Drishtikone
The first thing you notice in Jaisalmer is the Golden Fort, like a crown atop the Trikuta hill. Made from yellow sandstone, it exudes an ethereal glow in the morning rays of the sun, visible for miles around. No wonder Satyajit Ray called it the Shonar Kella . And then you notice the cows… Dozens and dozens of them; dotting every street, infesting each square, pooping away without a care in the world. Every time we traversed the length and breadth of the town (which was quite often) we did a complicated hop-scotch to avoid cow dung .The sight of a busy bovine posterior brought out the latent Olympian athletes in us.
Located in the heart of the Thar desert, Jaisalmer is one of the largest fortresses in the world and has beautifully sculpted Jain Temples. The town is divided into the fort area and the expanse around it. The fort built way back in 1156 AD is now tragically listed as one of the most endangered sites. It is speculated that leaks from the sewage system is eroding the fort’s foundations. The tourist boom has made it worse. The hundreds of mushrooming restaurants and shops drawing gallons of water are stressing the already overstressed open drains.
We mostly discovered the town on foot. The people are friendly, the shopkeepers aggressive. The displays in most shops looked like rags. How is it that the same skirts, shawls, kurtas with the same prints and colors are available at all tourist destinations? Is there a “Great tourist con manufacturing industry” that retails all over the country with a statutory warning “To be sold only to gullible tourists desperate for shopping”? There was no dearth of innovative advertising. Want to sell a size 20, once upon a time white kurta? Just paste a “Makes your boyfriend look less ugly” tag line. Who knows someone with failing eyesight and sense might just bite the bait. Saddled with a bed sheet that hasn’t sold for years??? How about “works better than Viagra”. Pfizer can shut shop, colorful ugly embroidery works better.
We didn’t just roam around like vagabonds scoffing at shop displays. Like most dutiful tourists we did the mandatory sightseeing. Right near the entrance of Jaisalmer fort is the Raaj Mahal, home to the Bhati clan. One of the most popular sights, it is a seven storeyed structure with stunning lattice work. The terrace affords a spectacular 360⁰ view of the town and the now dried-up Gadisar lake. Near the superbly sculpted Jain temples, we were privy to an impromptu recital by a crazy balladeer. Man happy, toh woman Happy…happy happy he sang giving a full throated performance to an audience of amused tourists.
The town is dotted with a few notable ancient havelis. These are palatial houses mostly built by wealthy merchants, with beautiful, ornate sandstone carvings. Visited just one: Patwon ki Haveli, sticking to the if you’ve seen one you’ve seen all logic. Each town in Rajasthan has a unique colour-code. If it’s pink for Jaipur, then it’s indigo for Udaipur. Jaisalmer is a uniform golden-yellow sandstone which blends nicely with the desert surrounding it.
Eating out was always a dilemma. Where shall we have gatte ki sabzee and ker sangri today? The Rajasthanis are not very imaginative when it comes to their cuisine. And the arid conditions do not help either. But where they lack in imagination, they compensate with oil. After a few days of eating out I had so much of oil in me that you could actually mine for it! Our first meal in Jaisalmer was a disaster. Little Tibet, our chosen one, was akin to space-time singularity. Once you order, the staff goes into a happy stupor making you wonder whether they have just had a short term memory loss. You impatiently drum your fingers, cast furtive glances in the direction of the kitchen which shows no signs of activity, and when you have just given up hope, your order makes a steaming, grand entry. You belatedly realize that all that waiting was just not worth it. Our thukpas were a dieter’s delight, the type you wouldn’t touch even with a barge pole. After a series of spicy and scary misadventures we were quite looking forward to a continental dinner at the much hyped Trio. In a fit of fervid excitement we ordered almost half the menu and waited impatiently. We smiled through the live folk music even though the notes touched new highs and lows and the occasional vocal maneuver that sounded like someone having a painful saline gargle. We braved a sudden dust storm, a squall, napkins flying off our tables all in the fond hope of a decent meal. Alas it was too decent; insipid, boiled with sauces which bore no semblance to the exciting descriptions in the elaborate menu card. My advice? stick to local cuisine, oil be damned.
When you are in Jaisalmer you cannot go back without an excursion to the Sam dunes. In our mission for a sand dune expedition we discovered that the travel agents in the town are a fun-loving lot. Their offices were mostly sans their occupants but outside they had giant advertorials promising to take us to “Non Touristic sites”. Touristy it seems is the new four lettered word in the travel agent’s lexicon. We eventually did locate a functioning-in-his-office agent. Call me Mr. Desert he announced as he shook our hands genially. Apparently a local celebrity, in his previous avatar as a camel driver he was featured in a few foreign publications as the face of Jaisalmer.
Quite a few friends, family members had waxed eloquent about the dunes and the desert’s vast expanse. Our take, the desert has deserted the desert. The sandy stretch had more shrubs that one could count. The dunes were littered with discarded bottles, kurkure wrappers and hordes of screaming, excited tourists. Our camel ride was more memorable than the view of the desert. We swayed at an unhurried pace. The husband’s camel was quite an opinionated creature and made its displeasure known by emitting gurgly grunts. We just couldn’t stop giggling. But our bout of giggles was rather short lived. Our camel riders came to the hasty conclusion that we wouldn’t mind an extra dollop of excitement and threw in a free camel race (with us atop the camels). Imagine your internal organs doing a samba all at the same time? We held on to the poor camel for dear life with our emotions doing a kaleidoscopic flip. But when you are in Rajasthan you are expected to tip. Be it the pushy Rajasthani dancers doing the jig at the drop of a hat, the exasperating sarangi player who plays off key, the street urchin who annoys you with a rattle and the camel driver whose idea of amusement is a giddy marathon.
Later in the evening we had a prolonged faux Rajasthani village experience at Choki Dhani. The evening ended with a sumptuous dinner. The USP of Choki Dhani is force feeding. Our anguished nahiiiin had absolutely no effect on the determined staff who continued to lavish our thalis with dollops of ghee.
On our way back we were treated to the most spectacular sight. The Milky Way embracing the inky gray sky and countless sparkling stars that you never to get to see through the haze that envelopes city skies. We could see the golden fort twinkling in the distant horizon. Thankfully, tourists cannot mar the pristine beauty of the sky, not at least for another decade.
On our way to Jodhpur I couldn’t help but ponder at the irony of tourism. Are we inexorably adding to congestion and encouraging blatant commercialization? Seeing the dramatic deterioration of once-upon-a-time pristine hamlets, one is overcome with an annoying sense of guilt. Are we like termites, eating into the already crumbling infrastructure? I think next vacation I will just stay home, or maybe not.
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