Back at the hotel, I really wanted to avoid Anel, the massage guy. After a long hot day of sight seeing and feeling slightly emotionally renewed, I had no desire to negotiate an evening of food and beverages I couldn't eat and pestering for immigration support I didn't feel strongly about.

Rather than going into the hotel, I headed to the web cafe out front. Despite being quite dirty, the owner struck me as being a nice person. He did that after hearing me cough and sputter and sneeze every few seconds by offering me an ayurvedic cold remedy. I said know taking it for another attempt at an upsale, but he just said okay and sat back down. When I left, I revisited the issue and bought the stuff. It tastes pretty good, but it hasn't done anything for my cough or my cold.

While I typed away on the dingy old computer sitting in a rolling chair that had lost three of its five wheels, my back twisted like a corkscrew and the keyboard with sticky keys almost at shoulder height, a couple of American girls walked in. I figured out that they were Stanford girls by the t-shirt one of them wore. I figured out their age (about 20) by their manic energy and their strong efforts to prove to one another how competent and in charge they were. I remember that only too well from my college days in Japan when so many people were posing. Once I got to know them, most of them turned out to be way more confused than I was.

These girls were arguing diplomatically over the one remaining computer. One of them, a think attractive blond, suggested that she might get a massage while she waited for the computer. She reasoned that at 400 rupees even if weren't too good, it couldn't be all bad. I piped in then and told her of my experience. Straight up honest I advised that the massage could only be called fair to midlin in technique and the face and scalp massage should be avoided at all costs, but it might be relaxing after a long day of travel.

She went and got the massage which took me off the hook for dinner. Its ince when clear opportunity presents itself and everyone's needs are met at once. I finished up my writing and headed to the hotel restaurant for dinner. I ordered some boneless chicken skewer item that turned out to be really amazing. I did't order water because I found I could get the same stuff just outside the front gate for a third the price.

I talked to the hotel manager about arranging a car to take me from Jaipur to Agra the next day stopping at the old well (8th century), the bird sanctuary, and the forgotten city. The cost approximately $60 but I would see the country in between and be able to stop at the more interesting landmarks. I slept quite soundly on it and woke up convinced I'd need to hire the car.

I paid my bill and met my driver. He stood about 6'2" with bright alert cheerful eyes and a friendly smile. I guessed his age at about 25. I soon discovered his English didn't quite rise to international standards, but he seemed affable enough.

He pulled out one of the big white cars that looked like a relic of the late 50's, the same kind of car I'd seen the president of Yugoslavia being carted around in the day before. I felt quite special.

I got in and surveyed the car. The inside appeared to be a much cheaper version of the Yugo. It had the old seats in the front that stretched the width of the car. The positioning of the seat disallowed comfort or any kind of back support. However, I sat happily watching the city disappear behind me. My driver's foot liked to sink down hard on the gas and his eye liked to drag him into oncoming traffic. He almost took out a camel caravan, or actually better stated, he almost took us out by running into a camel caravan. Every time we'd pass another truck, another ox cart or bicycle or motor bike or string of aimless cattle blocked our way. Almost an hour later we left behind the filthy auxiliary stores that lined the road just ouside the city and got to some good agricultural land.

The amount of mustard grown surprised me. I always thought of it as a weed growing up, but field after field after field of it stretched into the horizon, broken only by a few dots of green trees along the fenceline, a number brick walls plotting out boundaries, and a few acres of rice or fallow land here and there.

Plenty of goats, sheep, pigs and cattle grazed along the side of the road. A number of people chopped branches of the acacia trees that lined the roadway off as fodder for their livestock. I gathered this was not something the athorities smiled upon by their furtive glances at traffic either way along the road.

At one point the body of a mangled deer lay along the highway. I scanned the area as far as my eyes could see for signs of suitable habitat for the dear but found none. It had looked pretty healty, so it must have been helping itself to the various crops and slept along the walls.

Women in colorful saris dotted most fields pulling this weed or splashing water on that, their back bent at the waist. Most of the men along the route busied themselves in groups to do a simple task requiring only the energy of one. Otherwise they sat alongside the road lounging away chatting lazily amongst themselves.

It seemed like women bore the brunt of the heavy labors. Even in the big cities at construction sites women would be lined up along the bamboo scaffolding handing up heavy loads of bricks or concrete along with the men. Life is miserable for the lower castes, but it has to be particularly hard for women.

About 4 hours along I discovered that my driver had no idea where the old well was located. He'd never been there. We stopped about six times for directions, people just kept pointing us further along the road. Just before we reached the turn off to the wells we came across dozens, maybe hundreds of stone carving shops line the roads. Men kneeling on their haunches of bending at the waist stood over big blocks of marble banging out intricate designs. The finished work really impressed with its delicacy and minute detail of the designs carved out of large individual blocks of stone.

At the junction of the turn to the well, the driver, Sureg, stopped to get the final directions from a police officer. While a spoke to the man, another distinctive looking gentleman wearing a huge turban laced carefully into a regional design, a chiseled face with a stong aquiline nose, and a grey handlebar moustache that had been twisted carefully at ends to form matching bookends on his upper lip came up to my window and started speaking to me. I suspected him of being yet another brazen tout. I eyed him suspiciously while Sureg turned his attention to the man for a moment. Sureg said "This village man, good man."

My attitude was, 'yeah, whatever,' not grasping what he tried to tell me. He pulled forward a few feet and parked the car, parked the car in the middle of the road setting off a cacaphony of horn blasts. I managed to question him enough times in enough ways to understand that the man just wanted a lift to the village we headed to. With no objection to that, Sureg waved at the guy from the window and the man trotted up to the car and sat regally in the back seat with a pleasing smile.

Sureg translated to me that the man was very happy I would be visiting his village and the people would be very happy to see me there. I got the impression that most people didn't bother to take in this well.

Off the main road things got really gorgeous really fast. Lush trees seemed to sprout up all over the place, the incessant honking from the road completely faded away and people smiled and waved at us from along the road. Children ran alongside the car yelling "hello, hello."

I felt like the pressure cooker I'd been in for a week had been temporarily turned off...