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  • Hugh Hutchison

Rajasthan

Not long after my return from Rothera, a colleague invited me to his wedding in India - in Bundi, in the state of Rajasthan, in India's northwest corner. What could I say? So I thought I'd share the pics and my reflections of this trip. Read more
  • Currently in
    🇮🇳 Jaipur, India

    Day 11 - Car to Jaipur

    Yesterday in India ⋅ ☀️ 26 °C

    This morning I shared a 4-hour lift with Rory & Katie from Bundi to Jaipur, we parted company and thought I’d spend the afternoon wandering the bazaars and back streets.

    My white face in the tourist hot-spots of Delhi, Jodhpur, Jaisalmer and then Udaipur naturally exposed me to a constant barrage of attention. The wedding interlude in a big hotel was not like that, which was a relief. Interesting that this afternoon’s visit to the Old City of Jaipur was also not like the earlier cities. This is Rajasthan’s administrative capital and its many occupants seemed predominantly wrapped up in their own affairs.

    It is another frantically busy place, and the back-street vendors specialise in textiles, jewellery, shoes and stone carving. It was remarkable to see almost every textile store engaging with customers, their shop floors strewn in fabric of bright & vibrant colour. I think one of the wedding’s take-away memories will be the colour and beauty of the fabrics on display. Definitely not ‘off the peg’ and really quite striking; comparable to Royal robes I’ve seen in some palaces.

    Walking Jaipur’s streets and even whilst being driven through the countryside, kites are clearly seen being flown. Nice to see. I do also love the architecture here; it is invariably tired, but photographically, it is so unique to here, stirring childhood memories of the cartoons of ‘Arabian Knights’ and ‘Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves’ (albeit not entirely set here!).

    I have a table booked at a rooftop restaurant, might even step to ‘non-veg’ now that the wedding event is behind me!
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  • Day 10 - Wedding Part 2

    December 6 in India ⋅ ☁️ 24 °C

    After breakfast, I vacated my hotel in downtown Bundi for an upgrade - my host had found me a spare room at the wedding venue - so that was welcome. My Tuc-Tuc drive first took me past the Nawal Sagar (lake), overlooked by Bundi’s Garh Palace & fort.

    This 2nd part of the wedding is simpler, with Phases 3 and 4. A Hindu religious service late morning called ‘Vrindavan Holi’, lunch, and then the evening reception where 800 guests are expected.

    The Vrindavan Holi was ‘evangelical’, if Hindu services can be. Drums, bells and singing, congregation on their feet with clapping & dancing, and thousands of flower petals cast over everyone. A festival of celebration for divine love, with bride & groom dolls which were showered in red & yellow petals from roses, and other flowers.

    Lunch followed in the same room, and it was oddly laid out, rather like school desks. In keeping with the theme of the bride’s family welcoming the groom and his party, the groom’s party (inc me) were all seated first. The meal was then served, and all of the bride’s party then proceeded to visit each of us, to check we were enjoying it, had sufficient, provided more if not, and asked if there was anything further they could do for us. Only when we were finished and sated, did we move out and the bride’s party ate. Members of the groom’s party then took care of the bride’s party dining. The meal was another vegetable curry meal of multiple dishes and deserts, all unique to the Rajasthan region.

    The evening event saw the arrival of the newly weds, who spent all night having photos taken on the stage with whosoever wanted it! Meanwhile, everyone present ate more veg curry dishes….
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  • Day 9 - Wedding Part 1

    December 5 in India ⋅ 🌙 14 °C

    That was quite a day. I confess to feeling a bit like James Bond as I stepped out of my guest house at 1030 and onto the dirt street, passing stray dogs, rubbish, & general mess in my 3-piece linen suit and tie, to find an idle Tuc-tuc! On the ride to the venue, people who saw me waved excitedly, and like a visiting ‘dignitary’, I naturally reciprocated…😊. In Octopussy, Roger Moore was chased around Udaipur in a Tuc Tuc, similarly attired….👍🏻

    The hotel is only 3-years old, and I’m sure was purpose built for the wedding market. The only guest in a pale linen suit, and one of only 3 non-Indians, I tried to circulate casually for breakfast but clearly stood out like a….? the hotel staff were numerous and hyper-attentive.

    https://www.anantahotels.com/classic-sapphire-a…

    The wedding has 4 phases, this day had 2 of them, Bhaat & Sangeet, pause for lunch, then Baarat Procession, Varmala & Phere with a vast buffet dinner throughout. The Bhaat is an exchange of gifts between the bride’s and groom’s families, like jewellery, cash, clothes and the like. The Sangeet is a vibrant pre-wedding celebration of dancing & music, some individuals did some traditional dances, while parties from both family sides performed Bollywood-style pop coordinated routines. All good fun and colourful.

    We emerged from the basement ball room to catch the day’s final sunshine for a buffet lunch at 5pm, expecting phase 2 to start at 6pm, but it was clear that the hotel was still building the stage and resetting the outdoor space from a previous event; it looked more like the morning after a summer ball, rather than the ‘before’, with leftovers and mess everywhere.

    In the waiting period, men from the 2 sides (groom / bride) had turbans ‘fitted’ of 2 colours, groom-side in red and bride-side in less attractive pastels - and I had a little time with my colleague Neh (the groom) and his family & friends. By about 9, it finally began.

    The Baraat Procession sees the groom ride a decorated white horse, with his party & family, to the bride’s house where he is welcomed. At this hotel, they effectively used the ‘in / out’ driveway to serve that purpose. The Varmala is then the exchange of flower garlands between the groom and bride, which took place on the hotel steps, and is the formal making of the marriage. The Phere is the slow, peaceful Hindu religious ceremony, led by the priest, where they make declarations with family & parents part of it, and it can last 3-4 hrs. I confess that I left at 0130 for my hotel in town with the blessing of the groom; have no idea what time that bit ended!

    Similar to the Anglican tradition, where the bride casts her bouquet of flowers, and the catcher might be the lucky one to marry next, the man who mounts the groom’s horse after the groom dismounts, is also said to have that same luck. Neh’s brother did just that, and seemed delighted by the achievement!

    Tomorrow sees Part 2 - when I’ll get to wear my Kurta Pyjama…. 😊.
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  • Day 8 - Arrival in Bundi

    December 4 in India ⋅ 🌙 20 °C

    My 0430 alarm got me to a train (only 2 services a day) which brought me to Bundi - the wedding venue - by 9am, 150 miles further east of Udaipur. Bundi is a much smaller town, perhaps more typical than the previous tourist stops, but it too has a massive palace & fort overlooking it.

    I’d ordered some Kurta Pyjamas to wear at the wedding, but the host texted to say they were not going to be here on time, so I stepped into a shop and bought some! I then got a text later to say they’d arrived after all, so it looks like I’ll have a choice of outfits for 1 of the wedding’s 4 phases.

    Met a young Portuguese couple, who were also on my train and happened to be in my guesthouse too. Together we wandered around the palace and to the fort above. This palace, constructed from around 1600, was nothing like the others I’ve seen. Bundi (or Garh) Palace is a pretty tired place, vast but empty of treasure and sadly in gradual decline.

    Monkeys are also prolific here, both langur monkeys, and rhesus macaques, so our accommodation is surrounded by razor wire and doors need to be kept shut!

    Off out tonight with a couple from the UK, here for the wedding too. I think we 3 will be the only non-Indians in the 800 strong party on Saturday. The fun starts tomorrow from midday…
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  • Day 7 - Udaipur

    December 3 in India ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C

    This place is very much a ‘must see’ on the tourist trail, and sitting beside 2 lakes, has some similarities to the Italian Lakes with its swanky hotels. Some of the hotels do not publish their prices - if you need to ask, you probably can’t afford it!

    Today I did another palace, and probably won’t do any more. Udaipur was founded in 1559 by Maharana Udai Singh II, the ruler of the kingdom of Mewar. It seems about 36 clans ruled Rajasthan, each with their own lands, fort, palace, army…. I’m sure you get the picture by now. Amongst these treasures, is the world’s largest single collection of lead crystal. Back in 1877, the Maharana commissioned a firm in Birmingham to make items to his design. The number of items isn’t declared, but over 10,000. Glasses, plates, chandelier, chairs, tables, a bed, lights, lamps….. I’m sure some UK stately home was funded by it! Photos were not permitted…😕. Just before the shipment arrived, the Maharana died, so the items were left in their crates. 110 years later, they were opened and discovered! Crazy.

    I’ve mooched around, used the pool, drank tea. Cocktail later and dinner on a terrace. I have a train tomorrow at 0545 (only 2 trains a day…😳) to get to Bundi, the wedding venue.
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  • Day 6 - 12 hrs on a Bus to Udaipur

    December 2 in India ⋅ 🌙 18 °C

    It started in the dark and cold in a very quiet Jaisalmer with an 0600 Tuc-Tuc ride to the bus stop. It was indeed a 12-hour, bouncy 300km bus ride, punctuated by the driver moving around speed bumps, pot holes, dogs, cows, camels, motorcycles, trucks and everything else; earplugs essential as the horn featured continuously. It was at least air conditioned, only half full from Jaisalmer to Jodhpur, but it filled there. Fascinating to observe the roadside activity as we passed through the towns en route; sights I simply wasn’t fast enough to photograph. But I did see;

    - A cow eating from a bin in Jodhpur bus station.

    - A puppy sleeping on the concrete, with buses moving around him. I moved him on, of course.

    - Main 2-lane A-road; a motorbike with a man at the front, wife behind him and 2 kids squeezed between, no helmets… I saw this example more than once along the way.

    - They drive on the left, it was a 2-lane road with a hard shoulder. Truck passes us on our left, coming towards us down the hard shoulder. Not seen that since I was in Kenya.

    - A lot of monkeys as we pulled up into the Aravalli mountains. The driver’s mate tossed a load of bananas onto the verge as we approached, keen to get them off of the road! 🐒

    Quarrying is clearly big here; marble, granite and much else. Farmers fields were fenced, but the posts were stone; I haven’t seen many big trees here, so they’ve had to adapt.

    My day ends in darkness, as it had begun, but now on a high rooftop terrace for dinner & wine, overlooking Pichola Lake. A great improvement on the bus ride….
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  • Day 5 - Jaisalmer

    December 1 in India ⋅ ☀️ 25 °C

    A dull train ride got me here at 0100, but at least I got here. I gather it’s not unusual for the train from Jodhpur to be cancelled!

    Jaisalmer is a golden city with blue skies, the rock being a warm yellow sandstone. Like Jodhpur (and I’m sure many settlements out here) the fort dominates. Home of the Bhati clan from 1156 AD until independence in 1947, their palace was integral to the fort. Delightfully, my hotel is also inside the fort - a stone building, about 400 years old, and a multi-room apartment, all for me.

    Haveli, meaning ‘partition’ or ‘private space’ , are 2 or 3 storey dwellings, with a flat roof used as a terrace, built around an open-topped central courtyard for light & ventilation. Long pre-dating glass, the ‘windows’ are carved screens, intricate sandstone perforated panels called ‘jali’ or ‘jaali’ which allow occupants to see out, but you cannot see in; important when protecting women from being viewed. They also allow in some light and cooling airflow. I’m fascinated by clever architecture, designs which provide comfort to occupants long before electric light and air conditioning came along. Thick stone walls, narrow paths through the city, clever ventilation….

    Next door to my hotel is a Jain temple; only 1% of Rajasthan shares this faith, about 5 million globally and it seems they’re predominantly here in India.

    Jaisalmer sits in the Thar desert, which is the world’s most populated desert, despite getting only 10 inches of rain annually. Completion of the 500-mile Indira Ghandi canal from north to south through Rajasthan should aid farming. It has a long trading history, sitting on the silk route between Arabia and the East, and would have traded spices, textiles, opium, precious stones, silver, silk and the like. Having purchased both textiles and silver today, the tradition clearly continues….😊
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  • Day 4 - Jodhpur

    November 30 in India ⋅ ☀️ 28 °C

    With Jodhpur city seemingly running at the same high tempo as Delhi, it was a great relief to step out of my Tuc-tuc at Mehrangarh Fort early this morning, which watches over Jodhpur from its rock plinth 400 ft below. The city noises were faint, the light soft, and the loudest sound was the birds in the trees.

    Before building started in 1460, the leader of the Rathore Clan had first to eject a hermit who was living on the rock who was so indignant, he set a curse. To assuage the spirits, a cleric needed a living sacrifice, so a man volunteered to be buried alive in the foundations. The fort is vast, and full of treasures. The arrival of the Rathore clan marked the creation of Jodhpur as a key trading city, sitting strategically between Delhi to the north and the port of Gujarat to the south.

    The current head of the Rathore clan no longer lives there, so it is open for visitors. He (Gaj Singh II) was crowned at the age of just 4 following the death of his father in 1952 in an aircraft crash, and is now an Indian politician and diplomat.

    There are some great gardens to the north and I then visited the mausoleum of the Rathore clan, Jaswant Thada, made of a beautiful white marble, suitably ostentatious!

    My day ends with a 6 hr train ride, west into the Thar desert, sadly all in the dark, to Jaisalmer; first class of course, for £12……😊
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  • Day 3 - Delhi to Jodhpur

    November 29 in India ⋅ ☀️ 27 °C

    Delhi air was a bit cleaner today, nice to see some blue skies. Journey to airport in my taxi was as crazy as all the other trips; sobering to pass a crunched-up Tuc-tuc static behind a bus at the roadside, with a smashed windshield and blood on the road. These things do 60 kph and share 3-lane roads with all the other traffic, no seat belts, no helmets…..😕

    Internal flight from Delhi to Jodhpur, in-flight meal was a warmed spinach & sweetcorn sandwich….🤔. Thirty degs on arrival, nice. Been a while since I’ve arrived on a foreign airfield with batteries of surface-to-air missiles beside the runway….

    Paid my new friend Rakesh to show me some of Jodhpur in his Tuc-tuc, albeit at just 5mph (👍🏻) thro the winding streets of the old city, in amongst motorbikes, scooters, stray dogs, pedestrians and some cows….. Warmer here, still smelly, but a more agricultural odour than Delhi! Counted 4 stray dogs sleeping on the roofs of parked cars, and when we returned to our parked Tuc-tuc, a dog was curled up on the seat.

    We popped into a hotel being constructed from a very old stone property. I peered into what will be an en-suite shower to clock some bats sleeping up high - a few flew through the place. Delightful creatures, so precious.

    The film ‘The Fall’ is worth a watch; it includes footage from the Namib desert, and also Jodhpur, which is famous for its fort and its blue houses. More of both tomorrow!
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  • Day 2 - More Delhi

    November 28 in India ⋅ 🌙 21 °C

    A whole day of Delhi’s delights. An hour’s drive south through the city took me to Qutub Minar, a UNESCO world heritage site, and home of a 22-storey tower built around 1200 AD. It uses no cement and is held together by ingenious masonry - cut to fit together like LEGO. Until 1981 you could climb to the top but after a tragic accident, where a power-cut thrust the internal stairs into darkness creating a stampede in which 45 people died, one can no more.

    My trusty driver then took us NE to see Humayan’s Tomb, sometimes called ‘baby Taj Mahal’. It’s a 16th-century Mughal-era tomb of Emperor Humayun in Delhi, India, built by his Persian wife, Bega Begum. It is another UNESCO World Heritage site, recognized as a masterpiece of Mughal architecture, and which served as an inspiration for the Taj Mahal.

    Driving around today was just as crazy as yesterday. It is a miracle that there aren’t more collisions. When waiting at lights, kids often wash your windscreen, hoping for payment; one boy today was so young he could barely see in through the window. A young girl, maybe 8 years old, barefoot and wearing face paint, doing cart wheels between static cars, hoping to be paid for her acrobatics. More cows on roundabouts, and even watched a tuc-tuc, waiting at another roundabout, turn INTO the oncoming traffic….🤦🏼‍♂️

    I caught up with Ruth for coffee, a long-time friend from home also travelling out here, then we hoofed up to see ‘India Gate’, a triumphal arch similar to the Arc de Triomphe. This was unveiled in 1931 to commemorate the 74,000 Indian soldiers lost in WW1. It sits on the eastern end of the ‘ceremonial axis’ - a tree lined straight road with the original colonial parliament building on its western end, government offices on either side and the president’s residence at its head.

    All the stray dogs are a sad sight, but they do appear to be content with their lot. Nice to see dog bowls out and the occasional dog bed… 🐾

    Another veg curry tonight and an internal flight south to Jodhpur tomorrow. 😊
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  • Day 1 - Delhi

    November 27 in India ⋅ ☀️ 13 °C

    My preconceptions of Delhi were twofold; its poor air quality and its crazy roads. I can confirm both are accurate!

    Stepping out of the airport building, the air was warm and humid, around 25 degs, my nose sensing the combination of moisture and smoke; something I’d not sensed since being in Malaysia many years ago. The air is misty and yellowed, the light hazy, but not unpleasant. The sun was just a glowing patch of cloud above, unable to puncture through the smog.

    But the roads are CRAZY! Shared by pedestrians, bicycles, motorcycles, peddled rickshaws, motor rickshaws, cars, buses, lorrys, cattle (saw a herd being shepherded by a farmer in his tuc-tuc), cattle pulling carts and even a man on horseback. Numerous stray dogs add to the chaos. Road users pay no heed to the white lines, and all use their horns prolifically. No-one seemed irritated or angry, and the ‘low’ speeds seemed to ensure everyone gets through without collision. Remarkable.

    This afternoon went out to see the red fort - built by the Mughals in the mid-1600s and then the Jama Masjid, India’s largest mosque. Then leapt on a 3-seat motor trike with my hotel driver to see the markets.

    First impression? It’s messy, vibrant, chaotic, but friendly and without animosity. Noisy from the honking horns everywhere but remarkable. Had my first veggie curry tonight, the first of many I suspect. 😊👍🏻
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  • And I could have been back in Rothera...

    November 23 in England ⋅ 🌙 6 °C

    A few months ago, a colleague of mine kindly invited me to be present at his wedding ceremony, due to take place in early December in Rajasthan, India. Having never witnessed an Indian wedding, never been in India, and with ample annual leave following my trip south, I graciously accepted.

    A few weeks later, I was then asked if I was willing to return to Rothera for a month before Christmas. I admit I was tempted, but with the prospect of a few weeks in India instead, I declined. I am delighted that another work colleague is now there in my place, so I am genuinely pleased that someone else in our company will get the opportunity to see what I saw.

    My India plan starts in Delhi for a few days, then an internal flight south to Jodhpur for night. A train next day will hopefully take me to the former medieval trading city of Jaisalmer, 300 miles east of the Pakistan border in the Thar Desert - or the Great Indian Desert. Two nights here and a day sightseeing in-between is followed by an 11-hour bus ride east through the Aravali Mountains to Udaipur. Two further nights here in a hotel with a pool (which I figured I'd need after the bus ride) and a day looking around is followed by a further journey east to Bundi, where the wedding is due to take place.

    I've bought a linen suit and some Kurta Pyjamas for the wedding, which is expected to have 300 guests on Day 1 and 800 on Day 2...

    A few days as yet unplanned after the wedding and a flight from Delhi to LHR will mark its conclusion.... should be remarkable and memorable!
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    Trip start
    November 26, 2025