During our 2 days in Ahmedabad we had the chance to be guided by Mrunal, my sister's friend who is native from the city. She brought us around, to visit some of the city's hot spots and we were invited at her parent's home to celebrate some of her family's member birthdays. Lot of fun, strange dog, even stranger italian pizza and even more stranger italian pasta. A few glasses of excellent red wine and a huge glass of single malt whisky allowed us to have sweet dreams. On our way back from some mosque, Mrunal asked me to drive her scooter after sunset and that turned to be a funny but hard moment, Ahmedabad is big city, and driving here is not like hitting beautiful desert roads like I did so far in India. Thank you Mrunal, was great going around with you!

We took a night(mare) bus to Jodhpur, in Rajastan, where we had no problem to find a nice and cheap accommodation. Nice because we were back in a very touristic area, and cheap thanks to the low season! Jodphur is well known as the blue city, and we soon realized that it totally deserves its nickname: even the inside of our room was completely painted in blue!

We started to discover Jodhpur with a long walk, trying our best to get lost in the maze of its old city's streets. It didn't took long before some young man invited us to his house to share a cup of tea and to look at some neverending pictures of his sister's wedding.
During one of our usual afternoon nap, we unfortunately broke one of the beds and asked hotel manager to replace it. He first looked pretty angry, blamed us despite bed was barely standing on his own feet and asked us to pay for it... Few hours later he came back with a huge smile, saying his house was our house, bed was no longer an issue and keep doing the namaste sign by going very low with his body... He acted strange, and smelled also strange. The day after it turned that he was completely drunk... Bed was never replaced as it was probably completely forgot.

We walked, walked and walked again, Jodhpur is very touristic, but it's also surprisingly easy to step out of the beaten path, and meet local way of living, which is sometimes a bit "dangerous". Indeed by walking in some remote area of the city I was sometimes assaulted by dozens of young boys literally climbing on me asking for money, for a photo with me and sometimes simply for my camera. One afternoon I met some teenagers which invited me to share some brandy with them...about one hour later they decided to organize something like a body building exhibition... They were very proud of their nice sculpted bodies, so everybody had to remove his t-shirt and show off his pectorals and biceps... Only difference between me and them: they were 17 years old, I am 30... For obvious decency reasons I won't publish any picture of this on this website.

Another very quiet night on beautiful, well maintained Indian flat and smooth roads brought us to Jaipur. Japiur is known as the pink city, but the only pink think visible around are wild pigs roaming around the streets...before they roll in a deep puddle of mud and rubbish.
Ok..sorry... that might be a bit overdone, but our expectations were high after the beautiful blue city, and Jaipur just didn't made it. The old city's main streets were like a amusement park, with fake old houses painted with a mix between brick orange and pale pink, traditional handicraft and original gem shops, noisy and dusty roads and only one affordable hotel.
Moreover, dozens of buses were unloading hundred of tourists for a 30 minutes overview of each mosque, temple or fort.

Well, to make it simple: all that I dislike in mass tourism.

To escape from this uncomfortable mess, we spent the day at the monkey's temple at the edge of the city. Here we finally found a quiet place with a nice view over the city. Definitely nicer from above. Monkey's temple, as its name says, is literally full of monkeys, some friendlier than others, but also wild pigs, goats, squirrels, dogs, and as everywhere in India, cows surprisingly living very peacefully with each other.

As those were the last two days with my sister we focused more on being together rather than exploring every corner and point of interest of the city, and as I often happens, the best experiences comes when one doesn't search for it: by walking randomly along some avenue we were invited to a young tuktuk driver's house. He introduced us his wife and 4 kids, and explained us his main job: this guy is an artist who had traveled nearly all around the world to spread Radjastani culture and tradition through music.
We had a long chat together, with the inevitable chai, and he finally asked me to type some emails in English for him. Was a good share, and had a real good time together. Once again I was amazed by how simply people live without needing anything beside their family, friends and only enough money for everyday meals and basic needs. And once again I was about to throw my cell phone and laptop in the river.


This post coincide with the end of my second month in India, and with my sister's return to Switzerland. I left her all the unnecessary weight that I was carrying with me since a while and locked my pack, trip continues for me... with a very exiting upcoming destination!