Jaipur

We stopped at Jaipur on our way back from Ranthambhore. Having heard so much about the Pink city, we had a fair bit of expectations around it. It lived up to most but disappointed on some. Photos.

In Jaipur, we were put up at Hotel Umaid Mahal. We had done our bookings through Travelguru, and faced no problems at any point. The rooms were clean and tastefully decorated, ambience was great, and their rooftop restaurant was really good. We had some time to kill on the last day as our flight was a few hours after the check out time, so the restaurant was a real blessing.

Onto the sight seeing first. We enjoyed Jantar Mantar the most - the skill and precision of the equipment and the sheer scale was inspiring and educational at the same time. Amer fort was also a great experience with its sheesh mahal, royal chambers, diwan-e-aam and diwan-e-khaas. We had watched the entirely forgettable 'Jodha Akbar' a few weeks earlier, so it was even more fun mapping the movies sets to the real structures and ruins. Jaigadh fort has a huge cannon (largest in world?) but nothing much beyond that. We visited Nahargad fort as well on hearing about its great view of the city, but didn't find it that interesting - give it a skip. Hawa Mahal looks much better in photos than reality - we were surprised about how thin and unimposing the structure actually is. The City Palace was again on the average side, the only interesting points for us being some stuff in the arms room and the museum displaying clothes of the kings - one really has to see the clothes to believe how huge those kings. I had heard tales about the king being on the wrong side of the weight scales, but this was beyond words as some pajamas were a good 6 feet across at the waist!

Shopping was at the top of Sheetal's agenda, and rightfully so. There is so much to shop for at such good rates, I couldn't but join Sheetal in letting the flood gates open ;). Hand printed textiles were good (especially the bagru prints) -from saris and dresses for Sheetal and Ilisa to bed sheets and razai. We found some of the precious stones (and jewellery made using) them also tempting, and rates were very competitive when compared to Hyderabad. I found some good leather chappals as well (camel) for myself as well. Apart from the government showroom (Rajsthali), we visited Bapu bazaar and Ganpati Plaza in hunt of the goodies :)

Eating was at the top of my agenda :). We made it a point to visit the famous 'Choki Dhani' and had more than our fill as we did full justice to the very reasonable entry fees. Our dinner was made more interesting by some tourists from South Africa next to us, who were really trying hard to figure out stuff and were looking to us for some help. We also picked up very good ghewar, onion kachori and malpua from Rawat on the way from hotel to the airport.

Some aspects of the city were disappointing though. I found the city fairly dirty and filthy, this coming from someone living in Hyderabad is a damning indictment. You get a sense of a well oiled machinery out to squeeze the last penny from the tourists, but perhaps that is to be expected given the dependence of tourism. But above all, I was taken aback by lack of polish and finish amongst the staff all over the tourist places and even in some shops - most came across as indifferent, while some were outright rude :(. This was surprising given the overall hype about the importance of tourists etc! And finally, the airport is a huge letdown in several aspects- the mannerism of the officials manning the security check and otherwise, the airlines staff, the toilets - everything was very disappointing :(.

-Phani