The Travels of a Curious Old Man: Meeting the Locals: Gujarat Part 3

Friday, 1 March 2019

Meeting the Locals: Gujarat Part 3

Gujarat: The What, Where, When and Who

India

Gujarat

This post covers day 3 of a 14-day journey around Gujarat, following our circuit of Rajasthan last year. Smaller than Rajasthan, Gujarat is about the size of the Island of Great Britain and has much the same population.

5,000 years ago, Gujarat was a centre of the Indus Valley civilization and subsequently played its part in most of the major north Indian empires. When Islamic invaders reached northern India in the 9th century Gujarat held out until 1300 when it became part of the Delhi Sultanate.

Despite the lines on the map, today we drove straight from Ahmedabad to the resort of Jambudi across the border in Rajasthan. Fortunately Vijay knew how to occupy the non-driving time

An independent Muslim sultan seized power in 1391and Gujarat maintained its independence until becoming part of the Mughal Empire in the 16th century and later the British Empire, though local rulers of a patchwork of Princely States retained considerable autonomy. At independence in 1947 Gujarat became part of the State of Bombay, becoming a state in its own right in 1960.

With a long coast line facing the Arabian sea, Gujaratis have been seafarers and international traders for millennia.

Gujarat is the home state of both Mahatma Gandhi and the current Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

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Visiting the People of Rural Gujarat (and a Corner of Rajasthan)

At Vijay’s suggestion we reversed our programme for the next two days. Instead of driving north to Jambudi via Modhera, Patan and Siddhpur we could visit these places tomorrow and today we would meet some locals.

To Idar and Beyond

We set off north towards Gandhinagar. 23Km north of Ahmedabad, Gandhinagar is the new purpose-built state capital, but the by-pass meant we saw very little of the city before heading into the countryside beyond.

Passing a man driving cattle along the other side of the dual carriageway we were seriously impressed by the horns of some of his cows. His turban is worth a look, too.

Fine horns, fine turban, somewhere near Idar

A couple of hours from Ahmedabad we passed through the small town of Idar (pop 29,000). Idar, Vijay informed us was once a princely state and as an employee (when not being a guide) of the Maharajah of Bavnagar, he was well informed on Gujarati royalty. There were 584 (largely) self-governing Princely States in India in 1947, 40 of them in Gujarat. Some were large and important, others, like Idar, less so. Being Maharajah of Idar sounds a bit like being King of Congleton but that was not always the case.

The remarkable Lieutenant-General Sir Pratap Singh served as Maharajah of Idar from 1902-1911. He was the younger brother of the Maharajah of Jodhpur – a major Princely State - where we encountered him last year. He was Chief Minister of Jodhpur before becoming a professional soldier and fighting for the British Empire in the 2nd Afghan War, in China during the Boxer Rebellion and as a senior commander in France and Flanders in 1915/16 before being deployed to the Palestinian Mandate. In between he was regent in Jodhpur after the early death of his brother, and again after the death of his nephew. He earlier took his polo team to London for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee and riding britches have been called ‘jodhpurs’ ever since.

Sir Pratap Singh, Maharajah of Idar
Early 20th century, paint on photograph (public domain)

Beyond Idar we passed a man driving buffalo, wisely facing the on-coming traffic. From this angle it looks like man and beasts proceeding along a rural road….

Driving buffalo along a country road, north of Idar

…though a wider angle suggests it was a little scarier than that.

Another view of the same scene, seconds later

The livestock theme continued with a large mixed flock of sheep and goats…

Sheep and goats,north of Idar

…and then, with no animals but still far away from the world of Maharajah’s, two women carrying straw.

Carrying straw, north of Idar

We had been going for a little over three hours when Vijay asked L, the driver, to stop. It looked as unremarkable as any other piece of road, but Vijay clearly had something in mind. ‘Do you want to visit some tribals?’ he asked. We did.

Meeting the Locals

We followed Vijay across the fields towards the nearest house. We had an uncomfortable encounter last year in Rohet on a hotel organised ‘village safari’. The Brahmin guide told us at great length how important and spiritual Brahmin’s were and how lucky we were to have a Brahmin guide, then showed off his Bishnoi neighbours as though they were zoo animals. We hoped (and expected) this would be different; Vijay’s quiet confidence promised a much better experience than the Brahmin’s smug self-importance.

Our car is parked by the road, and I am following Vijay (though from the front, apparently)

The first visit did not go particularly well. We were invited in and seated ourselves on charpoys, but everybody except the man of the house hid in the back room. The man himself was somewhat taciturn, so we soon thanked him and left.

I did ask before taking the photo, but he still looks less than delighted

Walking another 100m across the fields to the next dwelling we met a very different welcome and were immediately ushered inside.

The house was a simple construction, the walls of mud and stone, and the roof – supported by roughly shaped branches of trees – was of thatch partially covered in aged, not quite haphazardly laid, pantiles. The floor was packed mud.

Round the back of the next house
There was no sign of electricity, but could that be a telephone line?

A pump stood in the yard but inside there was no running water and no electricity, light coming only through the open door and a hole in the roof – rain was months away. Western prejudices might have suggested we expect otherwise, but our first impression was of orderliness and cleanliness. The mud floor was freshly swept, indeed groomed, the many shadowy corners that could have harboured dust and cobwebs had none and the family’s charpoys were neatly aligned, the bedding and spare clothing tidied away.

The kitchen occupying one end of the room was equally spotless. Gleaming cooking vessels sat on a stone surface, buckets perched on a plastic water barrel and a wall-rack held smaller cooking utensils and the family’s metal plates and cups. A row of tiny china tea-cups hung below the rack immediately below their saucers. The hearth and fire wood were in the alcove behind.

The matriarch had never met Vijay before, but talked and laughed with him as though he was her oldest friend and they had months of catching up to do. Vijay translated whenever he could, interrupting the torrent of words, and we were able to ask a few questions.

Times were not easy, she said, but her husband and oldest son were policemen so they had a reliable income. Fetching water was a chore as the ground water was salty and the pump gave water for washing (and possibly cooking) but not for drinking. She had rarely left the area, but was content with her life as she had all she needed around her. She had little curiosity about the outside world and asked us no questions (well, you might as well come from Mars, Vijay said).

Immensely proud of her family, she lined up her daughters, daughters-in-law and available grandchildren for a photo.

The whole family - the matrarch still laughing, still talking so slightly blurred

As we left one the daughters-in-law was fetching water and Lynne was soon pressed into service to do the pumping. After tasting the water I can vouch for its extreme saltiness.

Lynne pumps up the water

Back in the car I asked Vijay why he had referred to these people as ‘tribals’; were they, I wondered, a particular ethnic group? ‘No,’ he said (and these are not necessarily his exact words) ‘tribals was not accurate, they are the same as everybody else, they are people who have just been left behind.’

Left behind or not, I have rarely met such a cheerful and friendly group. Happiness and contentment do not, of course, come from possessions; far more important is the relationships you have with those around you. She also felt she had all she needed, which is easier to feel if you do not know what other people have. Some possessions would certainly enhance all their lives; if they had electricity, lights, a fridge and ceiling fan would do that. And a television would tell them about all the things others have and take for granted, and that might be the end of contentment. The women may live isolated lives, but with two policemen in the family the outside world cannot but seep in.

They can, and doubtless do, visit the nearby village, which is what we did next. It was market day and fans, fridges and TVs were there to be seen by everyone. They may be contented now, but I doubt the next generation will opt for a life of such simplicity.

The market at the nearby village

Wildwinds Resort, Jambudi

We reached our destination in time for a late lunch. The austere beauty of the rolling, arid hills was not enhanced by the Wildwinds Resort, indeed it is hard to imagine any landscape it would enhance.

The Widwinds Resort, Jambudi

The rooms, more accurately apartments, made up two sides of a square while reception, offices and the restaurant formed the other two. The exteriors might have been ugly, but the interior design was clean and modern if rather anonymous. With, two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a sitting room and three televisions we had more than we needed.

So why has this ugly resort been plonked down among these hills, miles from anywhere? Simples! Gujarat has prohibition and Wildwinds is 200m across the state boundary in Rajasthan. We had the restaurant to ourselves for lunch; the paneer curry was acceptable but the beer was the best bottle of Kingfisher ever.

More Locals

After lunch we re-joined Vijay who suggested L drive us into the hills to meet more locals, an idea we would have welcomed even if there was something else to see round here.

Following the small road that had brought us to Wildwinds further north and a little deeper into Rajasthan, L parked at what Vijay deemed a likely spot and we followed a rough footpath up the hill.

We walked up the hillside from the road

The arid countryside did not look promising, but some fields were prepared for planting and the wandering livestock looked healthy. We reached a dwelling and a young woman came to the gate to talk to us. She was friendly, but on her own in the house and did not feel she could let us in, which was understandable.

100m further on we reached another house where we were invited in for a brief tour, though our host declined to be photographed. The concrete floor, ceiling fan and corrugated iron roof suggested they were better off than our friends of the morning, or at least more acquainted with modern times.

A concrete floor, ceiling fans and a corrugated iron roof.

Leaving the house, we passed a strange looking tree. It was the third or fourth we had seen and my initial thought was that the trees had a parasite, but that was way off. The tree is stuffed with hay, it was a way of storing animal fodder without the need for an expensive barn.

Animal fodder stored in a tree

I had thought we would find few dwellings in these arid hills but India is densely populated (a 50% higher density than the UK) and looking across to the opposite hillside we could see it thickly dotted with houses and shacks.

Dwellings dotted about the opposite hillside.

Across the road we were invited into another house. Our smiling host was surrounded by her grandchildren and said she wanted nothing else in life but this. She threw five of them onto a charpoy for a photograph. They were lively happy children, but when she ran through their ages, each one was a year, or even two, older than they looked.

Five grandchildren on a charpoy

She had seven pre-school grandchildren, so I had to a photograph the other two - and their grandmother and the mother of the youngest.

Youngest grandchildren, smiling Granny and the mother of the youngest

We met several other families who for various reasons could not invite us in, but nobody appeared hostile or suspicious, indeed everybody greeted us with smiles. This tells us much about the locals but some of the credit must also go to Vijay; he treated all with openness and respect and we were treated the same way in return.

All the people we met spoke Gujarati. From the late 1950s onwards, Indian states have been restructured along linguistic line, Gujarat being formed in 1960 by separating the Gujarati speaking north of the former Bombay State from the Marathi speaking south. The process is still ongoing, but this corner of Hindi speaking Rajasthan clearly speaks Gujarati.

Children were returning from school as we left, bowling hoops down the road as they went.

Bowling hoops in the road

Dinner and Breakfast at Wildwinds

Back at the resort we found the lure of legal alcohol was limited. It was Friday night and apart from a young Indian couple we were the only people there. We dined, as we lunched, alone but with a beer.

02-Mar-2019

Breakfast was chaotic. At first there were no staff, then a man turned up and produced tea and fruit. Later bread and butter arrived and, in the fullness of time, an omelette.

Scary Incident with a Suitcase

Before going to breakfast the combination lock on one of our suitcases made a strange crunch when Lynne closed it. Returning to our room we found it would not open. Like all such cases there is a keyhole intended to allow access by customs authorities. The collected wisdom of the internet says it is easy to pick, but having lived sheltered lives we doubted we had the necessary skill, and indeed we didn’t.

The lock has three tumblers so, given time it should be possible to try every combination, starting at 000 and finding the answer before 999. Unfortunately, we did not have time. 200m from the hotel we had to re-enter dry Gujarat, and there was a barrier and two men with official armbands lounging in the shade waiting to leap out and check the rare cars that came down that road. In our hold-all we had a bottle of Old Monk rum and one of Maqintosh’s (sic) whisky, but the liquor permit allowing me, as a foreigner to possess these forbidden delights was firmly locked in an un-openable suitcase.

L, out driver, was at reception waiting to drive us across the border to the small town of Ambaji and pick up Vijay from his lodging. I explained the problem as we checked out, and we soon found the hotel staff were keener to help pick our lock than they had been to serve breakfast. It was, I suppose, encouraging, if unhelpful, to find their lock-picking skills were as underdeveloped as ours.

There was nothing for it, we would have to talk or bribe our way into Gujarat – or have the next ten days' nightcaps confiscated.

Lock picking. The Hotel staff show plenty of enthusiasm but no expertise

We drove to the border. L slowed down, one of men with armbands rose from his chair and walked towards us. I looked him in the eye and smiled and he waved us through.