Thursday 1 February 2018

Rohet: Rajasthan Part 7

India
Rajasthan
This post covers day 9 of a 16-day journey around Rajasthan.

The size of Germany, Rajasthan is the largest of India’s 29 states. With the Thar Desert covering the north and west it is one of India’s less densely populated states, though with 200 people per km² (the same as Italy) it is hardly empty.

After a short drive from Jodhpur, we spent the day in and around the small town of Rohet (or Rohat)

In the 11th and 12th centuries the rise of the Rajputs created some 20 or so petty kingdoms ruled by Maharajas - the ‘Rajput Princes’. These kingdoms, at first independent, later vassal states of the Mughal or British Empires survived until 1947, when the Maharajahs led their ‘Princely States’ into the new Union of India, creating Rajasthan (the ‘Land of Princes’). The rulers became constitutional monarchs until 1971 when the Indian government ended their official privileges and abolished their titles. ‘Maharaja’ is now a courtesy title, but most remain leading members of their communities and some are still immensely rich. Several, like their British counterparts, have supplemented their income by turning forts and palaces into tourist attractions and hotels.

-o0o0o-

A Repurposed Fort and a Visit to the Bishnoi People

Rohet and Rohet Garh

The small town of Rohet (sometimes ‘Rohat’) sits beside Highway 62 some 40km south of Jodhpur. There was little to see on the main road, but Umed swung confidently off the highway into the maze of narrow streets behind. We did not get far. Umed is a professional, unfazed by cows, pedestrians or randomly parked motorcycles, but even he was stymied by a stationary delivery truck with no intention of moving.

Our way is blocked, Rohet
Forced to take an unfamiliar route he picked his way with care, but Rohet is not large and he soon encountered a familiar landmark and quickly delivered us to Rohet Garh. Garh means Fort, but Rohet Garh is hardly a forbidding bastion like the forts of Jodhpur or Jaisalmer. It was built by the Thakur, the local ruler, at the time when forts were beginning to resemble country houses.

Standing outside the entrance to Rohet Garh
Rohet is a scruffy little town, but there is nothing scruffy about Rohet Garh, still owned by the family who built it and a Heritage Hotel since 1990. The flowery courtyard….

The courtyard, Rohet Garh
…leads to an immaculate garden...

Garden, Rohet Garh
... and, beside it, our comfortable and characterful room.

Our room, Rohet Garh
Having settled into the surroundings of the rich, there was time before lunch to take a stroll back in the real world.

In one sense there was not much to see,…

Rohet
…though we did observe a barber chasing out three goats apparently seeking to take up residence in his shop. But watching a small town go about its unremarkable daily business is always interesting…

Rohet
…particularly when the small town looks so very different from the places we are used to.

Rohet - there's that van again!
Back at Rohet Garh we lunched in the garden on pakoras and Kingfisher beer.

Blackbucks and Nilgai


In the afternoon we assembled with other hotel guests and a local guide - enough people to fill two Land Rovers - for a ‘village safari’.

We headed out of town into the countryside.

Leaving Rohet on a 'village safari'.

I do not know whether the sudden detour into the fields was planned or if the lead driver spotted something interesting but after bumping across a recently harvested field….

Across the fields near Rohet
…we encountered a small herd of blackbuck. They were all females so were not bucks and nor were they black but calling them Antilope cervicapra sounds so formal. Medium sized antelopes, they are native to the Indian sub-continent though pressure on habitat has led to their extinction in Bangladesh and near-extinction in Nepal. Elsewhere there are healthy populations and they have been successfully introduced into Texas and Argentina.

Female blackbuck, near Rohet
A group of females is essentially a harem, and before long a male came into view. The buck has a black back, black stripes down his legs and a pair of magnificent corkscrew horns. He sniffed the air with appreciation while looking around warily; this was a harem, but clearly not his harem. A cloud of dust hurtling across the field announced the arrival of the dominant male. The interloper took one look and fled, the boss chased him for a while then wheeled round with a look of satisfaction at a job well done.

Male blackbuck near Rohet
Further on we passed a group of nilgai – we had previously seen them on the road to Bikaner. Much bigger and less graceful than blackbucks they are India’s other native antelope.


Nilgai near Rohet

The Bishnoi People



The wildlife was all very interesting, but our safari’s quest was for the Bishnoi people. Fortunately, they were not difficult to find as unlike blackbuck the village stands still.

Arriving at the Bishnoi village
The Bishnoi are a Hindu sect who follow the teachings of Guru Jambheshwar who lived from 1451 to 1536. The Guru’s 29 tenets cover the usual grounds of religious devotion, respect for others and cleanliness in mind and body, and also instruct followers to be vegetarian and treat plant life with consideration. In 1730 in the village of Kherjali 20km east of Jodhpur the Maharaja’s soldiers set about felling a grove of sacred Khejri trees for use in construction. Amrita Devi, a local Bishnoi, put her arms round a tree, telling the soldiers they would have to chop her down as well. They did, and 362 more Bishnoi died following her lead before the Maharaja discovered what was happening and put a stop to it. I have no idea how much truth there is in the story, but as an essential Bishnoi myth it has great power, as does their reverence for Amrita Devi.

Our local guide told us this at some length while we were seated on benches at the village entrance. At even greater length he told us he was a Brahmin, and Brahmin’s are very important and very spiritual, and we were privileged to have a Brahmin as a guide. The Bishnoi, he said, were a sect not a caste but, whatever they were, Brahmins were more important and he was a Brahmin. The village elder listened in dignified silence, though his serenity might have wavered had he understood any English.

Bishnoi elder, not really listening to the Brahmin
The village, home to four related families, consisted of a few basic huts...

Bishnoi huts
... and a simple kitchen containing nothing that would not have been there two hundred years ago – except for the plastic transistor radio hanging from a tree.

Bishnoi Kitchen
The men, mostly dressed in western clothes, were willing to say ‘hello’ and offer a smile, the women and some of the older children sat in sullen silence.

Bishnoi Village
Almost all the women were in traditional dress with a large and elaborate half-moon nose-ring attached by a chain to their left ear – they never take them off. As we wandered round the huts the women were there to be photographed, but seemed to have absented themselves in every other sense. Lynne and I (and others) had been uncomfortable since we arrived; it was like being shown specimens in a zoo, but these were not zoo animals, they were human beings.


Bishnoi woman
One young woman – not in traditional dress – was called over by the Brahmin to introduce herself. She was, she told us in English, studying natural sciences at Jodhpur University. Further questions would have been interesting but did not happen - life here clearly has some undercurrents.

Scratching a living from the arid land around Rohet is nigh on impossible, so the men spend half the year working in the city while the women (except the student) remain in the village, which maybe accounts for their different demeanour. Perhaps the women should get out more.

The Guru also gave instructions for animal husbandry, and we finished our tour with the animals. The cows are never slaughtered, but the Bishnoi are vegetarians not vegans and appreciate the dairy products.


Calves, Bishnoi village
We left the village with mixed feelings. The ‘zoo’ aspect was offensive, but we did at least see a living culture, the alternative (and the Chinese are shameless about this) is worse - hiring actors to fake a sanitised version of the culture. We applauded the young woman university student, while acknowledging that education, particularly the education of women, will destroy the community. Perhaps that would be no bad thing, we were superficially looking at Bishnoi culture, but did we see anything more than picturesque poverty? The Bishnoi are not the Amish - they do not deny everything that came after their founder, the teachings of Guru Jambheshwar sit well with modern environmentalist thought and can be (and are by other Bishnoi) followed in the 21st century as is in the past.

Opium and Clay


Not very far away, and back on a tarmac road, was a much larger village, which we were allowed to believe was also Bishnoi. Here there was electricity and farm machinery and other conveniences of the modern world.
 
Village near Rohet
In a small room beside the square we perched on benches to watch an opium ceremony, the traditional welcome for honoured visitors. Opium poppies are grown legally for medicinal purposes and ‘opium water’ is made from the dried seed cases. Although technically illegal, we were told, the authorities turn a blind eye; true or not, it provided a small frisson of excitement.

Broken up seed cases are placed in a filter bag and hot water is poured in. The water is run through the filter bag several times and, hey presto, you have opium water. The product was passed round, poured from the spout of a small wooden vessel into outstretched palms.

Making opium water, near Rohet
Confession time: when offered a tot of locally distilled firewater, as occasionally happens, I feign innocence and ignorance, but in truth I know exactly what to expect. I may have drunk little of that particular beverage but I have experience of a large variety of similar legal, illegal and semi-legal drinks. When it comes to opiates I am a virgin.

A few declined the opium water though most tried it. Only two had accepted the home-made cigarettes of local tobacco passed round earlier, so clearly it is more socially acceptable to be a junkie than a smoker. The opium water tasted, unsurprisingly, of burnt wood and drinking it was not a mind-altering experience. I suspect there was a vanishingly small concentration in the water, and the quantity I sucked from my palm was a teaspoonful at most. I think its impotence left me still an opium virgin. Is it unduly cynical to suggest it was a cheap way to make tourists feel they were doing something daring while actually drinking woody water? I might add that Guru Jambheshwar’s tenets 24 and 25 forbid the use of opium and tobacco, so perhaps this village was not Bishnoi.

If I had my doubts about the opium ceremony, I had none about the man we went to see next. The local potter worked just across the square and we watched as he inserted a stick and gave his wheel a good spin.

Winding up the wheel
 With no motor, just a large and well balance fly-wheel, he was able to produce several pots before the wheel slowed.


Throwing a pot
It is always good to watch a craftsman at work, and there was something magical about the way a lump of clay transforms into an elegant pot when caressed by skilful hands.

Throwing another pot

Evening at Rohet Garh


We were back at Rohet Garh in early evening and at the appropriate time presented ourselves in the bar for a G&T. Indian made Blue Riband gin is cheap and very acceptable.

The dining room overlooked the pool. In days gone by Maharajas would optimise the acoustics by seating their musicians on a platform in the centre of a pool, though no one ever swam in it. Today’s circumstances are different so the musicians entertained us from the far side.
 
Musicians across the pool, Rohet Garh
Eschewing the tourist buffet, we chose Kema Mattar (lamb with peas) and Aloo Gobi Muselman from the à la carte. Both were good enough, though not exciting and neither of us can remember (and the internet won’t tell) how a Muslim eats his (or her) cauli and spuds.

Returning to the garden we found a magic show in progress. We sat down to watch but only caught the last few minutes, though in that time the young man demonstrated impressive sleight of hand. He finished, there was a ripple of applause from the dozen or so watchers followed by a prolonged cultural misunderstanding. The magician sat and stared at the audience, the audience like a class that has not been dismissed, remained seated, fidgeting and avoiding his gaze. After a while, with a look of exasperation, the magician reached into his robes, pulled out some banknotes and ostentatiously started counting his money. He was waiting for a tip but westerners do not tip an act who has been booked. If we had seen the whole show I might have helped him out, but for five minutes…we slipped away and left it to others.

Under-paid magician, Rohet Garh
02/02/2018

Another short journey today meant a leisurely start and after breakfast we sat in a sort of roof-garden overlooking a lake watching the birds. I photographed a heron of some sort…

Heron, Rohet Garh
…but then the nearby trees were infested by a crowd of rose-ringed parakeets. [update: A colony of these has become well established in the London area in recent years, but this year (2018) we have had one visiting our bird-feeder. Whether it is a new escapee or the precursor of an invasion remains unknown, but although it might find the unaccustomed heat-wave to its liking, the North Staffordshire winter could be a problem.]

Wednesday 31 January 2018

Jodhpur: Rajasthan Part 6

India
Rajasthan
This post covers days 7 and 8 of a 16-day journey around Rajasthan.

The size of Germany, Rajasthan is the largest of India’s 29 states. With the Thar Desert covering the north and west it is one of India’s less densely populated states, though with 200 people per km² (the same as Italy) it is hardly empty.

From Jaisalmer in the far west of Rajasthan we travel back to Jodhpur in the centre

In the 11th and 12th centuries the rise of the Rajputs created some 20 or so petty kingdoms ruled by Maharajas - the ‘Rajput Princes’. These kingdoms, at first independent, later vassal states of the Mughal or British Empires survived until 1947, when the Maharajahs led their ‘Princely States’ into the new Union of India, creating Rajasthan (the ‘Land of Princes’). The rulers became constitutional monarchs until 1971 when the Indian government ended their official privileges and abolished their titles. ‘Maharaja’ is now a courtesy title, but most remain leading members of their communities and some are still immensely rich. Several, like their British counterparts, have supplemented their income by turning forts and palaces into tourist attractions and hotels.

-o0o0o-

Much More than a Pair of trousers

30-Jan-2018

Jaisalmer to Jodhpur

Jaisalmer is the end of the line, so to reach Jodhpur we first had to backtrack to Pokran, passing the military base and again battling through the roadworks – static obstacles last Sunday but busy on a weekday.

Roadworks between Jailsalmer and Pokran
At Pokran we turned southeast towards Jodhpur, breaking the journey at Ummed’s roadside pure veg restaurant, partly because Umed, our driver, (same name, different transliteration) had missed his breakfast and partly because he wanted to show that he understood our feelings about tourist traps. Although this is a matter of principal not money, two cups of tea and a small packet of biscuits here cost 40 rupees (45p) while each tea in a tourist stop is typically 80.

Ummed's 'pure veg' restaurant en route to Jodhpur
We continued across the Thar desert on small but adequate roads …

The Thar desert on the way to Jodhpur
… reaching Jodhpur around 1 o’clock and checking into our second genuine palace in three stops – with a fake fort in between.

Ranbanka Palace Hotel


The sandstone palace of one the Maharaja’s brother, built in the 1920s has been extended to create two hotels, one of them the Ranbanka Palace where our room – in a relatively modern wing – was comfortable enough but could not compare with our genuinely palatial accommodation in Bikaner. A shared balcony overlooked the lawn, restaurant (where we lunched on pakoras) and the pool. In the picture below the pale figure in the water is me; January days in Rajasthan are pleasantly warm, but the nights are cold and so was the pool, so I had it to myself.

Outdoor restaurant, parched lawn and pool, Ranbanka Palace Hotel, Jodhpur
We spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the locality, finding a possible local restaurant and turning down invitations from the large number of local jewellery shop owners.

The 30th of January is Shaheed Diwas (Martyr’s Day), one of Rajasthan five annual dry days. As this does not apply to hotel residents we ate in, sitting beside the garden, warmed by braziers and soothed by the tinkly music of a harp-like instrument. Junglee Murgh is chicken with industrial quantities of ghee and chilli; traditionally a peasant dish of wild jungle fowl it has gained a little sophistication, but still packs a punch. Bharwan dum aloo, potatoes stuffed with cashews in a yoghurt-based sauce was gentler and together they made a fine dinner.

The line into Jodhpur Railway Station runs a few hundred metres to the north. The noise of the day drowns out the trains, but at night the mournful calling of the hooters – and Indian train drivers do like a hoot – is guaranteed to interrupt your slumbers.

31/01/2018


Mehrangarh


We set off across the city to Mehrangarh (often tautologously ‘Mehrangarh Fort’ but garh is Sanskrit for fort) with Umed and Dr S, our local guide who had dropped in yesterday to make the arrangements.

After succeeding his father as King of Marwar, Rao Jodha built a new capital modestly naming it Jodhpur after himself. In 1460 he started construction of Mehrangarh on a rocky outcrop 125m above the city which grew around it. No doubt it was impressive in 1460, but its 17th century refurbishment by Jaswant Singh I (reigned 1638-78) makes it as forbidding a fortress as can be imagined.

Mehrangarh, Jodhpur
A road winds up to the base of the fort.  If I had battled my way there, dodging arrows as I went, I would probably be dismayed by the 30m high walls. Fortunately, nobody lobbed rocks or poured boiling oil on us while we waited for Dr S to buy tickets. My picture catches the top of the Chhatri of Kiran Singh Soda. Dr S did not mention it, so I was unaware it was a ‘memorial to a brave soldier who fell on this spot’. This phrase is trotted out with minor variations in Wikipedia, a dozen Trip Advisor reviews, and all the photography websites of the world, but who was Kiran Singh Soda? Blogger Jatin Chhabra says he ‘died fighting against the forces of Jaipur in 1864 AD’, and that is all I have found.

The walls of Mehrangarh and the top of the Chhatri of Kiran Singh Soda, Jodhpur
From here you can walk up through the fort's various gates, but we took the lift, opening up fine views over the ‘blue city’ of Jodhpur.

Jodhpur is known as the Blue City as the houses were traditionally painted that colour - and some still are
Like Jaisalmer, Jodhpur is a desert city, but with over a million inhabitants it is twelve times the size. The desert topography gives it an unusual shape, the fort being on the northwest corner of a narrow rectangular centre beyond which the city becomes a loosely articulated patchwork of habitation and desert. From the foot of the rocky outcrop a desert park stretches northwest to the Jaswant Thada, the mausoleum and cremation ground of the Marwar royal family.

Jaswant Thada, Jodhpur
Unlike Jaisalmer’s fort, Mehrangarh is uninhabited, functioning solely as a museum. For decades it was deserted and crumbling but in 1972 the current Maharaja, Gaj Singh II, set up a trust to restore the fort and create the museum within. He had become maharaja in 1952 aged 4 after his father died in a plane crash but only took up his duties after attending Eton and Oxford - a proper maharaja’s education.

Courtyard, Mehrangarh
The courtyards, rooms, apartments and objet d’art are regarded as the best of their type but after four maharaja’s forts/palaces in the previous week I was becoming jaded. We saw exhibitions of howdahs, palanquins and turbans - who knew there were so many ways to tie a turban? – and inspected the armoury which, among other grisly ways of dealing death, has the swords of various luminaries including Mughal Emperor Akhbar the Great (another tautology, ‘Akbar’ means ‘great’) and Timur the Lame (Tamerlane).


Hilt of sword possibly belonging the Emperor Akhbar
(I am not sure which sword was whose - and the internet seems equally uncertain)
An exhibition of miniature paintings included several camel-bone models, one of a train…

Small train, Mehranghar

…and the genealogy and portraits of the maharajas. Marwar had 41 rulers between 1226 and 1947 when Rajasthan joined the Union of India - the present (42nd) has only a courtesy title. 21 are assembled in the photo below, though how many of the earlier likenesses were painted from life is anybody’s guess.

Maharajas of Marwar (Jodhpur), Mehrangarh

The Phool Mahal (Flower Palace) was the Hall of Private Audience of Maharaja Abhey Singh (ruled 1724-49).

Phool Mahal (Flower Palace), Hall of Private Audience of Maharaja Abhey Singh
Phool Mahal, Mehrangarh
The ceiling is gold filigree with mirrors and the 19th century paintings are of gods, maharajas and the moods of classical ragas.

Ceiling, Phool Mahal, Mehrangarh
Outside, we did not need the Birmingham-made spiral staircase to reach…

Wrought iron spiral staircase, looking slightly out of place, Mehrangarh
…the bedchamber of Takht Singh (r1843-73) who must have appreciated Christmas baubles.

Chamber of Takht Singh, Mehrangarh
Beyond was another magnificent courtyard…

Another magnificent courtyard, Mehrangarh
….and the Moti Mahal (Pearl Palace), the Hall of Private Audience of Sur Singh (r1595-1619). Polished chunam (plaster with crushed seashells), coloured Belgian glass and lights twinkling in the alcoves would have made this room brilliant, if slightly strange.

Moti Mahal, Mehrnagarh

Jaswant Thada


From the fort we drove across the rocky desert park to the Jaswant Thada, pausing at the artificial lake beside the monument. Despite the lack of birds in my photo, the area teemed with wildfowl; several species of duck I could not name, coots with slightly different frontal shields from their British cousins, though they are the same species (Eurasian coot), red-wattled lapwings - common throughout Rajasthan but looking more at home here than the one I photographed in sandy Mandawa - and many more. A white-throated kingfisher flew across the lake, showing off its iridescent blue back.

Lake by the Jaswant Thada, Jodhpur
The Jaswant Thada was built in 1899 as a cenotaph for Maharaja Jaswant Singh II (r1873-95). His reign brought prosperity as he purged the area of bandits, introduced a proper judiciary, re-organised the administration, built roads and brought the telegraph and railway to Jodhpur. Dr S suggested the cenotaph was built by public subscription; I would rather have a present before I was dead, but as a Maharaja’s life was marked by (relatively) unlimited wealth and power, what else could he be given?


The Jaswant Thada, Jodhpur
Pratap Singh, a younger brother of Jaswant Singh, served as Chief Minister before going on to a career in the British Indian Army. He travelled widely, in 1897 taking his polo team to Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations. Traditional ‘churidar’ trousers are narrow fitting on the lower leg but loose around the thighs and hips and Pratap Singh realised that a little redesigning and reinforcing made them perfect for riding. He equipped his polo team with them, they took London by storm, the trousers were widely copied and ‘jodhpurs’ were born. Pratap Singh cannot be held responsible for subsequently redesigns by Savile Row tailors, the East German police, or anybody else.

Lieutenant-General Sir Pratap Singh (centre) with his son and the Raja of Ratnam
at Sir Douglas Haigh's chateau, Montreuil-sur-Mer - Jodhpurs much in evidence
(I don't know who owns the copyright, so thanks and apologies, whoever you are)
Having set the trend Jaswant Singh is now surrounded by the mausoleums of lesser royals, some much lesser,…

Royal mausoleums by the Jaswant Thada
…some only slightly lesser.


More royal mausoleums with the Jaswant Thada in the background
There is also a garden, and you have to respect anyone who can keep plants green in this rocky terrain and dry climate, though the desert rose is better suited to it than most.

Desert rose, Jaswant Thada, Jodhpur

Sardar Market and MV Spices


Umed drove us into the city centre, Dr S first directing him to the Post Office so we could dispatch some postcards, then to Sardar Market in the Girdikot district.

Sardar Market, Jodhpur
The market has a clocktower built by Maharaja Sardar Singh (the son of Jaswant Singh) around 1900.

Clocktower, Sardar Market, Jodhpur 
And stalls selling everything from saris to vegetables.

Lynne and some vegetables, Sardar Market, Jodhpur
In a corner of the market is MV Spices.

MV Spices, Sardar Market, Jodhpur 
Mohanlal Verhomal once sold spices from a barrow but had acquired two shops, complimentary mentions in international guide books and a visit from Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen for a TV travel programme before he died suddenly twelve years ago. He left a wife and seven daughters and in India having no son to carry on your business creates a problem. Much as I love India, I realise that the attitudes of too many Indian men towards women are not just bad, but shockingly appalling. The seven sisters took over the business and despite facing problems ranging from acid attacks to unfair business practices by their rivals, they have prospered, now own five shops and were in 2013 the subject of an Australian TV documentary ‘The Spice Girls of India’. We sat, drank marsala tea and discussed spices with one of the sisters and left with a large number of packets, some to keep, other to distribute round the family.

One of the Vermohal sisters in the shop

A Rajasthani Lunch


Dr S understood our desire for an Indian rather than a tourist lunch, and recommended a restaurant called ‘The Spice Road’ – no marks for originality, then. It was a small, pleasant place in a garden and, one Japanese couple apart, all the other lunchers were Indian. The menu offered several local specialities from which we chose deep fried gram flour balls in a spicy gravy and a dish of minced chicken and lamb. Both were good without being outstanding.

Lunch at the Spice Route, Jodhpur
The waiter on the edge of the picture, left, is wearing churidar, the trousers from which jodhpurs developed.
Indian meals normally finish with a breath freshner, a teaspoonful from box of sugar crystals flavoured with mint, violet or aniseed. Sometimes the ‘box’ can be quite elaborate – or even be a train pulled by a fire engine.

A train full of breath freshners, Spice Route, Jodhpur
Dr S reappeared to check we approved of his recommendation, took his leave and Umed drove us back to our hotel.

Umaid Bhawan and a Blue, Super and Eclipsed Moon


We idled away much of the afternoon, but we did take a walk to photograph the Umaid Bhawan.

In the late 1920s a series of failed monsoons brought famine to Rajasthan so Maharaja Umaid Singh employed several thousand drought-stricken farmers on a ‘workfare’ project to build him a palace. They started the Umaid Bhawan in 1929 and progressed slowly, spinning out the work (with the maharaja’s blessing), until 1943 when Umaid Singh moved into what was claimed to be the world’s largest private dwelling.

Designed by Henry Vaughan Lanchester and influenced by Lutyens’ designs for New Delhi, it is now a hotel, indeed the third best in the world (Trip Advisor’s Travellers' Choice 2018). In a land where a night in a four-star hotel costs less than a decent B&B at home, it is also one of India’s truly expensive hotels. Sadly, it was on the far side of one of those outbreaks of desert which are a feature of Jodhpur, so my photo is less than satisfactory.

Umaid Bhawan, Jodhpur
The evening was warm so we chose seats in the outside restaurant without bothering to check out the braziers. Our attention, though, was taken not by the menu but by the moon, hanging at the end of the garden, huge, red and at that point about two thirds eclipsed. A ‘supermoon’ – a full moon at the moon’s closest approach to the earth - is only slightly bigger than the average full moon, the size and colour we saw were caused by its proximity to the horizon. It was by far the most impressive lunar eclipse we have ever seen, though not as exciting as the full solar eclipse we saw in the Gobi desert in 2008. And where is the photo? There is none, just this picture of the restaurant at night from our balcony. Pathetic.

Restaurant, Ranbanka Palace, Jodhput

After our large lunch, dinner was a snack of peanuts, papads and satay chicken washed down with gin and beer (not at the same time!).