17 Feb. BUNDI - JAIPUR 274 km.
8:30 .- Great again to be on the move.
At the first piece of road towards the town Tonk, which according to my maps are not much longer than the main road, I come through so many small beautiful and very poetic villages with their sensuous simple stone houses.
It's not quite early anymore, but yet I see many who are doing their morning toilet, which takes place at the local well or in front of their houses. Fine life-affirming little intimate poetic images of a world that is slowly getting ready for another day.
These situations are a little too personal so I will not stop up and take photos. But the images are imprinted on my mind and one day I may send them in detail pixels resolution.
In the town of Tonk I stop up and take some photos of street vendor and these beautiful pottery.
I am doing a persistent attempt to avoid the main road to Jaipur.
From Tonk my map of Rajasthan is not helping much. I have no google any map covering the day's route in detail, since I had not planned that I would visit the city of Jaipur. The locals referred me constantly to the main road.
I tried sometimes to take a side road to find a parallel road. But always I ended up back on the highway. This highway was really bad, because that drove many tractors and trucks, which only ran 40 km. per hour. The other slow-moving trucks therefore attempts in slow motion to overtake.
Even on a MC is it stressful because you must continually swerve between these columns of vehicles to keep a reasonably speed.
After my break, I make another attempt to get away from the main road. This time many of the smaller roads I follow ends up in a small cottage or dirt road becomes slower and uneven bombed and less and less viable. A simple village I drove through 4 times in my attempt to avoid the main road.
The last 60 km. I chose to run a campaign of the highway.
Jaipur / 3.2 mill. inhabitants / Pink City / Capital of Rajasthan.
I finally reached up to Jaipur which is a mini version of Delhi in terms of congestion and chaos.
This time I am well, to be naturally tired after a hard stressful day, where I again didn't have full control but lost the orientation, got a sore ass after the many hours of driving on bumpy dirt roads.
My friend Sandy from Bikaner had also contacted a hotel in Jaipur. I told Sandy that this time I would look at the hotel he was bruised, but that he should not take it personally if I chose not to live there.
I had agreed with the hotel that they would pick me up at the big Station. I had to wait a while before a young guy from the hotel shows up on MC.
I try to kick start my MC. but it is completely dead. There has the last week been problems with the ignition. I could not start it with start button alone, but have had to use the kick starter. But now it's completely dead.
The young man try to push me. We succeeded, but it goes dead again. After a few attempts, however, I keep the gas up and follow the young guy to the hotel.
It is an OK hotel, but I can totally breathe freely in the room I look at. From the window I feel there is not enough visibility to the outside world - it is not a nice place to stay besides sleeping. I must find a better hotel room with daylight, where I like to be, so I can get a little longer with my reports.
Outside the hotel there is a tuktuk driver who contacts me while I look in my Lonely Planet for an alternative hotel. In this city, there is proposed some Hotels / Guest House in the old part of town, but they are quite expensive. Therefore, I resign myself to find a hotel of recent, outside the old city center.
I hope that my MC can start. After some kick I get it started and luckily I could follow the tuktuk driver, which I have agreed with, run ahead and show direction. The sun has now gone down and it is becoming really dark.
Hotel Anuraag Villa is a little too exclusive and the price too high I think. They give me an offer and I turn to because I know it can be difficult to find a hotel that is cheaper and better than this, there is incredible check and clean with a very nice Garden Restaurant.
I enjoy a good dinner and get into conversation with a young Frenchman. He has just graduated as a teacher and teaches a class in Paris with many immigrant children. His think it's a great and very exciting challenge. We are facing some thoughts on the Global World Order.
This evening I get also some cultural theater inputs, as a young puppeteer and a musician invite a few person at a time to sit in front of their small, intimate theater, they have set up in the garden. They argued in 5 different short puppet scenes. Puppet Master makes a sublime work in his surprising movements of the puppets, while the musician is missing the last octave.
This morning it is not so much barking dogs I hear but high nasal scream of a male peacock near my window. Indeed high in the tree just outside my window at a branch, sits a beautiful peacock who repeats his nasal cry, probably to attract some females. In the distance I hear a second peacocks scream.
During my morning meditation was the peacock nasal sounds that filled my head.
In the afternoon I see the peacock in the garden, this time in direct contact with a female peacock (To the left at the next lower photo) which it then pursues along the house wall.
18 Feb. Honda Service Center
Next morning the international newspaper is on my floor. Welcome back to the global world. Actually I have not heard or seen the news one whole month, but it seems that it has done fairly without my involvement.
I let go of the global problems and concentrate on my own little here and now problems. I get the receptionist on internet, to find a Honda Service Center here in Jaipur to resolve my MC power problem.
Luckily I was able to kick start the MC and then easily found the workshop, thanks to a finely drawn map and description from the receptionist.
I figured that I just needed a new battery, but no, it seemed that it was the whole power relay, there was something wrong with. It was thoroughly checked and parts has to be replaced.
At first, they said that MC would be ready in 2 hours. When I came back they have just started so the 2 hours got to be 4 hours. Again I was forced to stand and look at the mechanic, because otherwise he started with another MC or disappeared.
After this little stressful waiting at the workshop, I am enjoying being back at my hotel room.
I get food brought up and can now concentrate on to continue my travelogue. After several hours of concentration, I turn on the television, which I only a few times has done during this month every time I quickly zappet me through all the channels without finding a channel that would keep me trapped.
Again I zap through all the programs that I think reminds a lot about each other. I can choose more than 100 channels. In 2008 when I was on my MC. trip to North India in Delhi, I could watch 60 channels.
I find the MTV channel for o get a little background sound atmosphere while I'm working on with my travel writing. I started to see and hear some songs by Lady Gaga, what was perfectly fine. But her sounds, rhythms and intensities, like continuing, although it was other groups that played. It was as if all groups had found in favor of future joint sound and rhythm.
19 Feb. Old town
Jaipur is a big mill. city and when I find myself outside the old city walls I use my MC to come around. Even within the city walls the distance is great.
Jaipur's old town is very charming with its beautiful pink facades to move around in, but also incredibly difficult because you can easily lose orientation when everything is pink. Although rhesus monkeys have a more glowing red buttocks here or perhaps I now psychologically sees everything through a pink filter.
The whole district is divided into different sections of handicraft stalls.
I'm very fascinated by how these jewelry craftsmen uses there feet like hands and how they quickly tie different colored threads, ribbons and pearl pieces together for 1001 Nights Jewelry. They had very few ready-made jewelry. My buyer gene, made sure that I purchased this simple but colorful bead jewelry that remind me of my hippie period. Gold developments where the two stems of green beads meet, was not quite right so I asked him to rectify the beauty bug.
He was actually about to arrange a piece, with some veiled women. Maybe he was therefore a little too fast in his movements, so he came to cut the wrong wires over so that the beads rolled.
I got out of my fascination and agreed with jewelry craftsman that I would come back the next day and retrieve the neck jewelry, which I had paid for, so he could finish his business with women.
Jantar Mantar / Astronomical Observatory 1734
If you use a guide to lead a round, you will get an exciting and fascinating insight into how each of the astronomical constructions must be read and from these observations made the astronomical calculations. Deep respect for the ancient astrologers.
I've seen an incredible number of craftsmen creating various utility items, else you would think were cheaper to mass produce on my MC journey around Rajasthan. But it seems that the industry is still in this part of India, find it difficult to outperform the cheap craftsmen who can create anything like pots, pans, axes and knives. Consumers here seem to choose the products they know if they are not expensive.
Nor have I encountered some big stores (I've heard that there should be a part here in Jaipur) or larger foodstores. The reason maybe that I am in most cities, has lived in the old town and has not moved me so much outside that.
Farewell from the hospitable 'Pink City'
Bjarne
Color Powder for spot between the eyebrows, the symbol of 'Third Eye', 'The Inner Guru', 'Being in the World'
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