i’ve now flown on my first passenger prop plane. desperate to get out of bangalore and maximize the two weeks anna has off before she gose back to work we opted for a flight to jodphur, rajasthan. travelling around india is as cheap as you’d like, unless you’re flying in which case it’s every bit as expensive as domestic flights in the us.

but. we got there.

jodhpur was founded in 1459 and is centered around an old rajput castle. the old city of jophpur lies between the castle walls and the original outer city walls. it’s known as the blue city as most of the buildings here are painted sky blue. the city itself reminded me a lot of genoa with cramped, ancient and chaotic streets and the castle imposes itself on the city much like the castle in edinburgh. set in the middle of the desert with actual camels roaming the streets the city felt very foreign.

according to most guidebooks the thing to do in jodphur is to visit this castle. but if you ask me the thing to do is walk past the castle and visit the mausoleum of all the old rajas of jodhpur. it’s cheaper and prettier. then. if you ask yogi, the manager of the guest house we stayed at, the thing to do was try to catch a glimpse of the various famous western actors who (according to yogi) regularly come to jodhpur for filming. it seems that we just missed richard gere and omar shariff.

anna and i spent a few days in jodhpur before going farther west to jaisalmer. jaisalmer it turns out is also centered around a medieval castle which looms over the city the same way. as it appears to be the case for many cities in rajasthan. but the reason we came to jaisalmer was camel trekking. for three days we rode camels through the thar desert near the border with pakistan.

now. i’ve only ever seen camels in zoos. as such i missed a couple important things about camels. first, they are incredibly tall. i could quite easily walk underneath a camel, that is of course if the city boy in me weren’t so scared of getting kicked. and. if i wasn’t so put off by the second important thing. the smell. sweet baby jesus on a hangglider camels stuh-ink. if they’re not pooping, they’re practicing (farting). all the only thing worse than the smell coming out their ass is the smell coming out their mouth. nevertheless i sure felt regal way up high riding them sitting half indian style like in lawrence of arabia.

since i was going to be in the desert i needed some sort of protection from the sun. naturally i opted for a turban. despite being a 7 sq. meter rectangle of cloth they are quite easy to put on. in addition to the turban i had thes wicked rad mirrored sunglasses about half the size of my face. if they hadda been scouting for bad guy extras for jewel of the nile ii i would landed a part easily.

apart from camels there was plenty of other goofy life in the thar desert. i was really into these large black (and quite friendly) beetles which seemed to be everywhere on the dunes. occasionally i would see some sort of half rabbit half deer type thing (yes … a jackalope perhaps). and on the last day we rode through patches of wild, small and round watermelon looking fruits^*. these watermelon seemed to be a favorite of the goats that wandered around the outskirts of the villages in the desert. which brings me to the final night’s meal.

while chatting with our camel drivers the idea of having some desert barbequed goat came up. the drivers told us a goat would cost about 900 rupees, divided by eight. all i could think of was 3 dollars for a traditional desert feast.

it wasn’t until i saw nura, one of the drivers, walking over a dune leading a goat that i fully realized exactly how traditional this feast was going to be. put simply, i’ve now witnessed what some people say all meat-eaters should.

after the camel trip we returned to jaisalmer just in time for the biggest night of the biggest hindu festival, diwali. diwali is often compared to the christmas, presumably because both create the same amount of cultural hype, and commercial hype as well — i am fully stocked with suggestions for what kind of mobile phones are in fashion for this diwali. but it’s prolly closer to hannukah since both are multi day affairs referred to as “the festival of lights”. i don’t know why hannukah is called that because adam sandler’s song wasn’t descriptive enough. but. i did find out why diwali has that name and i think it’s cool.

so. apparently, back in the day it was foretold that some prince was going to be killed by a snake on the fourth night of his wedding. despite this he was married anyway, to quite a thoughtful wife. on the predicted night she placed lanterns all around him as he slept so that the brightness would scare away the snake. well it worked and now we have diwali (well, part of it. diwali actually encompasses lots of other myths as well.) to celebrate this evening hindus place lanterns and “christmas” lights on everything. what’s more they light firecrackers off. everywhere. it seems that little kids are especially happy if they can sneak up behind whitey and set off a really loud one.

after the celebration and a bit of post camel relaxation anna and i headed up to uttaranchal to a city called rishikesh, the yoga capital of the world (the same city that the beatles came to to meet their guru). it’s on the bank of the ganges close enough to the source that you can see that it’s a glacial river. beautiful. we got here yesterday and have been maxing and relaxing since.

*note: under no circumstances should you attempt to even taste the tiniest bit of these “watermelons”. it is the foulest taste on this mighty planet. i don’t care what the goats say.