Day 4- Juphur

Today we travelled to Juphur, this took about another 3 hours on the bus. On our way we stopped off at a brick factory to have a look round. As we walked off the bus we noticed that there was a lot of clay huts running down the side of the factory, we then realised they were the workers houses. All of the sudden out of nowhere about 20 children came running out down the pathway towards us! They were SO excited to see us, they were unbelievably cute. They loved having their photos taken on our cameras and then seeing their face on the camera screen, therefore, I have LOTS of photos of children. Me and Laurie particularly just very distracted by the children so we didn't actually hear much about the bricks because we spent our whole time with the children. They were also trying to speak English which was really cool as some of them must have only been about two. We did see a bit of the factory at the end which was incredible to see how hard they work in the sweltering heat. They use camels to pull the bricks around and we saw the men using the moulds to make the bricks and leaving them to dry in the sun in huge quantities. The children were also expected to help on the factory. Overall this was an amazing experience and possibly my favourite bit of the tour so far, it never seizes to amaze me how hard they all work just to get by in life.

We then got back on the bus and continued with our journey to Juphur. We stopped off at a service station and to my amazement they had salt and vinegar Pringles (my absolute favourite) which made me extremely happy for the rest of the bus journey because I am completely sick of eating curry!!

We visited a local village before reaching our hostel. Unfortunately, Gemma still felt poorly and the heat made her feel a lot worse so she sat back on the bus, although, it does sound like our bus driver made a fuss of her and made the chairs into a bed for her which was sweet. The Village was really interesting- we visited a Potters house who showed us how he made little clay chi cups which he then went on to sell to local restaurants and hotels. His house was extremely minimal and was made out of clay. The locals dry out cow dung then mix it in with powdery stones and water which they then use to plaster their walls, ceilings and floors. Although this sounds disgusting it is actually a genius idea because once dried out it doesn't smell and is very strong. They have cows EVERYWHERE so it is also very economical.

While on this tour we also saw the local school. There were no children at school because of a festival which was a shame but we heard a bit about their daily schedule. The government provide the children with a meal at lunch to encourage the locals to send their children to school. It is a big relief for them knowing their child would get at least one meal a day. We visited the tailors who showed us all his beautiful material and items he was currently working on.

We then went to see the watering well which we were expecting to be a small well with a bucket.. We had the completely wrong image!! The well was huge and we spent around 30 minutes wondering around. There were hundreds of very steep steps down to the water which the locals used to have to walk down everyday to get a bucket of water. This must have been very exhausting and also very dangerous!!!

Next door was the village temple. In comparison to others we have seen it was very small. There was a man chanting out of a microphone across the village and a few people were sat worshipping.

When then checked into our hostel. This was really cool. It used to be someone's house who then decided to convert it into a hostel. It felt very homely as each room was different giving it a unique feeling. It also had an amazing roof top terrace which you could see all over Juphur, however, we didn't get much time to truly appreciate it. The others went for a walking tour of Juphur but myself and Gemma stayed back because it was smack bang in the middle of the day so extremely hot and Gemma didn't want to risk it.

Jai had organised a tuk tuk to pick myself and Gemma up so we could meet the rest of the group to go to the cinema. This was our first experience on a tuk tuk and let's just say it was eventful. It was just as mental as they are made out to be.

We went to see a random Bollywood film which was hilarious because obviously we didn't have a clue what was going on. It seemed to be a cross between paranormal activity and porn so we decided to leave half way through!!! However, the cinema experience was really cool. The building was very big and glamorous- it was more like a west end theatre than a cinema to us! We also got popcorn and nachos for 50p which was a touché!

We then finished our day with dinner, Gemma had a bowl of boiled rice and I had cheese croquettes and chips!!! We are so adventurous (we were really concerned about our stomachs so gave spices a miss).

All in all an extremely hectic but good day in Juphur. We have already seen and learnt so much about India. It is definitely a trip we will never forget.