Dawn & Al escapades to India - Day 4

his morning we travelled from Delhi to Jaipur by train on the Shatabdi Express. The Shatabdis are among the fastest trains in India and the Indian Railways considers them as prestigious.

Our journey started at 6am, it was both dark and foggy and although already busy Delhi station had a real eerie atmospheric quality to it.

We had Executive coach seats so were a bit disappointed that there wasn’t the chai walla or the hustle and bustle on coach like we had experienced last time in India. Our food was also not the constant stream of rustic Indian home style cooked dishes, but a rather sterile western style breakfast!! We did manage to get some good sleep though.

On arriving at Jaipur station we saw the familiar aggressive jostling of porters to offer their services, in fact one porter had received the nod from a passenger to take his heavy cases only to be gazumped by another, which resulted in an angry scrap followed by fisticuffs and all. But no doubt these fellas graft for a living and the bartering banter is usually always in good spirit.

Jaipur also popularly known as the Pink City, is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Rajasthan. During the British rule in India, Jodhpur was the capital of the princely state of Marwar. Founded on 18 November 1727 by Maharaja Sawai Jai Singh II, the ruler of Amber, the city today has a population of more than 3.5 million.

Jaipur is the first planned city of India, located in the semi-desert lands of Rajasthan. The city which once had been the capital of the royalty now is the capital city of Rajasthan. The very structure of Jaipur resembles the taste of the Rajputs and the Royal families.
Jaipur is a very popular tourist destination. The main lure for this is the amazing shopping for arts, textiles, jewellry, gems, and handicrafts and the architecture with places like Amber Fort, Jaigarh Fort, Nahargarh Fort, City Palace and Jantar Mantar.

As we only had a couple of days we were excited to experience as much as possible so we had a quick spot of simple lunch at the hotel.

We both had lamb on the bone Rogan Gosht, paratha and saffron pilau and it was delicious, full flavoured and complex, the rice had a distinct saffron taste with a hint of rose and the bread flaky and perfect for mopping.

Our main personal reasons for going to Jaipur were a little different to the norm as this is where Punit has his import export spice business which we really wanted to see as well as the opportunity to buy some product for the interior of the restaurant, plates and kitchen ware.

Punit's spice shop is in the heart of the old walled city and it is all we hoped for, smelling and tasting the spices. Cardamom and black pepper from Kerala, the reddest dried chillis from Kashmir, cumin from Gujarat, the finest grade mustard oil from Calcutta, strong asafatoida uncut and the best you can buy. This is amazing for us and to think we will now be receiving our spices direct from here rather than months down the line via many a middle man. I am a happy man! The above picture is of Pathar Ke Phool - Black Stone Flower used in spice blends

In the evening we made our way outside the city to Chokhi Dhani. A tourist attraction popular with the locals and outsiders. It is a replica of a Rajasthani village, showcasing every aspect of Rajasthani culture. Having spent a number of years in Dubai we were used to the replicated and fabricated style tourist attraction so were a bit cynical, but we really enjoyed this place. It had a superb no frills typical local meal as part of the experience. We had to sit down on the floor cross-legged (my legs were splayed out as I am unable to sit crossed legged due to the many years of standing for long hours in a kitchen. I was quietly jealous of the 90 year old grandmother that was offered a wicker armchair). We were served lots of different dals, rice and curries as well as the famous ‘Dal bati Churma’ Unleavened bread balls with dal, lots of melted ghee and Churma which is coarse ground wheat with ghee and melted jaggery. It was delicious but a large portion would be a challenge as it is intensely rich and very sweet sitting alongside the other savoury dishes.

After dinner we walked round the attractions and Dawn got her fortune read by an old man with a parrot. The parrot picked the cards and we were translated the words of the wise old fella. He commented that Dawn works like a man and March will bring great success.

I wonder whats going to happen in March?

Another entry next week.