Lake Pichola
The first overtly touristy act I committed was to visit the City Palace. As far as I can tell, the main entrance is nowhere near the entrance we used last night, and of yesterday's lawns and lakeside picnic tables I saw nothing. In the cool light of day the palace is still beautiful, if a little garish in places, and an excellent introduction to the Maharanas of Mewar who have ruled the area around Udaipur since the 8th Century. The great hero seems to be Maharana Pratap Singh, who fought the Mughal Emperor Akbar in the Battle of Haldi Ghati in the 16th Century, the subject of much heroic rhetoric on the part of the Rajasthan Tourist Board. It was only after this event that the seat of power fully transferred from the fort of Chittorgarh to the planned city of Udaipur, the creation of Pratap’s father Maharana Udai Singh. Since then, the Maharanas have ruled Mewar from Udaipur ever since - first literally, now only symbolically. I am intrigued to find out more about the current Maharana who seems to be rather unpopular, according to a friend of mine called Hari, as he is only interested in the rich. He has founded a chain of luxury hotels called HRH and from what I can tell is keen on heritage rather than social development or environmental conservation.
Said Hari is one of the slim, oily-haired youths in trendy clothes. He swaggers more than most and his salutations have an extra confidence as he runs his own shop, a little marble-carving boutique. He seems to have a network of uncles and cousins all over the town. I entered his radar a few metres from his shop and he drew me easily into conversation, interrupted by frequent greetings to passing blondes of "Hi! How's it going? Do you want to see some marble carvings?" in a strange drawl that he evidently regards as the height of sexual allure. He asked me if I could help him with a form he was trying to fill in. I had no objections, although felt a slight sinking feeling on realising that this was an online form, to be completed at an internet cafe some distance away. This feeling was compounded when I saw the form itself - an application form for a tour guide job with Intrepid Travel - and understood the magnitude of the task in hand. However, we soldiered away at it, and after an hour and a half it was in reasonable shape. Hari's own contributions were odd, if understandable. One inevitable question asked what the applicant would do if a series of ghastly events befell the tour party miles and miles from civilisation. "Can I put that everything works out in India?" he asked, only half-joking.
Perhaps as a way of saying thank you he invited me to another garba in the evening, from which I have just returned. Less sartorially exotic than last night's, it was still enormous fun. The five hundred or more who attended formed two concentric circles divided by gender, and we slowly made our way round in opposite directions performing the standard five beat stick-bashing routine with girl after girl. I was one of the very few Europeans in the circle and at points attracted a certain amount of attention, although more often than not I was accepted without question and felt strangely like I was being ignored.
I had some difficulty in getting back to the guesthouse, and after an exciting journey of frantic running and two hitched motorbike rides, I made it just in time for the 11pm curfew. At the gate I met Priya, who is currently the only Indian volunteer staying in our guesthouse. She is a year or two older than me and comes from Haryana, the little-known state adjacent to the more famous Punjab. She is small and quite pretty and, while she tends to wear a sulky expression, in the few conversations I have had with her she has struck me as being fairly cheerful.
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