Jaipur, the Pink City

On our first day we were exploring the streets of Jaipur or the Pink City. The name comes from the color of the buildings of the old town, where the walls show every shade of pink that exist on the Spectrum. Interestingly there are many yellow painted buildings in the old town, mostly around the main palace but yes, Jaipur is still very pink. :)

Jaipur was just as dirty as Delhi if not dirtier, many beggars live on the streets but still it's a beautiful place to visit. Just watch your step, while your eyes are glued to the beautiful buildings you might step into a pile of cow poop or slip on trash. :)

The yellow walls of the old town

We visited the main palace but it was too pricey for us, so we simply crossed the street to take a visit at Jantar Mantar instead. I really like this name: Jantar Mantar alias the observatory that was built in the 18th century and is a collection of nineteen architectural astronomical instruments.

Offerings to the gods

After some shopping in the neighborhood (I got wonderful Rajasthani wall hanger with mandala and elephants!) we arrived at Hawa Mahal, The palace of the winds which happens to be my favorite part of the city! 

 The stunning details and the pastel colors are like true eye candy. I never wanted to live in a palace but I would say YES!! if they'd ask me to live here. :)  

Amber

I met my friend, Jeffery on Couch Surfing and we decided to go to Jaipur together. Before we hopped on a train in Delhi, we had to rush through the whole city to get to the old Delhi railway station, where our train was 2 hours late but hey, it's India! And being late with 2 hourse is like nothing (remember my friend who was late with 6 hours? nah that's what I'm talking about)

So after a 6 or 7 hours long ride we arrived at Jaipur Junktion, and hardly found a rikshaw that would take us to our hosts house, that turned out was 24 km-s far from Jaipur. Actually, in a total different town. We stayed at Eleday, Mansoori Farm. Well, the place was insane. No electricity, huge bugs and lizards everywhere, couldn't close the bathroom door, no light in the toilet, disgusting kitchen and I'm sure they never cleaned before. The guy said he has 30 elephants but there wasn't any until morning, when only 2 elephants appeared.

There was nothing to see in that village, so we visited the fort in the neighbour town called Amber. We took the local bus and that was insane! (I know, it's my favorite word to describe India but it is insane.)

Amber fort is amazing. You can sit on the back of an elephant that would take you up to the fort but it's nothing I'd like to do. I mean it must be amazing butsame time I find it cruel to the animals, so I skipped that. I have my own two feet to walk.  

Amazing spice garden of the Fort

With my friend, Jeffery

Some tour guides are very pushy, they follow you until you say 'yes'. We didn't want a guide but the guy conviced us so we said yes. Haha!  But you know what? It was worthy (and only for 200Rp). 

After the palace we visited fabric painters.

 

 Our hunger took  us to the next stop, a restaurant. Yeah, you guessed well. ;) It seemed pretty clear but when we got the food the fork was dirty, and the plate had some dried leftovers on it. Ewww... Few hours later I had terrible belly ache and diarrhea. Yeah, Delhi belly in Amber. Only I can get it.

 

A day in Agra

The train ride to Agra showed a new side of India. After getting over that people were taking paparazzi photos of me with their phones, I pretty much enjoyed the ride. I got food and tea and some strange coffee that was weaker than my tea. I wanted to read a book but just staring out the window was more entertaining. We passed by colorful villages, saw monkeys stealing food from tables, wild peacocks running through the fields, elephants playing, goats jumping on fences, women working hard in dirt wearing their beautiful saris and I saw an abundance of men pooping just right next to the rails. Unforgettable.

The Taj Mahal is majestic. Standing at the Yamuna river it makes you feel like you entered a fairy tale. I wouldn't wonder if princess Yasmine would appear on a magic carpet. 

Agra itself is somewhat better than Delhi, but still very loud, full of litter but at least there are more cows and buffalos walking around. One day is far enough to spend in Agra. You come in the morning and leave in the afternoon.

I got in easily but the overwhelming amount of taxi drivers who tried to get me in their car scared me so I turned back to the railways station where I saw a blond girl, looking quite lost. I decided to give up my plan of being a solo traveller who goes everywhere alone and asked her if she's going to the Taj Mahal and if she'd like to go together. She wasn't as lost as she seemd, already made friends with an Indian lady who helped us to find a taxi for good price.

We went to the Taj Mahal, and I'm not going to say anything about it here since you can all check it on Wikipedia if you're interested. The experience can't be described with words anyways. I recommend to take a tour guide, they know literally everything that can be known and work as an excellent photographer and they are champions of patience.

From the Taj our driver took us to a restaurant, food was ok and we met a snake charmer after! I so wished to see a snake charmer in India. I even held the cobra but I can't show you since the photos were taken by the girl who was with me and I didn't get the pics yet.

After the Taj we checked out the Agra Fort. It's wonderful and even prettier than Red Fort in Delhi, in my opinion. People told me not to visit here once I saw Red Fort but I think the opposite. If you saw Agra Fort then you saw Red Fort, too. (Don't want to offend anybody though)

Before heading back to Delhi we had some time to visit Baby Taj. Can you believe that it was empthy? There was literally nobody besides us. Later an Indian family came but they rushed through it. You shouldn't. It's marvelous, with many beautiful spots for Instagram worthy photos, if you care.  

 My tree pose improved a lot since then...

New Delhi - The good, the bad and the ugly

Traveling solo as a female can be so much fun in India but not in Delhi. Or at least, not for me. I'm gonna write the experience of the first days together, because I don't even want to think about Delhi for the time of writing several posts about it.

I met many travelers who had similar or even worse experiences in Delhi. I have to state that the touristy sights are beautiful and the city has amzing areas, but  my experience was so negative that I don't plan to go back there in the close future. I don't want to offend anybody because I noticed some get offended if I say I didn't like Delhi, but this is how I feel and if my feelings and negative experiences are affending anybody, I don't know what to do about that.

Day 1

It started with a crazy taxi ride from the aiport to Delhi, with a driver who opened my door in every two minutes while he was driving with 120km/h. It was a crazy experience for sure. P.S. no seat belts.

India gate

I had awful CouchSurfing experiences with a guy asking for sex in exchange, so I moved to Zostel. Had to buy new clothes right after arriving because people were staring at my legs like I was walking around naked, it was quite creepy trust me. 

I learned on my first day that in India everybody is late. Always. Oh, you arrived after 6 hours? Totally fine, they don't care but they buy you dosai for lunch and that's okay.

dosai, my favorite dish

Male friends will take you out for dinner, wanting you to pay for them, then act like they are your boyfriend. Or even take you to somewhere you don't want to go, after an exhausting day they promise to take you back to your hostel but taking advantage of your non-existent hindi knowledge they end up bringing you to some awful temple where people are chanting like they are mad. Oh not to mention it took more than an hour just to go there.

Day 2

I ended up going out alone, because my friend didn't show up and I didn't come to India to sit in a lobby for 5-6 hours every day waiting for someone I don't even know.

Took a rikshaw to the metro station but the guy took me to some tourist office, telling me that I have to pre-buy the metro tickets there. But the person in the office tried to organise me whole day trip in Delhi, then he thought I'm so stupid that he can sell me Delhi-Agra-Delhi train tickets for 300 USD!Then they didn't want to tell me where the next metro station is, trying to get me back in the same rikshaw that took me there before.

streets of Old Delhi

I just kept walking when a guy came up to me, saying Namaste and he helped me to the metro. Turned out we were both heading to Old Delhi so he showed me how to go to the Red Fort. 

 Inside the Red Fort

Then he found me again, actually I can imagine him waiting outside for two and a half hour... He showed me how to get to Jama Masjid. Visiting there was the worst idea of my life ever. It's noting special but very expensive. Inside a kid started to pull my sleeves begging for 2000 rupees (!), then a guy started to follow me, people were staring, it made me so uncomfortable that I left after 5 minutes. While I was taking my shoes back a bunch of guys gathered around me, taking my photos, then they kept following me on my way back, one even touched my butt! I ran to the policemen on the corner but he did nothing. Then I went to two female who looked like they belong to the army but they said they can1t do anything because those men weren't Indian because Indian men don't act like that.

But for every bad thing there's something beautiful in the world. I met two kind Chinese guys who helped me to escape from the creepy guys who were following me. I went to Akshardam with them. I still can't decide which one is more beautiful: Akshardam or Taj Mahal? Cameras aren't allowed inside the tepmle so I only have this bad quality pic I took from far away. Monumental.

 Akshardam

I felt like the two guys were my guardian angels, I should have stayed with them but I so wanted to go to Humayun's tomb (they had no interest in it), so we split up. The sight itself is worth to see, it's marvelous but my bad luck returned. I took the wrong exit at the railways station so I took a rikshaw to get back faster but the old guy was driving me around for 2 hours in the middle of the night! I had to ask a stranger to call Zostel for me so they explained him the way. In addition to it, the guy at the reception took me to eat, but "forgot" his wallet so I had to pay for everything and he even said such unfortunate things happen to me because I'm stupid.

 

 Humayun's tomb

Day 3 

was actually wonderful. I gave up all my plans and just deicded to go with the flow. (I know I should do that since the beginning, doh!) I ate a whole watermelon for breakfast, then slept until afternoon and visited the Lotus Temple with my roommate, who's the most awsome Indian girl I met (and trust me, Indian girls are very cool). The Lotus Temple is the opposite of Delhi. It's the calmest place in the middle of never ending traffic noise, yelling and honking. I always have trouble with meditation but there I just closed my eyes and disappeared somewhere for 40 minutes and I came back as a whole new person.

Later we went out to drink and I drank like 6 cocktails, all for free because a nice guy wanted to get rid of his rupees before leaving. Thank you!