Jaipur ... the sound and light show is worth the drive!

After an early breakfast we were on the road for a long day of driving and sight-seeing. We first drove to Fatehpur Sikri, which is 37 km west of Agra. Jalal-ud-din-Muhammad Akbar, ‘Akbar’ was made the king at 14 and shortly after met the founder of the Chisti order of SUFIS. Akbar was blessed by the saint and in gratitude he ordered the great mosque of Fatehpur Sikrin to be built. Akbar transferred his capital here to Jaipur and built Jodhabai palace and many other buildings. He was a very forward thinking person and was tolerant of all religions. He had a Portuguese Christian wife, a Hindu wife and a Muslim wife. He encouraged an era of prosperity in the arts, learning and tolerance. While we were touring Jodhabai’s palace we were again pleasantly surprised by the lack of other tourists.

From Fatepur Sikri we drove to Abhaneri. We were on the highway for almost 4 hours and it was a driving experience. Our driver was very good and dodged everything in his path, cows, goats, and trucks coming at us head on…on a one way highway. Everyone drives like they are the only car on the road and also in the middle of the highway; there is no point of even having lines painted on the road because no one uses them. The scenery was constantly changing from mountains to sugar cane fields, to desert. The state of Rajasthan is beautiful. We stopped for lunch at a little resort that was just being built in Abhaneri. On the inside the restaurant looked like a little palace decorated in marble. We were given 5 large silver bowls full of the local cuisine; stuffed small eggplants, potatoes sautéed with cumin seeds, chicken curry, vegetable curry, curds in sauce, naan bread and rice…what a feast!

After lunch we went to see the Chand Baori, which is a 100 foot deep open well with flights of steps on three sides. This Baori is a marvel of architecture. There are two bathing areas with two royal toilets and carved windows, which were used by the then Kings & Queens. There are three tunnels which open about 20 Kms away from Chand Baori, which were used by the rulers as escape routes in case they were surrounded with their pants down (hahaa…). As we were walking around with the guide local kids were following us around just looking at us, we don’t think that there are many tourists that come out this way.

After a quick visit of the Baori, we went 20 steps south to the Harshat Mata Temple. This temple dates back to the tenth century AD. All of the walls & surroundings around the Temple were of carved stone depicting the abodes of Gods & Goddesses Aradhnarishwar, Nag-Nagin, Prem Mudrakan, Natraj, Lord Vishnu & Budhas. It also shows a few scenes of kama sutra. This Temple which was looted and destroyed by the Mughals is in ruins and pieces of sculpture are scattered all around. The Archaeological Survey of India is trying to restore the Temple. Of course we weren’t able to visit these two sites on our own. We were greeted immediately by an ‘official tourist guide’ for the area who repeatedly told us that he was the local expert. We weren’t charged anything for the visit, but there was the outstretched hand and rubbing fingers together ‘give me a tip’ gesture. Now, we don’t mind tipping but we really dislike the forced tour and services that all have the expectation of tips afterwards. Coming from a background of doing everything yourself, it is hard to adjust to having someone do everything for you, from opening doors, carrying your bags, dishing up your food, practically washing your hands for you, on and on it goes. We can understand that it helps to provide jobs for everyone and helps to give them a living wage, some situations just take some getting used to and some, stern brushing off in others. Jaipur is the capital of Rajasthan which was occupied by the Kshatriya warrior caste before they made alliances with the Mughal emperors and the later British invaders to enjoy a privileged position under their powers. Jaipur is also called “The Pink City” because the city was washed with pink paint in honor of a state visit by the British Prince Albert. Our hotel was located just outside of the old part of the city. A quick turn off of one of the small cluttered local roads lead to a courtyard with a beautiful heritage hotel. We loved the little hotel, and the food at the restaurant. We did run into some problems with our internet (boo hoo us) and no hot water. The real problem with the internet wasn’t accessibility it was the horrible service from the reception.

The next day was packed with sightseeing. We visited the Amber Fort Palace, the City Palace, Hawa Mahal and Janta Matar. Our guide picked us up at the hotel and we quickly visited the Hawa Mahal. The ornamental facade of this "Palace of Winds" is a prominent landmark in Jaipur. It’s a five story structure of pink sandstone encrusted with fine trelliswork and elaborate balconies. The palace has 953 niches and windows. Built in 1799 by Pratap Singh, the Mahal was a royal grandstand for the palace women. All of the windows have screens on them as most of the buildings in these areas which are there so that the women can see out of the buildings but no one can see the women inside. Women were kept away from any males, they were only allowed to be seen by their husbands and sons and even their sons were sent to live with their fathers once they reached close to puberty age. The royal women were guarded by Eunuchs who posed no threat (they were castrated at puberty), no male guards were allowed near them.
We continued on our way to the Amber Fort Palace which is the main attraction of Jaipur. Amber is the classic romantic Rajasthani fort palace. Its construction was started by Man Singh I in 1592, and completed by his descendent Jai Singh I. We got in line with all the other tourists to take an Elephant ride all the way up the fort. It was a 20 min wait to get our Elephant and we spent it ignoring vendors trying to sell us Turbans (which was a little odd) and cheap pens, the best part was that for a turban they wanted 20 US dollars and 10 dollars for the pens, both of which probably took less than one dollar to make. No, sorry, THE best part was that some tourists were actually buying them!

Elephant ride on the way to Amber Fort

As we got closer to the elephants we saw that all of them were elaborately painted in bright colors, but they all looked sad. It looked like hard work walking up and down the fort carrying tourists on their backs. We noticed as well that almost all of the elephant masters who were steering the elephants while sitting on their necks were also hitting them with either a short wooden club or a metal hook like tool, it was not pleasant. The sort of tourist attractions always seem like a good idea but in the end always make us wish we would have not participated. The only reason those elephants are there is that dumb people like us agree to take a ride on them for money. At the end of the 15 min ride up the fort the elephant driver asked us in bad English for a tip, give tip, give tip. There were signs all over the place saying not to tip the elephant drivers. So we said no…he then asked us what country we were from and we told him to which he said many many times: Canada not good country. He then made us wait as several other elephants passed us, cued and had their riders get off. He told us ‘this is your tip’, at which we laughed and told him we don’t mind waiting all day. Oh well, can’t win em all. The Amber palace is huge and inside you can see that it is a beautiful fusion of Mughal and Hindu styles in architecture.

Next we went to the City Palace which is a delightful blend of Mughal and traditional Rajasthani architecture, it sprawls over one-seventh of the area in the walled city. It houses the Chandra Mahal, Shri Govind Dev Temple and the City Palace Museum. In the City Palace museum we saw many of the dresses and preserved textiles, they were all very detailed and some even woven with gold and silver. One of the rulers was 7 feet tall and 510 lbs! One of his outfits literally is as big as a small tent! Our last stop was the most interesting called Jantar Mantar, it is the largest and best preserved of five astral observatories built by Jai Singh II. It consists of huge astronomical instruments that are still in use. There were giant sun dials and other instruments with which you could calculate solstices the sunrise/set and the movement of constellations.
That night we traveled back to the Amber fort for a ‘sound and light’ show. We weren’t sure what to expect but we were ‘mind-blasted’ (thanks Russell Peters) by the show. There were only about 40 other tourists watching as the entire palace was lit up in a multicolored array timed to music and narration of the history of Jaipur. The sound quality was surprisingly excellent and in stereo, which along with the intricate lighting made all of the stories in the narration come to life.

Jaipur ... the sound and light show is worth the drive!

Jaipur, India