Mass tourisim

In contrast to the many days on the road, winding through small villages with people using traditional methods to tend their fields, the past few days have introduced us, slap bang, into mass tourism. At last, there were other white faces to distract the stares!

The first event was a large Muslim temple, which it is believed to be the second most important place in the Muslim world after Mecca. In fact, seven visits to this place, is equal to one of Mecca - now that's a pretty exact measure of holy-ness

Here the crowd felt somewhat different, with my companions on edge and the driver warning us not to take anything with us, there was a perceived air of hostility towards us. Yes, they stared just like any other crowd at the freaky white-man with his pale skin, but the stares were not at my face, more at my wallet. Perhaps it is all the negative press Muslim's have been getting in the media recently, but even so, what was to follow was not something any of us would like to repeat.

After donning a piece of cloth over our heads and taking our shoes off to respect their religious beliefs, we were ushered through a metal detector (the usual pseudo security ensued, where for everyone it beeped, but no-one cared). Once being relieved of my camera as photos weren't allowed, we headed towards the central temple area.

If anyone has been to a rock concert, they know what a mosh-pit is. For those who haven't, it's a grey line in between a crowd and a fight. Inside this temple, there was what could only be described as chaos. Everyone wanted to get in. No-one wanted to leave. So after getting to the front (not hard when you are twice the size of everyone around you) we were greeted with the expression "as you like", pointing towards the tips bowl. This was less optional then one would think, and the crowd organisers got rather shirty until one of our group gave about 300 rupees (7 pounds, ish) as he was giving for a friend of his as well.

From here, we were treated like celebrities, ushered out, then back in the queue at the front, before being pushed head first into the central idol, to make our prayer. Again, with shouts of "as you like". Perhaps it's karma, but Prasad and I both hit our heads on the way up. We also didn't indulge the "as you like" brigade. We won't be "liking" again, thanks.

From here, we went to the Pushkar Camel festival, which was an excellent event held each year whereby traders from all the tribes around the region sell their camels and horses. After snaking through many km (I kid you not) of crowded streets of "hippy nonsense", we finally made it to the centre, where the real business was being done with camels, horses and camel pet-stores.

All the silly decorations a camel owner could ask for. Multi-coloured nose peg sir? How about some fancy dangly things to hang off your camel? My, what a pretty camel. Two seconds whilst I take this call....

Even remote tribes-people, it seems, have mobiles!

Forever hunted by rickshaw drivers and beggars, desperate for their next taste of tourist cash, we continued on to Jaipur (where I currently am) and decided to take in some of the local sights and museums.

Much to the amusement of my travel companions, it was time for Mr Tourist to take a fleecing again. Not by some scam, trick or cunning of the local crowd, but by full endorsement of the office of tourism. For every sight we have been too, they charge one fee for Indian tourists, and one for foreign. I think you can guess who gets it cheaper. In the city palace, it cost me 300 rupees, with my friends coming to 80 rupees for the both of them. However, I got a free ticket to use my camera - which would have cost them 50 rupees each. Wow. This place was slightly cheaper, but you get the idea.

My gloating was short lived, when next to each sight there was a sign say "no photography". It was rubbish anyway, so I felt even more fleeced.

However, just across the road was one of the best places I've ever visited. Even more shocking, it was educational, so it was cheap (for Indian's anyway)! Back in 1750, one of the kings had a bit of a hobby for astrology. So he built a bunch of highly accurate sun-dials, and other such instruments to determine the time (down to an accuracy of 2 seconds) and anything associated with the tilt or rotation of the earth. Mostly star-signs. After being a little sceptical of the 2 second claim associated with the 15 story sun-dial, we took a look at the smaller sun-dial (still about 1.5 stories high) which maintained 20 second accuracy. Working it out for ourselves, we actually realised that the thing was darn accurate. Enough that my watch has been adjusted by 20 seconds to "sun time" :-)

With a day of mind expanding information taking its toll on us all, we decided to chill for a few minutes in the first park which I have seen on this round of travels.

In the cool breeze of the evening sunshine, with the rickshaw drivers blazing their horns around us, a tranquil serenity began to overcome us. That was, until a group of about 15 youths began to walk directly towards us. Ranging from about 6 to 16, this crowd split into two groups, with the small ones being sent in first to "soften us up". Quickly I grabbed my bag, thinking the worst. As they got closer they didn't look as menacing as I was expecting. What a way to go I thought, being beaten up by 15 kids in the middle of a park... I can see the head-stone now. "Here lies Hadyn, 6 years of martial arts lessons and he got taken by a bunch of kids. [Simpsons voice]"Haha!"

As everything in India, all is not what it seemed. Once the kids got within striking range, they presented their weapon of choice, the worlds largest and cruddiest camera. After a brief haggle between them and Prasad, or "Hadyn's agent" as he shall now be called (it turns out they were trying to sell my photo!) the kids gathered around and took a photo. I insisted they I take a photo as well, but only after a few of them had left (I would like to say the ones who had left were all 7 foot tall and built like tanks, but no, they were all pretty puny too!)

As I have promised for a while now, I'm heading up to Bukiner (or something like that anyway) on a 10 hour sleeper train to go for a camel ride and visit a temple full of rats. Until then, have fun!

P.S. Following some unfortunate news from my friend Rakesh who I shall be meeting next week, we have had to cancel our activity holiday which was going to involve some rafting and abseiling - although we are trying to arrange something a little different instead.... Watch this space...