The night we ALMOST got chai…..
After a day recovering from sickness in Udaipur, I ventured outside with ‘my girls’. You really do make the best friends while travelling. We had found Merav when we arrived the previous night, lying in wait for us on the staircase.
That night we went down to the ghats- the big article lakes originally meant for bathing- I wouldn’t try that now…. but they were pleasant enough to sit by and look out at the island buildings all lit up. Udaipur is one of the locations where they filmed The Bond film ‘Octopussy’. I vaguely recognized the island/palace Octopussy herself ‘occupied.’ I had the urge to swim over and sneak in bond style. Sadly lack of energy prevented me.
The next Morning feeling much better we explored the streets – well, I was guided by Merav and Kate who had orientated themselves the previous afternoon while Iwas resting. All the shops were full of beautiful Rajasthani handicrafts and paintings. Here there was a choice of numerous painting and cookery courses you could take (as Merav had done while waiting for us to catch up with her.)
Colourful embroiderd juttis (simple Indian shoes) Pashmina as intricately embroidered as I have ever seen and delicately hand painted cards featuring Rajastani soldiers, princesses and gods. the bazaars were steep and winding as we made our way up to the beautiful palace which had amazing views and displays of injurious looking amour. In the sunshine we continued to the less touristy bazaars. I purchased Kiplings ‘Kim’ which I have been meaning to read, he wrote it in Rajasthan and my grandad filmed the BBC series here in the 80s. I was led to a small jewelry shop where I was told another nice Indian gentlemen would push a piece of metal through my nose for only the price of the gold used, he did a good job. two down one to go :->
On the way home that day in the narrow bazaars of Udaipur we got trapped behind a wedding precession, two large carriages carrying the wedding party followed a music cart blaring out drumming and singing from metal loud speakers. Behind the carriage followed a long train of beautifully coloured sari’s worn by relatives. Trying to weave our way round we got tangled in amidst the celebrations- it felt like we were crashing the party…
Great fun was had in a shoe shop with two Indians who didn’t actualy own the shop but were looking over it for their brother. They were a little nervous about prices, but after a little joking and laughing I’m positive we got good deal. They also recommended their own businesses, one a roof top cafe, named ‘Cool’ despite the cheesy name (inavitable in India) we promised to pay a visit too later. We ate a good tali in a restaurant frequented by locals (a sign the food is tasty and good value) then we visited the Cool cafe in the evening as promised and shared sweets, some lassi and a kingfisher beer-this place was frequented by westerners obviously. We met some stoned French guys and an English couple who entertained us midly before going in search of chai.
We must of walked for about an hour looking for a chai stop. Honestly we thought, this is India you can ALWAYS get chai, but we failed to find a single place serving it. It was likely that this was going to be remembered as the laughable night we DIDN’T get chai.
Dizzily we recalled that at our hotel the little roof top cafe did in fact served chai- masala tea, although it wasn’t as good a the small sweet shots the street vendors sold. We made our way up to the roof and ordered glad our search was finally going to be over but still seething that chai which is ALWAYS possible on nearly every street….was not possible tonight……on the roof of our hotel our ‘chai’ came. Alas! it had no sugar! It was served in a mug! Almost traditional English tea except stronger and a little spiced! This will forever be remebered as the night we ALMOST got chai.
Tags: 1, india
grandvoyages
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