Pushkar – Holi Cow
From Jaipur, the others had discussed hiring a car and driver to tour round Rajasthan, and they asked me if I wanted to share it with them, as the first couple of stops (Pushkar and Udaipur) were on my itinerary. From there, I would head southwards to Mumbai, where the others would go north to Jodhpur. Hiring a car and driver round here, especially if there’s a few of you, can work out at similar prices to the train, only hopefully much less dusty.
Our car was to arrive at 12 noon for the three hour drive to Pushkar. This was the main day for celebrating Holi, when the fun we’d seen at the stadium the night before spilled over on to the streets. Initially the plan was to go out and join the fun, but after seeing a few fellow guests from our hotel leave only to return five minutes later covered from head to toe, we decided to stay put – memories of the hour-long shower to get the dye out the night before were all too fresh in our minds, and we didn’t fancy baking in the car with dye all over us. It was a good chance to have a lazy breakfast, get packed up, and chill out for a couple of hours. Even the dash to the car parked on the driveway was a bit hairy, as we had to persuade the waiting gang outside not to pelt us. It seems to be on a par almost with Hallowe’en, as sweets are handed out to roaming gangs; we were offered some, which of course we took (yes, Andy – even MORE free stuff).
The drive to Pushkar was, fortunately, uneventful – the car didn’t have air conditioning (I’m not that much of a Princess; the further south we get, the hotter the temperature) so we were riding with the windows down, until we got to villages where we were likely to get pelted with colour. We managed to avoid this, and arrived in Pushkar without further incident.
Pushkar is one of India’s holiest towns. Surrounded by mountains, it’s a relatively small place, with streets built round a small lake, said to have been created when Bhrama dropped a lotus flower. It’s got thousands of temples, holy cows, holy men, and travellers who seem to stay here forever and a day, grinding to a happy halt now that they have found the ‘real’ India. It seems to be hugely popular with the Israeli travellers, indicated by the number of places that have falafel on the menu.
We got cheap rooms in what appeared to be a very old house (think converted monastery and you’ll be on the right lines) – very basic but it was a roof for the night! Wandering down into town we were intrigued, because of this place’s reputation as a peaceful haven, to hear new-age rave music thumping round the buildings. Turning a corner, we saw a couple of hundred tourists, all dyed bright pink from head to toe, jumping and dancing to the music pulsating from a nearby rooftop. Holi, hippy traveller style! Although it looked quite good fun, it didn’t seem really my style at all – the others seemed to agree, so we gave it a wide berth and headed out for some lunch. Because of Pushkar’s holy status, there’s no alcohol, meat, fish or eggs in town – it’s completely pure veg (as they say here). So after stuffing ourselves on veg food, we wandered through the town.
Ringing the holy lake are a series of ghats, where men come to bathe themselves in the blessed water. These include Ghandi Ghat, where Gandhi’s ashes were scattered after his cremation. Photography is, in the most part, prohibited, so I’m afraid you’ll have to make do with my descriptions on this one. The Ghats are made up of many steps, leading right down to the water. In order to approach them, you have to remove your shoes. As Michelle and I went down one, we met a priest down there who offered prayers with us for the wellbeing of us, our friends and our family – this involved us making various offerings, petals, rice, sugar, salt and (most oddly) a coconut to the lake. For this, we got a blessing on our foreheads, and a ‘Pushkar passport’ (a red string around our wrists). It was amazingly peaceful down by the lake, and the intentions behind the prayers were so genuine they would translate to any religion or other belief system.
Picking our way through the holy cows and the ensuing ‘offerings’ on the street, we went to the Bhrama temple, the only one of its kind. We were given flowers as we went in, to make offerings to the deity, and again had to remove our shoes (you eventually give up all hope of keeping your feet clean in India!) It was wonderfully colourful inside – best, though, was the monk sitting guard over the shrine in Aviator sunglasses, and taking calls on his mobile. East meets west indeed.
We spent the rest of the afternoon meandering round the lake, over the holy bridge where shoes are again verboten, and settled in the imaginatively titled Sunset view cafe – three guesses what we did there? An indication of just how hippy-ish it is in Pushkar is that there is some dude playing bongos as the rest of the punters gaze appreciatively at the sunset. It was peaceful, sure, but not somewhere I could stay forever. I’d miss those eggs too much.
Right, guys, due to popular request (well, I think one person asked me one time, maybe) I have started to upload my photos on to my flickr account. There’s a link somewhere to the right (in the ‘links’ section, funnily enough) – if that doesn’t work, the url is http://www.flickr.com/photos/suzannehitchen/
And if even that’s too much for some of you to follow, I’ll try and put a selection here soon. If you go to flickr, you’ll see just how unrestrained I am with a digital camera, think it’s 300+ photos so far. 18 months of this to go, folks!
Tags: India, Travel
Suzanne
To Suzie, Hope your having a nice time in India. I heard you rode on an elephant, it must have been fun. Jack has stayed here for the weekend he was barking alot.I have made my first forgiveness and I did a reading it was fun. I am having a busy weekend and tomorrow I am going to a farm to feed the baby lambs. mummy bought me a new pair of wellingtons. I liked all your pictures, especially of the elephants- maybe I could decorate the elephants in Chester Zoo just as pretty!!! Lots of love, missing you lots. Ice cream is here…. Wish you were delicious!! Gabi xx x
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Pushkar sounds like a really nice place, even if it is a hippy paradise! If Pete Rolston reads your blog he’s bound to ask if you pushed your car to Pushkar!! I’ve viewed your photographs (twice) as a slide show. It’s great to see the pictures of the places/people you’ve described so well. I’m wondering though if your camera will survive at this pace for the next 18 months. I guess time will tell.
It was great talking to you on the phone this morning and I’ll be looking out for the gifts you’ve posted off to me. Let me know if there is anything else you need and I’ll ask Dave to bring it out to India for you.
Take care. Stay safe.
Love you lots
Mum
Hi Suze, hope this comes through to you OK
had a problem with the code.
Enjoyed reading about Pushkar, and as Clare
says our Pete is bound to have some amusing comment to make.He keeps me going with his wit.By the way, i have been thinking of the elephants which are painted so colourful.How do they get them to stay still
while they are painting them.What an experience for you to ride on one!Were you sore afterwards? I look forward to your next instalment on your blog.Hope all the messages keep you company on the way
love from Angela xxx