Next stop Udaipur, and was the journey one to remember or was it one to remember?!
Middle of the night we woke up to a stray foot lurking below our feet. We looked around to find Indian men sprawled across the isle - limbs stuffed in every orifice of the coach, all eyes on us. The rest of the night we spent with our knees to our chest to avoid any suggestive footsy playing!
After only planning on staying in Udaipur for two nights we are still here after a week - one of the locals! It is impossible to walk down the street without being stopped to join our various friends for chai. Jewellery shops seem to be our key to joining the various social networks of India.
Day 1 - we planned to take a short walking tour of the city - ten minutes in and we were shopping - classic. After popping in to a weapon shop where Milly got her nose pierced, we met Bamu...and it all began, our first rung of the Udaipurian social ladder had been climbed! As chai turned to beer and beer to whiskey the night progressed and we were introduced to our Indian family! Before we knew it we were chopping chillies in the courtyard of a beautiful old Haveli and enjoying the delightful company of numerous Indian men. It was a great first night in Udaipur.
In the same way that we were adopted by new friends, we had our own addition to the group - hi Beth! - and we are now the Fab Five!
Next day under the false impression that we were being taken on a tour of the town, we ended up on the back of motorbikes once more, heading to a horse ranch in the middle of Rajasthany countryside. Sat under a massive mango tree we had an Indian style picnic to soak up the whiskey and beer that had been consumed ridiculously early in the morning.
We returned home in the early evening to a wonderful home cooked dinner with the fam and some of their friends, one of which took a particular liking to the Rebecca Broooks-esque one of our group...we say no more..
After two days of socialising we realised we hadn't seen any of the sights so dragged ourselves to the City Palace - a beautiful maze of mosaics and Maharaja what-not. Inspired by what she had seen, Ana headed to the nearest turban shop and bought a maharaja hat, much to the delight and amusement of all who saw her. She then strutted down the streets welcoming stares and handshakes bestowed upon her with all the grace and superiority of a true maharaja. Other highlights of Udaipur include lounging by a rooftop pool surveying the view, and indulging our artistic tendencies in the form of miniature paintings. We finished the day by watching the Udaipur-set James Bond film, Octopussy on yet another rooftop.
Next day the excitement proved almost too much to handle...whilst chillin' with the fam, they received a phonecall informing them that we had been invited to join them at their cousin's Brahmin wedding. We leapt from our seats and exploded with sheer joy and excitement before the realisation dawned on us that we had exactly 1 hour to pick up the others, check our of our hotel, re-schedule our bus out of Udaipur, transport our bags to a new hotel and buy Lucy a sari. All hell broke loose as we sprinted, shrieking with joy through the streets of town. 45 minutes later we found ourselves back at the house, one stylist per person wrapping us up in our saris. We bundled into a tuc tuc, six per vehicle, the weight almost proving too much as it struggled up the hill, actually rolling backwards before we gained speed and charged full speed ahead (5mph) to the opulent location. Upon arrival we suddenly felt under dressed and in awe at the wealth of sequins, bangles and twinkly lights dripping from the guests and the trees. We milled around feeling dazed and amazed before being approached by the sister of the bride who announced that the family had requested that we do the honour of carrying the veil-equivalent over the bride as she walked down the aisle! FUCK! It was an indescribable feeling processing behind a crowd of dancers, drummers and photographers. It wasn't until afterwards that we realised our performance was possibly not quite up to Brahmin standards and we received a few odd looks when we returned from the stage. Our saris had come unraveled, our arms were quivering with the strain of the scarf and we were all muttering swear words of astonishment under our breath. Our sweaty faces of disbelief will be in their photo album forever....
As Brahmins don't drink we turned to the only other form of intoxication available - PAAN! Basically tastes of gravely nail varnish remover wrapped up in a banana leaf topped with some moldy raisins - yumm...
Our wedding experience shortly moved from beyond belief to beyond bearable...as time rolled by and we were still there at 7am. Words cannot describe how tedious it was. The rest of the ceremony consisted of various bizarre rituals including gee rice being sprinkled on the head, mothers wailing, and the fat groom struggling to carry his bride around a fire!
Our last night in Udaipur was spent with Milly in bed and the rest of us paired up with our new Indian pals. We returned to the cinema for a second viewing of the Bollywood love story Aashiqui2, Ana and Liv were curled up on the super comfy cinema seats, sharing their sarong as the only source of warmth from the bloody freezing AC. Meanwhile, Aashiqui3 was taking place just one seat away. Again, we say no more...
The film finished and with that we zoomed home to our Haveli, only to realise that a certain someone had left their purse with all her money and our hotel key in it....obviously a little distracted. The boys jumped back on their bikes to retrieve it - her knight in shining armour. Looking forward to our comfortable beds we were horrified to be told that we couldn't return to the Haveli as the police were roaming the streets...instead we had to sprint back to the house avoiding the police jeep. We ended up sleeping on the rooftop with only our sarongs for comfort, and spent the night trying to avoid various attempts at full body massages and unfortunate sleeping arrangements. As Lucy and Liv tried to steer conversation to more appropriate topics, all that could be heard was the faint cry of Ana pleading for 'just a head massage please!!'.
Definitely a night to remember...
PS. we've all got nits, thanks to rozza for the nit comb.
Middle of the night we woke up to a stray foot lurking below our feet. We looked around to find Indian men sprawled across the isle - limbs stuffed in every orifice of the coach, all eyes on us. The rest of the night we spent with our knees to our chest to avoid any suggestive footsy playing!
After only planning on staying in Udaipur for two nights we are still here after a week - one of the locals! It is impossible to walk down the street without being stopped to join our various friends for chai. Jewellery shops seem to be our key to joining the various social networks of India.
Day 1 - we planned to take a short walking tour of the city - ten minutes in and we were shopping - classic. After popping in to a weapon shop where Milly got her nose pierced, we met Bamu...and it all began, our first rung of the Udaipurian social ladder had been climbed! As chai turned to beer and beer to whiskey the night progressed and we were introduced to our Indian family! Before we knew it we were chopping chillies in the courtyard of a beautiful old Haveli and enjoying the delightful company of numerous Indian men. It was a great first night in Udaipur.
In the same way that we were adopted by new friends, we had our own addition to the group - hi Beth! - and we are now the Fab Five!
Next day under the false impression that we were being taken on a tour of the town, we ended up on the back of motorbikes once more, heading to a horse ranch in the middle of Rajasthany countryside. Sat under a massive mango tree we had an Indian style picnic to soak up the whiskey and beer that had been consumed ridiculously early in the morning.
We returned home in the early evening to a wonderful home cooked dinner with the fam and some of their friends, one of which took a particular liking to the Rebecca Broooks-esque one of our group...we say no more..
After two days of socialising we realised we hadn't seen any of the sights so dragged ourselves to the City Palace - a beautiful maze of mosaics and Maharaja what-not. Inspired by what she had seen, Ana headed to the nearest turban shop and bought a maharaja hat, much to the delight and amusement of all who saw her. She then strutted down the streets welcoming stares and handshakes bestowed upon her with all the grace and superiority of a true maharaja. Other highlights of Udaipur include lounging by a rooftop pool surveying the view, and indulging our artistic tendencies in the form of miniature paintings. We finished the day by watching the Udaipur-set James Bond film, Octopussy on yet another rooftop.
Next day the excitement proved almost too much to handle...whilst chillin' with the fam, they received a phonecall informing them that we had been invited to join them at their cousin's Brahmin wedding. We leapt from our seats and exploded with sheer joy and excitement before the realisation dawned on us that we had exactly 1 hour to pick up the others, check our of our hotel, re-schedule our bus out of Udaipur, transport our bags to a new hotel and buy Lucy a sari. All hell broke loose as we sprinted, shrieking with joy through the streets of town. 45 minutes later we found ourselves back at the house, one stylist per person wrapping us up in our saris. We bundled into a tuc tuc, six per vehicle, the weight almost proving too much as it struggled up the hill, actually rolling backwards before we gained speed and charged full speed ahead (5mph) to the opulent location. Upon arrival we suddenly felt under dressed and in awe at the wealth of sequins, bangles and twinkly lights dripping from the guests and the trees. We milled around feeling dazed and amazed before being approached by the sister of the bride who announced that the family had requested that we do the honour of carrying the veil-equivalent over the bride as she walked down the aisle! FUCK! It was an indescribable feeling processing behind a crowd of dancers, drummers and photographers. It wasn't until afterwards that we realised our performance was possibly not quite up to Brahmin standards and we received a few odd looks when we returned from the stage. Our saris had come unraveled, our arms were quivering with the strain of the scarf and we were all muttering swear words of astonishment under our breath. Our sweaty faces of disbelief will be in their photo album forever....
As Brahmins don't drink we turned to the only other form of intoxication available - PAAN! Basically tastes of gravely nail varnish remover wrapped up in a banana leaf topped with some moldy raisins - yumm...
Our wedding experience shortly moved from beyond belief to beyond bearable...as time rolled by and we were still there at 7am. Words cannot describe how tedious it was. The rest of the ceremony consisted of various bizarre rituals including gee rice being sprinkled on the head, mothers wailing, and the fat groom struggling to carry his bride around a fire!
Our last night in Udaipur was spent with Milly in bed and the rest of us paired up with our new Indian pals. We returned to the cinema for a second viewing of the Bollywood love story Aashiqui2, Ana and Liv were curled up on the super comfy cinema seats, sharing their sarong as the only source of warmth from the bloody freezing AC. Meanwhile, Aashiqui3 was taking place just one seat away. Again, we say no more...
The film finished and with that we zoomed home to our Haveli, only to realise that a certain someone had left their purse with all her money and our hotel key in it....obviously a little distracted. The boys jumped back on their bikes to retrieve it - her knight in shining armour. Looking forward to our comfortable beds we were horrified to be told that we couldn't return to the Haveli as the police were roaming the streets...instead we had to sprint back to the house avoiding the police jeep. We ended up sleeping on the rooftop with only our sarongs for comfort, and spent the night trying to avoid various attempts at full body massages and unfortunate sleeping arrangements. As Lucy and Liv tried to steer conversation to more appropriate topics, all that could be heard was the faint cry of Ana pleading for 'just a head massage please!!'.
Definitely a night to remember...
PS. we've all got nits, thanks to rozza for the nit comb.
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