India pt 3 Jaisalmer - Jodhpur- home

We hired a driver and car to take us the 280km from Jodhpur to Jaisalmer, there were trains and buses at inconvenient times, but we decided to take the easy route for a change. Jaisalmer is just 100km from the Pakistani border, and along the road we saw evidence of Military exercises.

roadside camels

view of the exquisitely carved Jain temple from our bedroom!

the three of us

 Our guesthouse was basic, but the hosts were wonderful, and were the uncles to two brides getting married, and we were invited along to the reception. Opportunities like that are kind of what makes travelling in India great, so of course we went along!

groom arriving with music, fireworks and portable lamps

one of the brides being given away by her family

 Jaisalmer is a fortress city, and there are 2 distinct parts, behind the walls and outside.  They are working hard to make sure that the walls stay up, but the buttresses are subject to erosion - a lot from water used by tourists like us as the infrastructure isn't there.

Our guesthouse from the below the fort - it was soldiers quarters in the past

Dads bedroom had the best decor

another bridal party

Since we were so close to the Thar desert we did, as all tourists must, spend a night in a tented camp to see the stars and the dunes

Our ride - Michael Jackson

 

 We spent a couple more days in Jaisalmer, eating and mooching round

 

 Drink stop with a view-  we had to walk through a derelict building site to get there though up 3 flight of stairs

 

never worked out why off licenses are called English beer shops

beautiful havelis

Lons favourite - jalebis

Paints ready for Holi celebrations

Our journey back to Jodhpur was uneventful except for the confusing toilet at a rest stop

tuk tuk journey in Jodhpur

a photo shoot was requested

and from Jodhpur we head back home

India pt 2 Delhi - Jodphur

All flights lead to Delhi - or at least the budget ones do,  we decided to skip going to Patna since we couldn't get a civilised response from the Boarding School we were going to visit, and we weren't encouraged that we might receive the same welcome we had in Kharagpur

Yoga mudras on the wall at Delhi International

we booked into a frankly awful airport hotel where I told a huge sikh man off for being noisy at midnight, but had fun in the meantime by "popping" into Delhi proper - the Metro Airport line was cheap, clean and fast

 

monkeys on the roof in the sunshine

 we were lucky / unlucky that it was a medium sized religious festival which meant many of the shops in the Connaught Place area were closed - but there was instead a food festival!

 We flew on the next day to Jodhpur and entered into completely unknown territory.  Lon and I travelled for around 4 months in India back in 1997, but flights in those days were pretty new and expensive - nowadays there are several budget airlines (think Easyjet) as well as Air India.  So we were heading further West than we had travelled before, to the blue city of Jodhpur.

Family motorbike

Our room at Bristows Haveli

view of the fort from the Haveli

carrots in Rajasthan are very long and very red

view of the blue city from the fort

 The Mehrangarh Fort was incredible to visit - and difficult to capture up close - it had the best audio tour I've encountered

one of our favourite restaurants  OTA

We decided to book a cookery class, and spent an enjoyable few hours with Rekha as our hostess and teacher, Dad and I both came away with a few new tricks up our sleeves, and Lon became aware of just what goes into the sauce on his favourite butter chicken - cream, ghee (clarified butter), butter and cashew milk

The feast that we helped to make included stuffed baby aubergines, vegetable biriyani, shahi paneer, veg curry, dhal fry, parathas, and ladoos for sweet

India pt 1 Kolkata-Kharagpur-Khurda Road

This was a journey that has been a long time coming, returning to India with Dad to see some of the places from his childhood.

We met up in Kolkata (Calcutta) to those of us who haven't upgraded, in a great BnB with views which made us feel very much at home, it could have been Dhaka!

Except when outside it clearly wasn't!   This is a person powered rickshaw - no bike, just a man running and pulling - these were only in some neighbourhoods

On our way to the park with the Victoria monument we spotted a pair of mongoose

 

In front of the Victoria monument

what is the collective noun for Ambassadors?

We spent a couple of days acclimatising, and getting some things organised that we hadn't been able to online

hot snacks in New Market 

One of our to-do list was to visit a restaurant in New Market called Nizams - Dad had a memory of going with his dad when he was young for a kathi roll - and Nizams is the place which claims to have invented them.  Kathi rolls are essentially a paratha (indian flaky flatbread) with a one egg omelette cooked on one side, this is rolled round a skewer of grilled meat (mutton) or chicken and some spiced onions.  They are very good, and are now found all over the subcontinent in one form or another - we used to eat regularly in Dhaka.

grilled kebabs

 First taste after 60+ years!

Ambassador cars are still everywhere in Kolkata, mostly as taxis, as cute as they look, they aren't that comfortable to sit in, and we much preferred the ease of Uber - airconditioned at a fixed price

 after more bureaucracy than we felt strictly needed we became the proud owners of some railway tickets

and caught a train to Kharagpur, a town where Dad had lived

 at the house he grew up in - we were invited in for a cup of extra sweet lemon tea

 We were welcomed at Dads old primary school too  with more tea, and an enthusiastic tour, almost everything was as the 'Britishers' had left it, including the bookcases which they were very proud of

a previous home in Kharagpur 

and in 1997 when we visited!

 We spent a long hot day in Kharagpur before heading back to the train station for our sleeper train to Khurda Road

 It was very very late

"Our" bench where we spent many cold hours waiting

Instead of heading straight into Khurda Road after our long night, we checked into our fancy hotel with a hot shower in Bhubaneswar and booked a car to take us to Khurda road the next day when were fresher

 
This is the railway town where Dad was born.  Walking round here and in Kharagpur with adult eyes, we saw that the railway colonies were a place of privilege, where Anglo-Indians and Britishers (whites) lived in much better circumstances than the Indians who were excluded from many areas.

easier than using the foot over bridge?

another former home

Sacred Heart Church 2017

and 1997

altar boy

 

 Bhubaneswar