 a night. The owner had built his own watchtower and from there you had as good a chance as any to see the wildlife up close. On the way there two police officers flagged down our bus and got on with a third man. The two police officers sat down while the third man remained sheepishly standing. My exact thoughts were could he be? No surely he wasn’t a prisoner, who in their right mind would bring an arrested person on to a public bus. But before I could begin to admonish myself for being so silly, one of the police officers reached over and opened the other man’s previously concealed handcuffs and then the man himself cuffed them to the rail overhead. Certainly one way to balance the books on the policing bill back home!

Unwanted Hitchhiker

The bus I had taken was actually the main bus ride between Mysore and Ooty, two big towns in the south of India. The incredible part was for forty-five minute of the journey it runs through the national park. So people on their ever day work commute will drive past a plethora of peacocks, a deluge of deer and manic monkeys stealing food from anywhere they could get it.  At the checkpoint between Karnataka and Tamil land, an unfortunate truck driver was unaware that a monkey who had climbed on top was pilfering his cargo of onions. Eating his fill and throwing the odd piece down to the waiting troop when he needed a breather. The buses were quite old fashioned, rickety, metallic contraptions. People were packed into them like the proverbial tin of sardines only I think that tin would have had a better suspension system.

The first day at the lodge I saw pretty much everything from the watchtower that overlooked a small manmade waterhole; wild boars bathing, more monkeys cavorting, stags charging and clashing heads. A peacock spread its feathers in a majestic display of defiance to ward of an approaching mongoose. It looked so regal and brave, but then ruined the moment when it flew (did not know they could do that) to a tree branch. The long wedding dress of plumage it carried behind it was so ungainly that it looked unbalanced in the air. This time more drunkenly majestic, like your friend at the end of the night falling over but managing to keep his kebab intact.

Watchtower view with boar and deer

At night as I watched a biblical thunderstorm play out in the towering mountains nearby the hostel owner joined me. He was an elderly man and had been working there since he was a boy and when it was still a hunting lodge favoured by British hunting parties, a very different set up to the eco-tourist business he ran now. I had really wanted to see a wild elephant or tusker as he called them, as so far I had only seen work elephants in India, always chained up whether it was for tourism or heavy labour. The next morning the owner delivered and one of the workers jumped me on to his bike. We sped off into the jungle in search of an elephant that had been spotted there earlier. I had heard before that Indian elephants where very aggressive when compared to their African cousins. They were known to have trampled tourist vehicles and now long trenches had been dug between the road and the bush to offer some protection, but the driver told me if the elephant wanted you bad enough it would still get you. We searched for twenty five minutes before he pulled the bike in and killed the engine. Walkeing back a hundred yards up the road he pointed through some branches. And there it was across the safety ditch but no more than fifty yards away. A big bull elephant busily stuffing a half shredded plant into its mouth, the powerful shoulders were haunched as if it was ready to spring off at a moments notice. Its head was down while it chewed but as soon as I took out my camera it paused eating. Whether it could see me or not or merely decided I was no immediate threat it went back to the task at hand. We sat for half an hour or so watching him eat his fill before he moved off deeper into the bush and I was still exhilarated after as we rode back to the lodge.

Wild Elephant v Work Elephant

The only downside were the local tourists at the lodge. Most of them didn’t appear to have any interest in seeing any wildlife, instead most of them seemed to want to be seen seeing wildlife. They spent most of their time in the watchtower taking selfies, answering phone calls or playing music off their phone. They talked loud enough they could have been heard back in Mysore and certainly loud enough to scare away any animals. With me the gora or foreigner, I was sadly more exotic to them than any tiger or leopard ever would be. While I was sitting there they would try to ask me every question from favourite colour to what my star sign was. Part and parcel of coming to India for sure and each day I'm definitely now waving at more random people than the Pope and Queen combined, but when out to see wildlife it does start to grate. Realising I wouldn’t see any more with them there I organised for a 4x4 to take me back to the bus stop. If I expected any difference here I was sorely mistaken as we ricocheted our way from pothole to speed bump. These drivers are employed to work in the national park but instead they drive like they are rallying on the Isle of Man. He used his horn in place of his brake for every blind corner, meaning we were more likely to hit a wild animal than see one on the way back!

Gulmohur/Peacock Flower Tree