Hidden For a Millennium

Something Indiana Jones would approve of... some gems that were revealed only to us after basking in the loving cradle of sands of time - to be more exact, created and hidden for at least a thousand years before being unearthed.

Just Another Normal Day Away From Home

My sleepy eyes pulled up their lids like cranky old Roman curtains on a cloudy, cool morning in Bangalore, or more fondly called by my own nuance, Bengaluru. It's another time of the year to drown in a lazy indulgence of absolutely relaxing and doing nothing, for no other reason than you can!

Basking in that glow, my mind kept running back to the past events of the last two months, like a love-struck gazelle prancing and jumping in a delirious celebration of armour, coffee beans and probably many others. What came as just another simple morning awoken to a land that I had to think a bit on bearings, on sounds spoken in a tongue that I could not recognise, bumps and huffs from a pet dog in our current friend's home by the name of Zac - prompting me a good wake-up with his gigantic gentle paws and lovely drooling smothering hot fat licking tongue of the physical kind.

I thought about getting smashed and literally carried away up above my feet from the ground, by a crowd that cradled me by its sheer size and numbers, along witnessing the parade of the palace like a queen on her own carriage. I remembered the pressing of hot human flesh from aunties that probably should had gone a bit easy on the jalebi pig-out, my ears still rang of the loud boisterous shout-back of Indian mothers who took no shit from bullies made in male uniforms as they hurled back abuse made more pronounced from impatience. My skin still tingled from the heat, the dryness yet my pores felt cleansed from the hike up that morning hill in Pushkar as sacred as the notion built upon to worship and appease the goddess.

Every now and then, no sooner than I had began to think that I find myself riding an auto and watch the world hopped by. Cows' udders filled with milk waited with a nonchalant pace as the milkman pulled down each teat with the fervor of spring, women balancing gently like swaying coconut palms as they put their urns of fresh water and milk on their heads, palms holding lovingly to their children. Bakeries filled out the streets with the pungent produce of the ovens, intermingled with the rancid smells of last night's late pissers, whom like thieves in the dark - desecrating walls with what their little bladders could not hold, and the paths along villages lined with fresh vegetables and flowers for the housewives and pilgrims coming to congregate for the day's cooking and pooja. Temple bells clanked out the hymns of the faithfuls, one could so easily find peace within such chaos.

Indeed, in India, with so much to offer and so little space, everyone is anyone's business. You learn to live within and without the community, you learn to stand up and you learn to let go. Be it the rich or the rags, anyone can somehow still find a little bit of magic amidst the pollution of politics and obstacles (for the latter, a Ganesha holds a lot of allure for the believers). For a single traveller looking for something in herself, this is, I will say again, the best and biggest classroom of life you can find.

India can be intimidating to the first impression. She's a complicated but attractive lady that takes the shapes of so many avatars. She's a wild mustang that runs strong amongst the Kashmiri hills, then she could be a tired, age-worn courtesan in Delhi that you keep going back for the stories of the ancient glorious past and a goblet of wine (and mind you, India produced some of the best wines I have tasted), to a seductive, saucy temptress leaving her footprints on the Great Thar Desert, while I drift into my private thoughts of the many village women that billowed away amongst the mirage from the heat, and as my train zipped past the fields of sunflowers, golden mustard pastures, laughing green sugarcane plantations that seemed to wave at me like children, I remembered vaguely of a tired looking lone turbaned Rajasthani man daydreaming away on a corner at the platform, while his mouth chewed absentmindedly on a paan.

And again, I thought so often back to the woman I saw opposite the train station on our stop at Vadodara. How her seemed husband slapped her face in what looked like a private domestic fight taking place in public. She looked fed-up, she fought back to warn him not to disrespect her again. He was a coward. He tried to drag her to the shadows of a flight of stairs, to further coerce her behind prying eyes. I wanted to run up the cross-over bridge to launch a thousand punches on him, I wanted to offer whatever I had to empower the woman. Whatever was her fault, I don't believe in subduing a person to win an argument. Why must it always be a one-sided discourse? Surely we have enough room for a disagreement, I may not be parallel with your thinking but that doesn't mean I don't like you - surely? But as horribly as the scene played out, nobody on their side of the platform came to help. The guards with cane sticks were busy parading their badges on the other far end, there were too many distractions and just as a power-cut would suspend your movie in-between, an incoming train cut off whatever visual I could have of the woman. And I had to get on to board.

I had seen many forms of the female here. Some were bright, some hopeful. Some determined and strong, some downright pending for an eternal deliverance from rebirth into this hard world. Some would hold the great history of India, some would be the great future of India. Some touched me with the charity of a greeting and nothing more, some begged for more beyond of what I could give.

Unfortunately I could not seem to reach beyond what public interchange allowed of me with the other half of India. That said, many in the North had been aggressively less polite to me because of my gender, many a time using the might of volume and rude hand gestures to scare me off... only to learn that a pure Chinese Hakka takes no crap from anyone, man or woman. Some were quietly respectful like the villagers I had met in Kashmir, others were, to say the least, quite happy to eye you incessantly. Many young boys were, in my joking mood, brave enough to reach out and touch my hand. I suppose little boys will always be curious but they will be the more adventurous ones to ask about my name. Moving South, I am more comfortable with the c'est la vie go-about attitude from the dwellers here. There was less stalking, less barking at my face. But all said and done, India generally speaking protects the honour of a lady very much. If a man so as much as graze you intendedly in a rude way, the crowd doesn't take to such act kindly. I would say that in today's world, this sort of communal looking after each other is a rarity but alive here in this country, although much in a fragile balance between the traditional and what not.

And there was also the incident in the city of Aurangabad. Young newly minted kids acting in an egoistic manner. Stealing drinks behind the club's bar and pretending that they "meant to pay" for it later. Creating a lot of noise, intimidating the bar tender when the bill was presented with a penalty. Using their daddy's money to ask "do you know who I am?" - isn't that too last century?

And then there was the ripping out of chairs and throwing of bottles onto the field because the fifth series of the ODI between India and Sri Lanka was cancelled. Forget about the safety of the kids perhaps? But then again, a little part of me had gone a bit cricket crazy.

There will never be another India and my only wish now is to make the best out of the next two months, and maybe a sly maybe, that in the future, we will catch the pinnacle of this wave that the Asian Tiger had woke up to.

Dream A Little Dream

Closing in on eight weeks of waking up in between white sheets, bumpy train sleepers, and an Indian Jasmine infused garden, I looked back at how far we had come to wake to, literally a new beginning every day. That, itself is a blessing. Perhaps it's the season of well wishing and the ushering into a new year as we bade a melancholy embrace to a year that will be to pass, perhaps it's a lot of reflecting and a lot of hoping. Perhaps yet, it could be just a simple little private shout-out from your heart that this is what every reason I should be thankful for.

Our train pulled up perfectly on time from a two day break at Mysore, and I learned that we would be on another train to Hampi tomorrow to celebrate jumping through ancient ruins strewn as leftover crumbs from the last Hindu empire in India and burrowing into my favourite set of arms as we count the dying minutes of the old year. But I would have to spare a few moments to share with you a funny past 48 hours in a lovely little charming town that was a way, the perfect getaway to celebrate a Christmas occasion - with the lights, the crowd, the drama, and the uniqueness that only Mysore could bring (to bring some local authenticity to it, just say it with a bit of "My-surrr").

We arrived on another wonderful train journey (nothing comes close to beat some of the flagship lines, hot piping Indian thali lunch, punctual schedule, clean seats, killer scenery) to a little drama of finding literally - our online room booking did not materialise (a tiny hiccup to be settled but then again, you always prepare for a little bit of left-hooks during travels) despite receiving an online confirmation. Mysore for a long weekend, think many revelers, multiply that by a ten-fold, now plus another hundred of bus loads of tourists - you definitely would have to have your lucky stars backpacking on you, and we did. Albeit a pricier room, we got our room for the two nights we were meant to stay in Mysore. We did the charming watching the lights at the City Palace, we did the smelling around into old Devraja Bazaar hunting for sandalwood items, soaps, learning about plant oils and perfumes from a Persian Sufi, took a many photographs along flower lanes, vegetable lanes, fruits to the heaps without a single person haggling aggressively at your face, made some acquaintances with locals that were curious on the reason we found a pile of jasmine buds interesting enough to photograph, given free incense sticks that warmed up our room for a special weekend, and just digging into some stupendously delicious food that only a feast invited and prepared by the Gods would be akin to alike.

Yes, it was quite a packed town as we moved from the old market lanes to the main circle and in between got a bit lost. Just asked and anyone will direct you. A young girl walked past me and wished me a "Merry Christmas" - I was touched, that was indeed, the clearest and most earnest yuletide wish I had in years. There were many homeless too, a reason to quietly give a little of what you have to help to make the smallest of whatever difference you can. The bus stands were packed, the shops were bursting like an overly indulged lunch affair. Watching the lights come up at the palace was like being a child waiting for Santa Claus all over again. Having all these tourists around you, doing the oohs, aahhs, and the like were like celebrating the end of the year's class with your friends again. It was magical, personal and something of a long-forgotten but remembered memory that laid in the deepest pocket of your inner chamber that held the good stuff that made your eyes a bit watery at the thought of a moment in your life before that was innocent and pure.

In a way, Mysore felt like a dream I woke up from. I knew I had been there, but in a strange mode, I felt like I was never quite there except by the very dream-like, floating transition of my physical being to experiencing something ethereal. Maybe sometimes it's better to dream, than to never have dreamed the dreamiest of a dream?

What Is My Palm Fortune?

"Would you read my fortune?"

"Of course" he said, with a twinkle in his eyes. Cupping mine in his warm extended hands, symbolically unfolding the secrets that were held within these loving fingers.

And so the story began that a lass would tread the long rocky road to Aurangabad, the famed last resting place for the tyrannical Mughal ruler, Aurangzeb. For the longest reign, the cruellest rule within the largest Mughal domain, this man's resting platform that served as a transfer route to the abode above, was stripped to the simplest form, perfumed only by fallen rose petals with long golden pencil minarets of the nearby mosque looking forlornly down at a man that once turned his back on the wide propagation of secular India to embrace a hugely fundamental iron fist of a rule that brought many an Arabian Night fantasy to their knees.

The city today was a hub of throbbing commercial activity, draped with a length of desert sandy cloth that hugged her voluptuous curves meandering the pasty brick buildings interspersing with the blue and egg white sack wrappers making up the homes of the homeless, dotted by mud strawed huts where man and beast co-exist in a harmonious balance that fed Aurangzeb's ancient city from a day to day, one small pebble a way along the long road to fertile extensions of mustard fields, sunflower gardens, wild vegetation, and tiny buds of cotton pockets. Cows, goats, dogs and chickens in the numbers built by the jumping heels of the young, signifying the fertility and the reproductive ability of a part of India that had seen relatively more rain than most of the Northern parts of late.

I would see a land that only appeared in my dreams, of pink sunsets and smells of lush green when the rain pellets left long time ago on the swaying grass under a winter's breeze. Like the wavy fingers of svelte dancing maidens, they bade me farewell as I made my way to the Ellora and Ajantha Caves, luring me to let down my guard and fall into a gentle hypnosis.

"What would I see?" my urging voice asked before I knew that I would be told.

I saw so many wonderful things akin to how one felt when he looked into the chambers of a king. Many astounding relics of times preceding the birth of Christ, paintings down in ways before anyone would put onto an organised form the art of creation. Carvings and sculptures born from monolithic erections, stories told through hands that lay cold buried today of their many sights and beliefs, thoughts and voices all articulating the ancient, the mythical, the mysterious. A times of gods, goddesses, demons and believers, it was a world then that the ancient traveller would have no problem dreaming of passing as time took obeisance to the opening mountains, no boulders or obstacles were too intimidating to overcome. Yes, this was a time when the world was indeed small yet diverse. The holy union of the Sumerian / Persian, Chinese Buddhism, Roman Egyptian and Indus notions were beautifully locked in perpetuity here. Again, wonderful things, amazing achievements and all these hidden for some years - close to a millennium for the case of Ajantha - at times, perhaps protected from the plundering rapists of invaders and thieves.

"And what challenges would we entail along your journey?" he asked.

What could be, then, more romantic than spending time productively, positively when you have to stand in front of the train station, knowing that your connecting train will only leave the platform in nine hours, at a glaringly sleepy hour of one in the morning? The middle part of India that we journeyed into lay out a feast of sights, like how a good host will decorate a long dining table for your pleasure. On the gutted fresh muddy fields, women took a break from back breaking work of harvesting and primming their land, working with a faithful ox, hushing away a crow, while kids ran in a crickety way up small hills of spiky grass waving at our passing train. Pune, a pit stop that we took interesting observation of how India morphed from the overly assertive yet hardened Northern attitude to a tropical easygoing Southern tune. It's not lazy, it's not rudeness, it's just how India has an amazing way of growing in different angles like the great rivers cutting through their arteries of train treks, servicing, feeding, keeping the nation in their grace. Thirty hours, bonding, getting to know, meeting new faces and laughing into the night with the simplest of humour that only the two of you understood...

As I sighed in a longing yet nostalgic breath, here sitting in Bengaluru, I loved how this city again, charmed me surprisingly without the blaring, hustler way of bigger cities I had encountered. The temperate weather and the old colonial layout of bricks and mortar, of umbrellas of trees lining the streets, of the people, the food. We move to Mysore tomorrow to spend another wonderful year of Christmas. We were in Bali last year, and I never would have thought that the great womb the spun the sacred knowledge of yoga, the grand courage of Tipu, the one that many a British Raj abhorred, the Durga Hill, a time to just be together...

"And you shall be loved by a man of brown eyes, curly hair, and you will have many children and your home will be filled with many dogs, animals like chickens and baby goats, you will live happily ever after..."

I looked into his eyes. That again, was when I realised how lucky and by no random chance that I had found someone to share all such unforgettable and defining experiences in life.

Merry Christmas hubby, and with all my love today, tomorrow and forever.

What Monster Sleeps Under Your Bed?

In my case, none?

Reason? The monster has hit again. I'm sleepless in Mumbai. Gosh, it sounds so bad that I don't think I can even cut it for a book cover!

I have less than three hours to pretend I should be sleeping for my 0430 hours auto pick-up and I'm already deliberating if not sleeping should be a better option.

Maybe it's the conversations I had today. Maybe I'm worried about returning "home" in case that I may not be able to fit back into "old shoes". Maybe I'm concerned that many original faces will find me odd now.

No, I'm not running off to an ashram nor am I renouncing Malai kulfi. Maybe India has opened my eyes to the wonders of a vegetarian lifestyle by choice? Maybe I am enamoured by the power of Ayurvedic healing. Maybe I am encouraged by the fact that you can speak out against wearing dead animal skin. Maybe I am, for once, braver than I thought I was. Maybe taking a conscious step away from the easy lure of the 9-9 rat race once we resettle back to "routine" despite the offerings of a regular pay cheque and retirement benefits is the answer. Maybe I do really want to throw myself in a more heavily involved schedule with animal work. Maybe I should not procrastinate anymore and sign up for that domestic animal degree, or take further tutelage in photography?

Maybe play more music? Create more enduring memories through my coffee table books and dig up some of those special DVDs that my good ol' Mac had churned out? Maybe cook a new recipe every day?

We're already holding hands more often, we're talking deeper, maybe now it's time to do that with myself.

Who knows where that maybe may lead to?

Mumbai Asks "Do You Have What It Takes?"

This is the face of today.

She is bright, chirpy, articulate in which language is no barrier. She is opinionated, well mannered, full spirited and positive. She is my Mumbai.

I woke to the hypnotic pipes of a bamboo flute, sent out rising to my second floor flat in the middle of Santa Cruz West by an early riser of a flute seller. Gazing out, the street was already filled with the cart sellers of today's fruits in season - voluptuous papayas and spiky golden pineapples, walled by spring green limes. The buses and autos were ringing off like a dutiful alarm clock, signalling the madness from the night before had taken enough of a rest to begin the cycle all over again. It's an energy giving marathon of taking on a day filled with school, work, a chat here, a chai there, some post-lunch phone calls, a trip to Crossword to send home another DHL-sped 55kg box of fantastic Indian literature, watching the humid hot smoldering day churned her fruitful hips along the many arteries of trains and vehicles funneling the city's millions turning into a mistress of the evening, cooling you down with her breathy windy whispers and tantalizing you with her erotic virile mix of the modern, old, industrious and a whole lot other bag of gastronomical, sensational hybrid of smells, sounds, thumping scattering of feet, many in that count, until you fall flat on your mattress, hot and sweaty, itching for that calming wash before you close your eyes to another unforgettable day.

This is my Mumbai. We crossed a rusty train railway off Bandra station, after the customary photo session with some young college Punjabi lads (off to a weekend away from parents at Goa) and fighting for a "cab by the meter", we arrived at Juhu Beach. It turned into a week of living with a friend's family, doing it the local Mumbai way. We were privileged into a world of three generations co-existing in a home of love. Nights of small whisky caps before dinner, many unique home cooked meals, stories of how our home's patriarch left with his grandfather at a tender age of almost two during the 1947 Separation on a flight chartered by the then Jodhpur Maharaja - narrowly escaping death due to his family's dedication as the Royal Tailor to His Highness. Stories of rags to riches yet one would be hard pressed to see this family behaving in anything but honourable. Yes, you have heard the stories, watched some Bollywood, reviled by the nouveau riche's gaudy behavior, but Mumbai doesn't have the time, not because everyone is too rude, but more of "what's the issue? Let's move on" attitude that had propelled Mumbai to leap ahead, despite the many Doom's Day proclamation on the 26/11 anniversary on the major papers.

Millions get transacted here, daily. Even Dharavi, the infamous slums (thrown into the eyes of the world unfortunately to the distaste of many locals, by the movie Slumdog Millionaire) generate a profitable close of US2million industry of leather, pottery and labour. A walk down the many winding labyrinth of houses and dwellings revealed people of pride, just like you and me - homes were garlanded with the Hindu offerings, front yards of a few square meters were swept clean, children did not ask for anything except that you pause and play a few English number counting games with them, a potter invited us to study their trade through observation. Should you be so inclined to offer a Namaste, it will be accepted with smiles and nods. You will be left in your own time and space to wander. Here, it swelled with positivity, a way upwards. We compared Dharavi with Colaba Causeway, the "poorer" side of dwellers in the old city. "So what?" they may ask. You see nets that had been tried out in the seas just this morning, hung to dry for another day's work tomorrow while the fishermen went to work and dry the "sea duck", a fish that dried to perfection reminded me of the salty seas of East Coast fishermen back in Malaysia. You'll pass by at least ten weddings all adorned in circus fashion just that very night, along Queen's Necklace.

Here, weddings are big business but you'll see that the money obviously flowed through hands that worked tirelessly to build, arrange, negotiate, all making that very bride's dream come true, the many friends dancing off the night, the groom's desire for sleep to come soon, and very proud parents happy - just that - one big happy family

And you head on to Haji Ali's tomb. The onslaught of people smashed your arms, face, back as if you've been thrown into a washing machine on full spin. The air burst with smells of popcorn, lime juice and rang high with shouts to come grab the best priced carpets and holy books in town. The march to the saint's tomb is long, but the sight is even longer. You will see people co-existing in different mashes of dirt, pooja offerings (here, they don't believe in throwing offerings post-worship into dustbin, hence the sea became the natural site) and an odd wedding card (perhaps a jilted ex?) with families - be it Hindu or Muslim - stucked, yes with possibly no way out in this lifetime, sleeping amongst the many mattresses of plastic bags, papers, rocks, filth, byproducts, burnt rubbish, coconut shells - only perhaps a deliverance will come in the break of your rebirth cycle, through karma wishful thinking or fervent prayers.

But then again, the "beggar community" pays "rent" to "beggar mafia" to suffice (I have no idea how to arrive at this number but you just have to trust the locals) a million if not millions dollar industry. Yes, the popular saying that no beggar in Mumbai goes to bed hungry. Some even tucked in a tandoori chicken with a couple of naan at it. Doubt it? Take a closer look, study the moves, body language - maybe it's not that far fetched a truth.?

If time could sweep you off without the limitation of 24 hours, you would float above the traffic again, mindless of night or day, stopping by a "since 1960s" Malai Kulfi shop (I indulged myself crazy on a 200g "just-for-me" ice cream, undeniably the best one in my entire life I have ever eaten and I had tasted a lot of ice cream everywhere!), and head off to Gateway Of India, passing the Victorian remnants of the government buildings and train stations, funnily gargoyles and lion statues "guarded" the lines of the sky covering the criss-cross traffic mash, while dots of saree and dhoti pedestrians walk around at their own pace, oblivious to the hurry of other hand gesticulating drivers and policemen. Stopping by the Crawford Market and bazaars, a mix of Muslim and Hindu traders - identified only by the henna brightened Muslim fashioned beard and hair, made only more eccentric by the Hijaada, eunuchs, all sipping chai together in dirt cheap stalls. Overhearing some conversations about some traders cutting cheaper at the other bazaar zones around the Muslim dominant areas lovingly nicknamed "Little Pakistan", I tried to avert my gaze but my curiosity got the better of me of the Hijaada. They drank their tea in the dark shadows of the stairs, but I could feel their eyes pawing down at me, as vulnerable as a gazelle I felt, in the open plains while the lion crouched nearby in the depth of cover.

And suddenly, I was brought back to the sunny decks of Dhobi Ghat, where hundreds of men, all slicked up hair and glistening muscles in a common motion, hitting out and spinning dry one man's work shirt, a student's pinafore, a government servant's pants. Nothing is lost in the supply chain, very much deserving a Six Sigma study equivalent to the Tiffin-wallahs.

Again, we flew away, above another day looking down from the circling eagles on the coast of Mumbai. A vantage view of a normal day's churn of Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Parsi, and other anyone, anybody, anything. Forget about Bombay Dreams - here, you will finally see how that dreams do come true.

Udaipur, Romance Your Inner Sunset

Udaipur is a town that captured you from the start. As I sat on my overnight train to Ahmedabad en route to Vadodara, I looked back at one of the more romantic moments rekindled with one's self and the world. Yes, not even the hard juts and halts of the train carriage could dampen one's reflection of...

Many will tell you (and this is a sure dead giveaway they hadn’t put down their travel guide books!) that the palaces greeted you with the first sight on this city. Not exactly. Perhaps if you took to being shipped around by a Taj or Oberoi equivalent (which really cut you off from seeing a majority of the many things that happened off the cuff on the streets) but not if you burn it through the hills that encapsulated this city like gentle giant camels that sat in unison. You can get hopelessly lost finding different roof top restaurants to have a sundowner or dinner by the candlelight, or you can soak in the day’s slapping and ritualistic cleansing done by the local women of their laundry and their toilet disciplines. Cows parked in almost every corner, sometimes near a water pump, while another turn, your eyes feasted upon the colourful assembly of a post-funeral gathering (how starkly different from a Chinese!) and up the hills, get a shave and close hair trim for Rs50 while pampered yourself with some Ayurvedic potions and creams from Auntie Anju (as she fussed over you like her child?) and the many self-professed screening of Octopussy.

There were many vantage spots to capture many a wonderful, romantic way to end the day. What I would leave for you to discover beyond the guide books is the hidden gems in the town quarters that the foreigners would never go. Come here. Take a slow unplanned, unchartered walk. You will see in close proximity, slim lanky women draped in all adornment, carrying loads of washing, ground flour, and some, dried up cow dung mud cakes. There will be carvers begging for patronage. Then some donkeys passed by, another woman dodging your path as she deftly carried a gigantic load of tree branches. Shy grandmothers sat by their little haveli’s shuttered windows, carts of vegetables tempting a bystanding cow. Walk down to the Muslim quarters, join a few boys and show them how the jumping tic-tac-toe is done. Wave at a kid that just wanted a hello. Resist an old Udaipurian woman asking you to clear off her vegetables for sale for the day, only to be mesmerized by the giant circular nose ring hanging on her face, protruding like a sore thumb yet elegantly reminding you of her youthful days. Stop for a chai and have another one. Marvel at the miracle of life as you stand and watch a mother dog nursing her eight puppies.

As traditional Rajasthani folk music filled the night’s air and swallows and sparrows burnt off into the sunset, sit back and relax with the assurance that Udaipur will remain as individually unique as She had been the night before, and tomorrow. For I really believe that Udaipur has to be seen, to be cherished. Like a lover that you took in a moment of uncalculated presumption, Udaipur will be the name that forever rings a sweet heartbreakingly melancholy note in your heart of hearts.

Only your yearning to return will be what is sufficiently called your sustenance during your time of separation.

Hitting High On Pushkar

Did you know that is is legal for the sadhu to smoke opium, drink it, get completely smashed in a "spiritual" state of high to bind with the heavenly beings?


Or did you know that should you accidentally knock dead a goat while driving in Rajasthan (even though the goat may had ran into you instead) that you have to marry the goat herder’s daughter? No bargaining allowed.


Yes, and did you know it was completely not unheard or unseen to get laced tea and watched many saucer-eyed travelers, dressed up in the most ridiculous hippy clothing, some running stark naked up the small religious sacred city of one of the most revered ghat in India?


Think, Nehru, Gandhi, part of their ashes were scattered in what was presently a dried up lake. For us, we took to watch the early sun rise on the hills, and soak in the sunset amidst the wide stretching Aravalli Hills, with the ashram and long-tailed gibbons hanging about.


Pushkar is one of the holiest towns, with complete adherence to the strict vegetarian diet, even no eggs! However, Pushkar was also a place competing for the precious tourist dollar and many came to “legally” get high (doing something stupid was at the abuser’s discretion, unfortunately recent records showed women were the worst perpetrators) and Pushkar was also a city that woke you up with pooja and a strange feeling of spiritual contemplation. Perhaps in the midst of such juxtaposes, I found myself thinking more of what’s and what’s not.


Pushkar was also the hiding ground for one of the head planners of last year’s Mumbai terrorist bombing of the Taj and the CBI happened to house up at our little lodging!


I saw my first homeless, how they lived, where they slept, where they communed and ran their daily lives as normal as their circumstances would allow. They seemed nonchalant about it. I bought some fantastic wood carving work by an old man, I was not allowed into a Hindu temple that was bought over by a single fanatical owner that had some unsettled issue with “foreigners”. I refrained from being forced to buy flowers and prayers. I had some fantastic vegetarian dishes since arriving in India. I learned about the table and the dholak. We shipped 15kg of things home to Australia.

I still am not sure what to make out of Pushkar. Had never been to one place that carried that much oxymoronic nuances, yet in a quiet elegant way, had never seen a city as queer and charming as Pushkar.

The Special Mentions

After chartering five weeks on the dusty road, there had been many a unique character that I will never forget. In all humour and the spirit of adventure, allow me to introduce to you:

Mootu, the one-eyed dog, who never gave up a long dry trek through the Khuri Desert. He came out of nowhere as we passed Devraji’s village in Jaisalmer, and he followed us through the afternoon, running ahead as we looked hard to find the giant Acacia tree to cook lunch and rest away the day’s heat. We gave him some dal and chapatti. We all ate pleasantly and took our siesta very seriously. As the sun hit the lower meridian, Mootu took off to lead our camels towards the sand dunes where we would camp for the night under the open sky.

That night, he guarded our surroundings by chasing after every negligent fox that came too close for comfort. All Mootu asked from me was acknowledgement and a scratch on his dog-fight bitten ears. In the morning, he was warmly curled up in a pit he dug himself, while we set up our camels for the ride home. As we passed by his village again, Mootu ran off, only to look back three times at us. Tailed straightly erected with a sense of purpose and belonging, Mootu bade a final goodbye as he tracked back to his village and I struggled to sense his whereabouts as Mootu dashed in and out of bushes and thickets. It felt weird to have him following me by my camel the whole of yesterday and until this morning, to so quickly have the umbilical attachment cut off without warning.

Then suddenly, I saw a glimpse of Mootu, in the far away parched field, proudly telling me that it was okay and that we accepted what we were given, as was the rule of the land in the desert.

B. S. Sodha, the proud and loud guide within the Jaisalmer Fort’s Palace. As other guides would attest, essential knowledge would be the fastest route to earning from and learning about foreigners like us. Not only he enthralled us with his camel love story (which led to the belief that the camel represents love in Rajasthan, famously told many times by the actions of a prince that took to his nightly stalking of a princess that lived near the ancient city of Nargaur, while his wife slept unknowingly back in where modern day Pakistan was) he seemed to tell a darn good tale backed by an even more entertaining volume of voice. Case in point we could tell that he must had been extremely proud of his past Maharaja when we ran past the genealogy when we saw other fellow visitors with their audio guide covering their ears, giving us dirty glances when Sodha culminated his story with beaming pride, pigeon-chested and a tenor tone to sing the praises of their proud emperors (long gone buried in the safety of their cenotaphs).

Kanu Swami, an artist of utmost talent. I spent a great few hours to admire his work and watch him guide the fine single hair brush across the painting of an eagle, more impressionist than classical portrayal of the magnificent creature in the desert plains. The oddity came when I was asking (and learning) about painting done on camel bones. Perhaps in between the crude exchange of language, me being completely painfully hopeless in Hindi and his smattering of English, he raised his index finger and loudly declared that he had “exactly what I was looking for” in his private collection of camel bone art done in six pieces of ravishingly painted pictorial of… wait for it… the Kama Sutra. Not wanting to sound like a prude, I held those pieces of art (they were beautifully articulated, no details were too small nor too big (ahem, no pun) to paint accurately) and pretended that I was looking at them as I would a Sufi painting. My brains were running a quick mental research of what was the most socially accepted and etiquette-wise graceful way of exiting this awkward situation for me without offending my enthusiastic painter, and I had no answer to the best number of seconds I should paused between the “module of the peacock (no pun) orgasmic obtainment” to the “module of pinches and kisses”. Too much detail before dinner perhaps?

Rest assured I went home with miniature depiction of Rajasthani tiger hunts, thank you very much.

Which leads us to the grand finale of the ultimate sacrifice of a learner of the unknown, my first encounter with a masseuse en route to Pushkar.

Although we slept fairly in most places, there was the one or two tight knots on the shoulders and I, in the spirit of “why not?” that I had learned from my fellow Indians, decided to risk where no man had gone, and called for a room massage. Apparently this lady was skilled in the fine art of a “Kerala” massage. Knowing next to nothing but not expecting it to come any close to the ones I had enjoyed in Thailand and Indonesia, I happily waited for the hours to pass before I succumb like a melting pad of butter under the warm loving hands of my masseuse.

And was I glad that I had my hubby with me in the room.

She turned out to be a chef that graduated from the school of beating out naan bread. I didn’t think she was a masseuse, least one skilled in the Ayurvedic healing massages. I tried to rally with her, I tried to bear the pain, I tried to hold on and prove that we puny Southeast Asian travelers could withstand the crushing might of the Rajasthani women (in hindsight I had no idea what I was trying to prove!) and above all, with nothing but my tiny little brief offering me the barest physical protection from her hands with fingers that resembled giant overfed caterpillars, I closed my eyes and whispered that 40 minutes will pass on soon enough.

Ten minutes into the gig, I could ask for a bag to store the powdered teeth that resulted from too much grinding, and she even had the cheek to switch on the television! Hubby told her “no television” and I thought she probably took it out on me. Smelling of chopped raw onions, she proceeded to slapped down my body on the mattress, giving no hole out for my nose to inhale precious oxygen to fight the onslaught. A few ugly squirts of oil (that were supposed to hold herbal goodness), she began to rub my back like how my over-eager aunt would marinate a fattened duck for the festival dinner. Between gasping for air as my face bounced rhythmically off and on the mattress, I found that I had to often remind myself to release my clenched fists. Even my toes were getting cramps from curling too much. In short, my massage was a date in hell, poured with kerosene and with the Devil himself poking his prong at my ass. I would had readily knelt down to ask for deliverance but my massage was only 15 minutes into the process!

As the minutes agonizingly crawled to the next, she topped the routine by emptying the bottle of oil on my head and proceeded to rolling me in between her hands. I felt like I was being used as an exercise prop for her biceps and as she pushed down my lower back from where she was standing (in front of my head), being amply blessed on the mammary glands department, I felt (again) in all generosity, the full impact of two huge gulab jamun, in their operatic bigness upon my skull. It was like a boxer doing his round of punches on the reflex ball, except that my head was the poor latter and her breasts were drilling down me, made worse by her coned bras that would turn Madonna in her “Like a virgin” days to shame and blush.

In the end, she asked me to turn over and I ungracefully made the move like a fish on its tail end of life, or whatever was left in it. Now, if previously I felt vulnerable, then I truly felt sheer fright. She began to speed up crushing my joints and almost dislocating my toes in the move of plucking out lady’s fingers for dinner. There was absolutely nothing relaxing about this entire session and I never realized that 40 minutes could be a lifetime of torture under the wrong hands.

As she culminated her treatment with smashing my face and rearranging (luckily unsuccessfully) my eyes with my lips and nose, interspersed with some weird smelling facial cream, I was almost asphyxiating from the lack of fresh air in between fighting for a clear hole from the top assault of her boobies and the onion smells from her armpits. I was still hanging on and in a strange way, I felt really proud of myself!

Something was seriously going wrong with my head but nonetheless, I went overdrive on positivity and told myself that this too, would pass. Only that I should had said my prayers earlier and hoped much, much later.

Two dark shadows came swooping down at my unsuspecting thoracic region and I felt her utilizing the ultimate chapatti kneading motion with my girls. Then with a gasp (from my part) and her satisfied slap on her hand, she announced the therapeutic massage was complete. It was 30 minutes.

I had lost all massage dignity in that time.

Jodhpur, India’s Most Formidable City

Meherangarh, the name itself inspired awe and wonder. As we whooshed into the exterior city wall unchecked except curious stares from the odd pedestrian, it was a hot cloudless day and I drifted away to the formidable might of its Marwari Emperors, sung today in dead ancient hymns of their past glorious resistance of the much feared Mughal forces. The city had never been invaded past its walls and the only way to bring the mighty Marwari spirit to knees was to lay a siege. Coming up the hills, the old truth rose clearer above the dusty sandy air as we saw the outside walls that snaked around the new and old parts of the famed Blue City was only a mere “fence” that guarded gallows of plains that undulated on a smaller sphere-like enclosure with the Meherangarh Fort as its nucleus.

Here the Lord Ganesh adorned the many gates penetrating the layers of walls amidst walls from within. Closing my eyes, I dreamed of proud Maharani and the subsequent “smaller” consorts summoning the proud Maharaja upon return from battle, if victory was secured, then only death would be their honour. For defeat was only for the weak. I had heard of sati being committed by these proud queens upon hearing the death of their husband as the men wore saffron robes to ride into battle, with only triumph in mind, they wore the colour of death with a sight upon something far greater beyond their worldly existence. As alike to the three sati famously named “two and a half” had been recorded in recent history in the days when Jaisalmer, like Jodhpur was still fending off greedy claws that campaigned to lay themselves on her glory, the Blue City didn’t lack any of those glorious details. It was a time of stealth and disguise, as enemies of the state masqueraded as ladies in purdah wishing to meet the Empress, stole easy entry beyond the mighty front gates. Realising that the royal court had been duped, the Maharaja knew it was too late to ride out and fight, hence spilling his last drop of blood within his own compound, but not before lopping off the head of his Empress. In Jodhpur, the only difference was the walls were adorned with a lot more hand imprints compared with Jaisalmer. Dignity and honour were the proudest asset of the Empress, as shown with previous sati processions where the Empress will be carried out from the palace’s gates upon laying an imprint of her hand on the wall of her home, onward to the city to distribute alms before joining her dead husband on the funeral pyre, moving into a celestial world sealed by the fire of their union. Young princes were hidden in the desert, only to return to claim their thrones once more in the dark calculating, unpredictable days of the warriors.

Of course today, we saw only the remnants of such Rajasthani culture, orangey turmeric coloured hand prints revered still by the palace’s guards. The fort was amazingly taken care by the Trust and it would have to be the only fort that one should not miss in India, if there was only one to be seen. Eloquently explained and displayed, we meandered up the long winding pavements with the dholak beats humming in the air around us. Many things were subtly preserved, such as a plaque raised in memory of the sacrifice of a close family’s son so that the fort could be built without the usual dismaying calamities befalling any great Asian ancient civilization (funnily still in practice in today’s modern architecture, just check the small altar!). The view of the city was breathtaking but I personally was enamored by the military thought that went into the fort’s reinforcement, such as sharp turns leading up to thick metal doors garlanded with sharp pikes to slow down the advancement of a charging war elephant, the chosen vehicle of the day then. The armory, the religious relics, the genealogy and the general well kept status of the surrounding set an honourable example for many other forts to follow.

Still Jodhpur was more than war games and we took an unplanned routine to visit the old city. Blue was used previously by the Brahmin caste to coat their buildings, partly as a cooling effect, partly as a disinfectant. Many then chose to follow and flowered into an entire institution of blue colour creativity, with today’s city shimmering in different hues of one of my favourite colours. But the people mixed and bargained, sold and haggled in various tunes and tones. Lanky women laughed and gossiped while the bangles on their hands clunked nervously as they exchanged money for the night’s groceries. Brimming carts of eggplants, carrots, radishes and greens, mountains of tea and herbs and spices, weird fruits that we had never seen (but tasted, it was good and cooling!) as the locals went about to show us two strangers what life was all about in this city. As dusk gave way to tiny small illumination from the adjacent and perpendicular lanes came alive with nightly trades of bicycle shops oiling their chains of customers’ bikes, kuali full of milk was being cooked to prepare for the country’s daily consumption of curd, fueled further by demands from travelers like us, while I munched into some milk candy that I had no idea of name but totally acquainted by taste. As mischievous children ran about while cows settled down by street corners, our eyes went on an overdose of golden lamps highlighting the clashing greens and reds of bangles for sale, embroidered shoes and flowing lehenga to entice the bride-to-be on her shopping, while we got our shoulders brushed more than once from the auto, as I nearly missed an oncoming motorbike that took the pleasure of yelling (and honking really loudly) at me to save my life.

This city was an entire new monster at the best party in the world once darkness sipped into the valley! And we were all invited, woot woot! The last leg of our “getting lost” in the old bazaar took us past an artist of the Chauhan family, whom had been painting for the royalty for ten generations. Now, I had learned to this point of my travels that some grandeur of stories told by the Indians had to be tapered down by a few 10% but I did love (as my eyes fell upon judiciously) a modern interpretation of Khrishna and Radha, the eternal lovers of Hindusm. More piles of cili, some street food for us that took the form of a coned newspaper holding a mixture of crackers and rice with lime and onions and coriander, wonderfully and weirdly mixed in a seductive explosion of tastes.

What would we had done if we had never came to Jodhpur? Such a blessing, had been and I suspect, will always be.