Farewell to Bundi

I’ve finally left Bundi, the time-warp town that held me fast for nearly 3 weeks. Although I did a lot, I also feel like I did a whole lot of nothing. The last several days I found myself sleeping in and spending most of the day indoors, reading and writing, rather than outdoors exploring like usual. I started to feel under the weather, loss of appetite, loss of energy and motivation etc and I deciphered the message; I'd overstayed in Bundi. Certainly not in the eyes of the locals whom Id befriended nor by my Indian family who by this time I regularly took my meals with, I was given the honor of chiming the bells at evening prayer at the home altar and attended midnight prayer sessions in town, hiked to favorite viewpoints at 6am, cooked with and they even set up a home cinema so that we could watch the latest Bollywood hit that id mentioned I wanted to see. They called me Beti (daughter) and Didi (any elder female family member) and as much as the intimate family experience was more than I could have hoped for and extremely culturally educational, I was feeling that old familiar tug more and more. I was getting a little too entrenched and for all I knew my ‘mother’ had started scouring the land for suitable marriage prospects – I am 27 and single, something unheard of in a proper Indian household.
The events in Bundi by no means deserve to be summarized but to save you from an entry as long as the list of Hindu Gods, I shall try.

Festivals
I attended the Mela (just like a state fair only less rides, less games and stall after stall of junk) with some of the family. Hordes of men roamed the aisles - they were quite protective of me and commented on the constant “Hallo! Hallo!”s – Its always like that, I tell them.

The Teej festival lasted 2 days culminating each night with a parade past my front door. Floats with figures, live and not of various Hindu myths rolled by followed by men pushing loud spluttering generators on wooden carts. Elephants, camels, marching bands, and dancers were flanked by strings of young boys carrying neon tube lights – these were high-tech parades! Horses carried men of importance wielding swords and onlookers tossed flower petals and gave out drinking water. I seemed to create my own spectacle just bobbing to the music!

On Krishna’s Birthday, after having fasted the whole day (because his mother was in labor), I joined Rupa, my ‘mother’ and her sister in a midnight puja (prayer) celebration. I watched our shadows from the street light glide down the road, mine with my skirt falling mid-calf with two Sari shapes on either side like shadow guards. I was truly lucky to be there. We made the rounds to many of the temples in town, I was the only foreigner there and I crowded in with the rest to pat homage cardboard cutouts of blue babies and brightly painted Gods on beds of fake and real flowers and neon lights. Sometimes deafening music thudded throughout to accentuate the otherworldly intensity of the faithful. All eyes were on me each time that it was my turn at the altar and to be honest, I felt a bit of a fraud. How brightly did the neon ‘non-believer’ sign flash above my head? Hopefully not enough to detract from the Gods themselves. Nevertheless, in order not to embarrass my family and even more the outsider intruding on their ancient rituals, I paid honor to the people, not their Gods and gave thanks for the experience.

Frustrations

One day, I ventured to hike to the only cenotaph in sight that I had not yet been to. Earlier hikes, to the closer ones had been marred by boys following me and invading my ‘alone-time’. This one, I was assured was unreachable, the path had been overgrown. Great! Perfect for an adventure and hopefully, a way to find some time for myself. I plunged into the woods, winding through thorny bushes, slowly climbing and when I finally reached the top, I was so excited! I felt like Indiana Jones uncovering a long lost temple and most importantly, I would finally be alone! I had my ipod and an amazing view of town and a beautiful historical structure all to myself… for all of about 2 minutes when I heard a rowdy group of men approaching.

Noooo! I quickly ran over my options – should I hide? I had no idea how long they would be there so I sat with my back against the far side and hoped they would take in the view and be on their way. Suddenly their shouting died and I knew Id been discovered even before I heard “You are?” from behind me. I ignored them despite having turned my ipod off and what followed was 2 hours of me being stubborn and wanting to wait them out and them following me around to each new position (I got up and moved about 6 times) and not caring that I just wanted peace and quiet (this I have learned to say in Hindi). Then they started tossing pebbles and lit matches. Up until this point, I had a debate going on in my mind about why it bothered me so much that they sat around me, stared at me and talked about me in a language that I didn’t understand. I challenged myself to find my own peace, ignore the men and our cultural differences. Now, I gave them a good glare and told them “Shame on you!” again in Hindi and before one last move, I approached and railed them in English, telling them to behave themselves and leave me alone and stop acting like dogs! To which I received a head wobble and the affirmative “huh”, Hindi for yes. “You’re dogs?? Well Jow then!” (Jow being the term used to shoo away street dogs). Finally, I gave up and retreated down the clear path. They had won… again, grrr.

Falls

A local friend of mine had been asking me every day to visit Bhimlet Waterfall with him until I finally capitulated one afternoon. It was a 45 min motorcycle ride, not including the stop for chai to show off his tourist. The 28m falls were beautiful and I managed to lose my flip-flop over the falls in an unintended offering to Krishna whose temple stood at the bottom. Distraught that I hadn’t reacted more efficiently and even more that I had lost my favorite flip, I stared over the edge know it had to float, but fearing it was stuck in a crag. Krishna refused my offering and about 5 long minutes later, it appeared beneath the falls. I had to get in and swim to rescue it and in the end, I think that was meant to be. After drying off a bit, my friend took me to ancient rock paintings in a completely unprotected cave that some say are 20,000 years old!? On the return, I got to drive – my first driving experience in Indian roads and a real motorcycle at that! I loved it except when cows lumbered in front of me almost in spite of my horn honking – Moooove! I exclaimed and giggled at my cheesy joke that clearly didn’t translate. Night fell and J.P took over. I tell you what. Riding on the back of a motorcycle on Indian roads, pitch black, any number of obstacles ahead, many number of potholes ahead and someone like JP who was either trying to impress or scare me or both by turning his lights off and swerving carelessly across the road while singing songs like “Come Mr. tally man, tally me banana” loud enough to tempt the monkeys must be one of the most frightening experiences! I pride myself on not being easily scared and I admit I felt my blood clot with thrilling fear and then flashed back to my own motorcycle accident…

Besides teaching the entire family how to salsa dance (not that successfully) and learning Rajasthani dance in return, these were the highlights of an eventful stay in Bundi. It was a difficult goodbye but I’ve promised to try to make the wedding as Lucky’s only sister.

I spent a day in Chittorgargh to see Asia’s largest fort and met a nice man, a descendant of the Rajput dynasty that runs 2 hotels there, one being the family palace, who let me stay all day in the gardens while I waited for my 1am bus and even gave me a room to relax in for a couple hours. One long bus journey and one broken down bus brought me to this charming little hilltop resort town on a nice little lake and with a set of Jain temples so intricately carved that it is said the artisans were paid for the amount of dust that they created. I will stay here for a few days and should be in Pushkar by Friday!