I can't recall details, but after a good sleep I packed my stuff and checked it into left luggage ready for my return the the Station later. I might have booked my ticket to my next destination the night before or I might have done it this morning. It doesn't matter.
Sure enough, when I emerged from the Station I was greeted by the rickshaw driver who had invited me to breakfast. I went with him. By this time I was more than wise to the fact that there would be more to it than breakfast. I was taken to a the home of a friend of the driver. My memory it is hazy but breakfast was only the lure. The real business in hand concerned gemstones. While I was treated to a very good breakfast (although I can recall not what) I was being given the patter about the export of gemstones. I was up to speed on this scam. It appears that not only are there travelers who would risk all their cash on one illegal black market money changing deal but also there are others who risk all their budgets having become convinced that a fortune could be made buying gems in Jaipur; exporting them to their home country; having them sold there; and then having the profit remitted back to boost their funds and extend their journeys.
It is perfectly possible that one could achieve the above. They do have a gemstone industry in Jaipur and doubtless bargains could be had. It's a pretty sure bet, however, that an introduction to a gemstone dealer of genuine repute was unlikely to be effected through the offices of a rickshaw driver and what the fools forget is that it is usually vitally important to know something about gemstones. I wasn't going to be taken in, not even after reading various testimonial letters thrust at me to convince me that there had been very many satisfied customers before me. I thanked my host for breakfast but did not feel obliged to return the favour by investing in worthless beads.
I then took a tour of the Pink City as it is sometimes called. The notes have the itinerary and pictures are below. This was a busy day of sightseeing. The first stop was probably the Palace of the Winds or Hawa Mahal. It is a magnificent sight. Try as I might though, I couldn't seem to stand anywhere to get a shot of it that would do it justice. There are hundreds of great pictures of it all over the web. My token Pink City photo was really a snap. I noticed a monkey scampering across the front of a building.
Next stop was Maharajah Jai Singh II's Observatory. One of his five observatories or Jantar Mantars built between 1727 and 1734. One thing I distinctly recall reading was that the sundial was accurate to within I think 15 seconds of the true time. My photos are below and in the first you can see the Palace of the Winds in the distance and the second shows the sundial.
I can't really say that it was a very exciting place but the feat of precision engineering construction was really amazing. If you want a better idea of the scale of the site I recommend that you visit this site There's a VR tour.
Next stop: the City Palace which I wandered around for a little while. This was another beautiful place. Limited as I was to a few slides only I only took a couple of pictures. The first shows two members of the palace staff. They could have been security personnel but the level of any security alert must have been pretty low because they didn't look like they would have put up too much of a fight if someone got a bit lairy. Incidentally the spell-check on this Blog doesn't recognise "lairy". It is a word in the English vernacular that means inter alia confrontational. I am sure most people know that. I only use the word here because it tickles me to imagine some beered up oik attempting to lairy with these two individuals. It just couldn't ever happen.
There's another member of the staff dozing on the right of this photo. Look through the arch and you can see a large urn. That is one of a pair that are on show there. They are two enormous water containers. I read that the Maharaja Sawai Madho Singh II used them to carry water from the River Ganga to drink on his trip to England in the late 19th century because the water in England was deemed unsafe to drink. The urns are made of solid silver and the pair of urns are acclaimed to represent the two largest pieces of solid silver in the world. There's a great picture of one of them here.
Then it was off to see Amber Fort. On the way I snapped an elephant making its way back to wherever it was supposed to be going with its mahout paying no attention whatsoever. There's no way to describe it really. The guy seems to be asleep at the wheel.
On the way I also passed the Jal Mahal, a water palace in the centre of Mansagar Lake. The foliage is water hyacinth and when in bloom it must be even more fantastic. My rickshaw driver told me that it was also known as the Honeymoon Palace and that the royal occupant who inhabited the palace had been so fat that his lady guests were often crushed to death by his amorous advances and their bodies were thrown into the lake.
I think that the dearth of pictures of Amber Fort and Jaigarh Fort is as a result of having purchased the Insight Guide to Rajasthan. There were excellent pictures in it and since I bought it as a souvenir there was no point taking pictures that were already in the book. Little did I know then that my book would disappear! So this is all I have:
My memories of touring the forts have gone. There is nothing that I can recall at all except that there was a Government run shop in one of the two forts and it was selling gemstones. The seed had been sown early in the day and I did buy gems after all. The stones were guaranteed genuine by the Government of Rajasthan and that was good enough for me. I bought a Topaz, a white Moonstone and what I thought was a Black Star Sapphire but which is probably a Black Star Diopside, still very attractive. Photos of these will appear when I have taken them. I was well pleased with these souvenirs. I can't remember right now what they cost but although it wasn't much, on the budget I was supposed to be on it was an absurd amount.
Then it was back to Jaipur and the trip to the Raj Mandir cinema. I did get in. There is s ticket stub somewhere. I think it is between the pages of my lost Lonely Planet guide. I think I went in the Emerald Circle and had a grandstand view not only of the screen but also of the scene below. I didn't rate the movie. I couldn't follow it and a great number of the people inside weren't paying attention either. I left before the end and returned to the Railway Station and collected my luggage and waited for the train to Agra.
While waiting I started to feel a bit queasy and within minutes was suffering a recurrence of the illness from Pushkar. Thank Heavens for the First Class Waiting Room facilities.
