The taxi arrived in Jaiselmer after dark. We had wanted to get there before then as its easier to find a place to stay in the daylight. But it worked out better, I think. We could see the lights of the city shining in the distant horizon, an oasis of comfortable life after traveling through the desert for the five hours on smoggy highways passing only little roadside stands and small dusty villages. From a distance it looked inviting, but up close was just more of the same dirty streets of India. Until we saw the fort, rounding the corner we saw its magnificence, the honey color of it rising above the city glow. We were suddenly in a fairy tale, winding up the steep narrow shining dark cobblestones barricaded by high sandstone walls on each side towards the massive wooden

gate. This was the stuff of Cinderella and all the magic of the princes and princesses of our childhood. It was like a fantastic movie set in which we were the main characters coming home to the Kingdom of Jaiselmer. To my western mind, the reality of Hollywood with its familiarity seemed easier to relate to than the truth of royalty all those centuries ago. But no, we were back in time, it standing still for us to catch up. The fort was impeccably preserved. Inside was a maze of narrow streets too small for the rickshaws with their noise and pollution. In the night we followed a trail of a road winding past added upscale tourist shops of embroidered bed covers and jewelry and Indian made clothes to the Desert Boys Guest House. It had been recommended by a friend. And it had a good Italian restaurant on the rooftop overlooking the city serving the best pasta in my experience of India as the unusually plump for India cook had lived in Italy for two years. We spent two nights there and a lazy day between just relaxing, strolling around the village inside the fort, eating (mmm... home-made vanilla ice cream at a place called The 8th of July where they no longer made the chocolate Bacardi rum cake that went with it because the cook died) and shopping.

The next morning we set off on a camel safari with other members of the Desert Boys. We chose not to take the touristy trips of other vendors to temples and to crowded dunes, other Westerners on camels all around. We wanted open space. For 1100 rupees apiece we spent two days on the backs of camels and one night camping out under the stars.

Our days were started with a breakfast of chai, the Indian tea with milk and spices, or black tea and toast grilled out on an open fire accompanied by fresh bananas, tangerines, pineapples and papayas. Then we would climb onto the camels packed and saddled by the Indian boys. Up they would go in their camel-like way, obtusely straightening knees and hips, disjointedly rocking back and forth as they lurched to a stand. Mine was a smaller camel, a girl I thought as it had been lying down hiding body parts before I mounted. But its name was Mr. Papood. I laughed as I realized that the eyelashes had tricked me, the long feminine eyelashes of the girl camels in cartoons. And we were off, watching the desert go by with its enchanting openness, its palette of browns. There was more green than I expected, trees and shrubs the stubborn camels liked to stop and gnaw on much to the dismay of our camel driver, upset that some of us couldn't control our beasts, unable to enforce upon them that munching uninvited on safari was unacceptable. On we would go in the desert sun, not as hot as I expected in the morning, but with the sun beating strong on my new cream colored safari hat with a brim and thin, long-sleeved white cotton India made shirt. Step after plodding step the camels would take, usually walking single file, their big feet like jelly donuts about to squish out their contents as they flattened with the weight rolled onto them. With clicking and sucking and Donald Duck like sounds the camel driver would at times hasten their gates, at times cajoling them into trotting. For me, the trotting was torture, pounding my already sore ischial tuberosities of my pelvis onto the hard saddle and every muscle and bone in my body tensing and jolting as I hung on desperately, almost sliding off a couple of times to the unforgiving earth below. But there wasn't too much trotting, mostly just the steady peaceful pace, the awkward rhythm of the camel finding its place in line.

My place in line seemed to be at the back as I had a very young camel, a baby of one and a half years, so Mahmood told me, my fifteen year old helper. The one up front, Mr. Magoo, was twenty-five and earned his rightful place at the front - demanded it too. He bit another camel on the rump that flagrantly dared to take its place, winning an unofficial race. That was Steve, inciting his camel to the challenge. The chomp on the butt sent rider and beast bolting forward with a wheelie.

To be at the end of the line was to be downwind of one of the most charming aspects of the camels, their bubbling flatulence, warm and sweet with a twist of pungence. It was often followed by sour greenish brown irregular lumps of coal falling to the ground unnoticed despite the musical announcement of their coming. The sound from one end was rivaled in charm by the sounds coming out of the other. These camels made strange noises, groaning, sounding like a motor boat engine trying to start, urping and sputtering.

We stopped for lunch for three hours under a shade tree, a black tarp spread over the ground for us to nap on, avoiding the midday's hottest sunshine. Both days were the same - chapati with dal and a nice soupy vegetable curry all to be eaten with the hands without silverware and no bathroom to wash up in. We could eat and read and nap and chat, watching the black dung beetles of dime store rubber busy across the desert sand.

Both days we visited traditional villages raised up with concoctions of animal dung, sand and water making nice clean looking huts with courtyards of the same. The efficient cleanliness seemed a contradiction for houses made of feces, but they were clean and nice and without odor. And the people were smiling and friendly, greeting us warmly when around although most were farmers and out in the field working out of sight to us.

We passed many herds of goats and sheep those two days. Once we watched as two white sheep butted heads, ramming against each other so loudly over and over again (males, no doubt!) while all the other sheep stood around in a circle, watching like boys at a street fight. And I swear we passed Donkey - from Shrek - it looked just like him exactly. He was with one small herd of goats, following along slowly, his head bent, his right front leg tied to his back right leg with a rope to keep him from going very fast or very far. He didn't speak, but I think he would have said something sad.

At sunset we approached the magnificent rolling, plunging sand dunes, the perfect picture of the Thar Desert, with nothing but waves of honey sand and camels. And there we camped. Dinner was almost more of the same, cooked over an open campfire by our camel driver and his four or five helpers huddled around. From our campfire we watched them cook and then wash all the dishes after the meal with sand, scouring the remaining food from the tin plates with the grains instead of with water. We talked some with our fellow travelers - two tall well-bred Germans just finished with their London boarding school, a young Englishman who looked and sounded so much like Harry Potter except the next morning he was sporting a light growth of beard, a lone traveling German female biochemistry graduate student, and a Brazilian man who was an engineer and who brought along an Indian gentleman wearing a Penn State sweatshirt that he had met in Agra. Desert colored grasshoppers flitted around and became the subject of conversation culminating in tasty treats crisped by the campfire on hollow wooden stakes. No one tried the dung beetles.

We fell asleep on thick blankets covered by the same, with a big wide sky of stars overhead in perfect constellations.