31st October - Pushkar

Happy Halloween! One of my favourite holidays back home and unfortunately not celebrated here (god knows what people would make of our costumes in India!) so I'll be having a look online to see what everyone got up to. I might not have been dressing up but I've been playing trick or treat with monkeys all day. After a piping hot shower (a rare occurrence here believe me!) I settled down on the terrace for my morning 'honey lemon ginger hot' and almost immediately had to move when I heard a monkey in the tree directly above me. I find it's always better to be able to actually see the monkeys to be ready to get out of their line of fire. My decision to move was proved a good one only seconds later when the exact spot I'd been sitting in was pelted with fruit falling from the tree that the aforementioned monkey was now vigorously shaking. At the other end of the terrace, another monkey was dangling down from the roof of the building, swinging back and forth. It was only when two of the young European girls staying here ran off at speed that we realised it was their clothes it was using to dangle so playfully. Luckily they managed to retrieve their belongings - it just reminded me to keep a better hold on my own things. They tell you to be wary of pickpockets whilst travelling, nowhere in the guide books does it mention thieving monkeys! In all fairness, I haven't had any unpleasant run-ins with monkeys during my stay in Pushkar - I've just got used to them being EVERYWHERE. They're so playful (the little ones especially), I managed to film a baby one playing today, he kept looking right at me, it was almost like he was performing on purpose for the camera!

Pushkar is getting busier by the hour now with the camel fair getting ever closer - every day more and more people are coming to the lake to bathe in the ghats that surround it. Bathing in these waters is like a spiritual cleansing but I've also seen people washing clothes in them! This afternoon, two young boys were splashing around and laughing in the ghat nearest out terrace. I asked dad if having fun in the ghat was allowed - he just laughed and said he didn't know.

In the afternoon we wandered across to one of the many temples surrounding the lake. These temples are now alive with activity, many people are visiting the temples to offer puja (prayers) and we were no exception. Once inside, we were immediately accosted by two 'holy men' and taken off to opposite ends of the steps leading down to the water. I say 'holy men' with hesitation as my guy showed me his photo ID which apparently proved his holy credentials. Any holy position that requires photo ID for justification of it is questionable in my opinion but we proceeded with the puja ceremony regardless. I was given a bowl filled with water and pink and orange flowers, had to repeat a prayer (in Hindi I think and much of which I pronounced wrong I'm sure but he assured me it didn't matter!), told him the names of my family members and on hearing that no, I did not have a husband, solemnly promised to return next year with one! He tied a red and yellow thread around my wrist and sent me off down the steps to thrown the contents of my bowl into the ghat. I say throw, that is what he told me to do. It was only after the contents of my bowl had made a massive splash that I realised everyone else was gently pouring theirs into the water, trust me to do the wrong thing! After placing a red mark and rice on my forehead, my puja was complete (save for his payment of course, I left the negotiations with dad - he wanted 1,000 rupees, dad paid 200 for the both of us as recommended by Lonely Planet). The experience is a tradition that goes back centuries so it was lovely to be part of it. And aside from the promises of good health, wealth and apparent husband finding, the thread around my wrist acts as a repellent (for want of a better word!) to others trying to extort money in exchange for prayers - once you've got your 'Pushkar passport' (as they're otherwise known) you tend to be left alone.

We had dinner at the rather upmarket Sixth Sense restaurant at the Seventh Heaven Inn. The restaurant is on the top floor of the hotel which is a converted haveli - such a beautiful space with vines and flowers growing inside the building and climbing each floor in a totally wild and haphazard manner. They even had an ornamental bird cage acting as a manual lift, bringing food from the kitchens on the ground floor up to the top. A lovely meal, (a gorgeous dessert - lemon tart - enough to feed four people!) and a stroll back through the streets during a power cut. Aside from the lights cutting out, the surround sound chanting cut out as well as the speakers died and we could hear the actual chanting now, quieter but just as powerful. We knew when Pushkar was back to full power twenty minutes later when the speakers came back to life and the chanting could be heard once again echoing across the lake. It lulled me to sleep last night - not a bad thing to drift off to sleep to, not bad at all.

1st November - Pushkar

White rabbits! In honour of my grandmother back home I say this as it's the first day of the month and I know it'll be the first thing she says this morning. Our plan today was to go up to the camel fair to explore as it's only days away from officially starting but by the time it reached noon we decided a few more hours in the shade could only be a good thing. We met some new people this morning, Bron from Oz and Jack from Brighton - both have been travelling for a while already and made me very jealous/excited after hearing some of their tales, every time I speak to someone new places get added to my list of places to go in the next six months! After a chilled out morning chatting with them, Jack, dad and I headed off to the camel fair. The main aim of the day was to go for a camel ride - having never been on a camel before I was especially excited if not a little apprehensive. As one of the main attractions of the fair was camel racing, I'm well aware that they can move pretty quickly when they want to and I had a vivid image in my mind of my camel taking off into the desert and there being nothing anyone could do about it. Ridiculous admittedly but a fear I had none the less. Dad and I got ourselves on a camel and Jack followed on the tour around the fair and attached camping grounds for the camels and their traders. Jack's a photographer and he managed to get some pretty impressive shots whilst accompanying us - one of the benefits of being on a camel ride is that they take you into the very depths of the fair, wandering through the areas that you wouldn't necessarily wander on foot for fear of being berated by camel traders who don't want strangers wandering in their midst. It was really unbelievable how many camels were actually there now (especially when you compare it to the measly seventeen I saw last week!), there must be thousands and I'm assured that more and more will arrive in the coming days. The ride itself was a fantastic experience - you're a lot higher up than I'd realised and getting on and off was certainly a traumatic experience (lesson of the day - there is NO graceful way to get on or off a camel, in my case I just kind of fell in a very unladylike fashion much to everyone's amusement!) but after a few minutes you get used to the motion of the way they move and settle into it. I'm not sure I'd manage a proper camel trek but I certainly survived the hour without embarrassing myself too much! We headed back to the Lotus and was surprised to find the most people I'd ever seen congregated on the terrace at once. We had an excellent evening with the fourteen or so people from all over the world (England, Scotland, Australia, Spain, Germany, India, South Africa...the list goes on!), chatting and swapping stories. Pushkar really is the easiest place to meet people, it's such a small town and I've found that people are so happy to talk about where they've been, where they're going and trading travel tips, all without the aid of alcohol which I find is usually the catalyst that gets strangers talking to one another in foreign lands. I've really enjoyed tonight.

It feels very strange to be leaving Pushkar tomorrow and despite looking forward to another night in Delhi and heading to Goa to see my family on Thursday, I will be sad to go. A week here really isn't enough and it's flown by without me even noticing. I've learned that I'm a hummus fiend and that with a ready supply of hummus, falafel, smashed avocadoes and pitta bread I could happily be a vegetarian; that a week without alcohol can only be a good thing and have met some fantastic people whose paths I'll hopefully cross again during the next five months and beyond. That's the thing about India, you really never know who you're going to run into! I'm leaving with my dad's words at the forefront of my mind. It's not 'if' I come back to Pushkar, it's 'when'.