All right!! It’s 8am and I’m up, at ‘em and eager to get out of the hostel. Apparently that label-less cocktail of drugs cleared out my system very well because my headache and fever are gone, there’s a hell of a lot less pressure in my sinuses and I can walk up the stairs to the front desk without wheezing or stopping! Today I will be the queen of small victories if I can feel good enough to make it from the dorm up to the restaurant, from the hostel to the touk-touk, from the touk-touk to the fort, from room to room in the fort into another touk-touk, a restaurant, and back to the hostel.
I don’t think I’m going to take any more of those pills, though, because quite honestly it scares me that there’s no brand or label on the packet and because I was tripping balls by the end of last night but without the pleasant feelings that normally go with it. Just to illustrate how bad I thought it had gotten, I sincerely thought I hallucinated the guy who moved into the dorm while Marco and I were at dinner last night until I woke up and he was sitting on his bed stroking his long, wiry beard, staring at the wall and rocking gently back and forth. Now, while I’m glad I wasn’t off-my-rocker high last night, part of me wishes I had dreamed up someone this bizarre. This guy was two feet away from me the whole night while I slept…
When I run upstairs (I can run again!) to ask about laundry services, I find a definitely un-creepy guy: Marc! Perefct! And he’s already had an interesting morning himself: the train arrived at 4am, at which point he came to my hostel and asked to stay in the dorm; they said it was full (blatant lie, by the way, there are 2 empty beds down there); he went to the other hostel I had considered; also told it was full; has the touk-touk take him to a random hotel then argues down the exorbitant, couple hundred rupee bill demanded by the driver. I’m not surprised that he’s finished his breakfast by the time I get dressed and get up to the café; ridiculous Indians make me surprisingly hungry, too. I guess my stomach knows getting some of their good food in me will automatically make me willing to deal with them for another couple of hours.
I introduce Marc and Marco, who almost immediately alienate me from the conversation by talking about cricket, living in London, traveling for long periods of time and countries they’ve been to but I haven’t. Thanks, guys. But no worries, I’m having loads of fun drinking the worst coffee I’ve ever tasted and picking onions out of my tomato omelet (where the hell did those come from?). Although to be honest, I’m pretty content to listen to them talk because their accents are easy on the ears. Marco’s got a very smooth, polished, well-bred English accent that makes me picture the rolling hills of the British countryside. Marc’s voice, on the other hand, is more of a drawl that’s bright but a little rough and brings to mind sunny weather and beers on the beach. I may or may not smile into my omelet every now and then when one of them says something in a way that’s particularly, albeit inadvertently, sexy. Eventually, I force us all to bring our attention back to the guide book and we discuss the short list of sights.
When we leave the museum and walk further up to the walls of the fort, we’re rewarded with incredible panoramic views of the blue-washed buildings that lay hundreds of feet below us. Far off in the distance, barely visible in and tantalizingly hidden by the ever-present smog, sits the gigantic palace I intend to visit tomorrow. Further along the wall, past the cannons, sits a white temple with lines of colorful flags blowing in the wind. Despite the idyllic situation of this rather small temple, Chamunda Devi has a bloody history: last year 250 people were killed and 400 more injured when worshippers, during a Hindu festival, stampeded into the temple when it opened. The scary thing is that I can picture this happening; rides on trains and buses as well as visits to temples and stores have shown me that Indian people enter and exit almost everywhere the same way: through force.
But all too soon I’m out of time for the internet, again. Marc has bumped into a couple of girls he knows from home (how that happens in India is beyond me) so Marco and I are going out to dinner by ourselves. The restaurant is on the roof of a very nice haveli that has been turned into a hotel. Marco, all class, is impressed by the large brass knockers on each door and decides to try one out before dashing up the stairs. Very mature. But he manages to keep a lid on his inner ten-year-old and we have a nice candle-lit dinner looking up at the fort—oddly not lit up—and Jaswant Thada, glowing an incredibly bright white from the floodlights around it. I decide to try a lemon honey lassi (the real chunks of curd made it like drinking very watery, thin, sweet cottage cheese, in a good way) and govind gatta. This is the dish that kicked my ass when I had dinner at Ambrai with Marc in Udaipur, but I’ve made them promise to keep it mild so I can actually taste it this time. And despite my suspicions that it was better at Ambrai, it’s quite nice, as is the company at dinner and on the slow walk home. Marco likes to tease, but I can give as good as I get and at least he leaves mocking my accent to my other favorite Brit, Bhavesh.
I’m sorry Marc and Marco are leaving me tomorrow; these guys have been a buoy of normalcy for me as well as amazing company these last few days. It’s tough to know when you meet someone whether you’ll still be able to stand them hours later and I’m really glad we seem to get along so well. Although, I guess I should have expected it because over the whole trip I’ve been pleasantly surprised to find that 99% of the people I’ve met have just been incredibly cool. If you think about it, though, most people traveling the world alone and on the cheap probably have similar interests and personalities and thus would make good friends. Shared traits of the poor world traveler: can stand a certain amount of physical and mental discomfort; like to try new things; extroverted and adventurous; have a solid sense of humor and a lot of common sense; laid-back, level-headed and flexible; can always find something to entertain themselves; curious about the people and things around them. Does this sound like you? Then you would probably do fine traveling the 2nd and 3rd world alone.
And alone is definitely what I will be tomorrow, but that’s okay, I’ve got work to do. I’m going to update my blog and finally ADD PHOTOS! I’m excited to share the images I’ve been capturing so that people will finally be able to see exactly what I’m talking about in my posts. Any skill you see, though, is due to my kick-ass camera, not any skill of my own. Hopefully you can enjoy them, anyway. Signing off from Jodhpur. G’night.
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