Today, we were supposed to get back into our van and take a 6-hour drive to Jaiselmer. Seeing as most of our trips have taken much longer than expected, we decided that we liked Jodhpur so much, we would stay here. We just gave ourselves 12 hours of fun, instead of 12 hours of van driving.
We met with our guide, Raghu, after breakfast. He took us to the crematorium of the Maharajah’s ancestral family. It is considered to be the Taj Mahal of Rajasthan. Whereas the Taj Mahal was created for the dead wife of the Maharana in Agra, this crematorium was created for Jaswant Singh, the husband (Maharaja) of the Maharani in Jodhpur. They still have Maharajahs here, but they do not have great significance. They are considered royalty, but do not make laws or have any political power. I suppose they are like Queen Elizabeth. They are figureheads, but are just for decoration. It was interesting to learn about how members of the Hindu faith treat their dead. All Hindus are burned on a funeral pyre – cremated. The family carries the dead to the spot where he or she will be cremated. After cremation has taken place, if the family is able, half of the ashes will be taken to Varanasi and sprinkled into the Ganges River. The other half stays and a memorial is built over the buried ashes. It’s sort of like a headstone, but in cases for the wealthy, the headstone is huuuuuuge – and very ornate. There is also great ceremony that goes with the lighting of the funeral pyre, but I won’t go into all of those details right now.
What did we do after that? We went to another fort. This was the Maharajah’s old castle. One of the Maharajahs had another one built because he wanted to create work for the people, which I think is a nice gesture to the people of India. He who has money makes up a new project so that the people who don’t have a lot of money can work and make some money.
We then went to the present Maharajah’s new house, but didn’t get to go inside. That might be considered impolite to barge in on the royal family at their house. “Hello, do you have any tea?” After we visited the English Wine and Beer Shop, we were ready to go back to the hotel for an afternoon of leisure. Mic and Grayson played Frisbee, while Jane and Laura lounged in the shallow end.
There is no need to worry about whether you can or cannot do something in India. You can pretty much do whatever you want without any worry about safety or anyone really caring about what you’re doing. When we were at poolside, the waiter brought beer, in glass bottles, and poured it into glass beer glasses. Pools and glass don’t usually go very well together. One would think – big pool, small glass, what are the chances that it is going to get knocked over? Well, Mic was throwing the Frisbee and Grayson didn’t catch it and it went sailing right over to that beer glass and knocked it over. Can you believe? Mic blames Grayson and Grayson blames Mic for the unfortunate accident. The funny thing is that the pool guy picked up the glass that he could see and then just left the rest. Is that safe? People are working with chisels and hammers, holding a piece of to-be-chiseled marble with their bare feet. Luckily they are wearing safety glasses … oh wait a minute, no they’re not! It’s just a different way of life, I suppose. Maybe in Canada, we worry too much about safety, and that causes people to be less careful because there are supposed to be so may safety measures in place.
Tomorrow, we will get in the van to go to the airport, to take a plane to Delhi so that we can get on an overnight train to Varanasi, so that we can get in a boat and go on a river cruise. It’s “Planes, Trains, and Automobiles” without John Candy and Steve Martin.
