Rajasthan- Day 5- Jodhpur

Well, I guess it was about that time to shower again. Little did I know, I would be showering with buckets of water in a bathroom reeking of urine. Hmm… how many more days until home when I get a good shower? So after I “showered” we gathered and headed down to the Clock Tower again for some shopping. I bought some spices and we walked around all the different markets before venturing further into the city where we happened upon this bangle shop where they were making bangles outside the shop. The bangles here were gorgeous and made of gum from the gumtree. We wound up buying some bangles, but had to wait quite a while (my usual task here: waiting for others to finish) for some of the bangles to made larger for my big handed friends. We sat with the two boys from the shop who grilled us on WWE and Arnold Schwarzenegger, some people have a pretty misconstrued image about the “identifying” traits of America. After our time at the bangle shop (which was lengthy) we headed to the world famous omelet shop. This man is very proud of his books of pictures, post cards, and guestbook. It is everything in the world here to be listed in travel guides and shop keepers pride themselves on the listing, and pride themselves on their pictures with foreigners. The girls enjoyed their omelets in the middle of the street with some makeshift seating, while I choked down another protein bar, not willing to risk getting ill. After this we went on a tour of the Fort, the biggest in Rajasthan. From here, you could see the entire city of Jodhpur which is known as the blue city. The blue color dates back to the caste system, where the priests would paint their houses indigo as a sign of wealth. It ironically also serves as a good coolant and insect repellant. The city was beautiful from up there. The fort was also pretty spectacular. We toured the fort at our own pace, so I finished first as was able to enjoy some alone time up top in time for Mom’s daily phone call. We then enjoyed sunset from the fort, but then had to sit around for two hours waiting for our dinner reservation. We ate dinner at the top of the fort overlooking Jodhpur. It was a breathtaking view of the city all light up, with fireworks in celebration of Diwali. The restaurant was literally on the roof of the fort, with eight small tables, and the entire place lit by only a few candles. Probably one of the most romantic settings I’ve ever been in… but alas, I was there with three girls, rather than one special boy. Such is life. Dinner was good, but took entirely tooooo long, so I was quite tired by the time we got back to the guest house.