Hindi word of the day: रंग (rang - color)

Another very very delayed post. So a month ago (yikes) Christie, Julia, and I went to Jaipur for Holi. It was kind of a random decision to fly that far up north for one weekend. We'd been talking with our Indian friends here and they explained that Holi isn't really that big of a deal in Maharashtra--it's mostly a northern tradition. Since the primary reason I chose to come to India spring semester was to be here for Holi, this was pretty disappointing news for me. So when Christie suggested we head to Jaipur that weekend, which also happens to be the weekend of the Elephant Festival, I hopped on board. It also meant I got to visit Aviva, a friend from Wes who is studying abroad in Jaipur this semester.

We flew into Jaipur on Friday, checked into our hotel, and met up with Aviva and some of her friends from her program (she's doing the SIT sustainable development and social change program). It was so interesting comparing our programs, especially since their focus is almost exactly the same as ours. Their program center is in a residential area (ours is on the Fergusson College campus) and because Jaipur is a much less safe community than Pune it's tough for them to meet new people, so they don't really have Indian friends or hang out with Indian students the way we do. On the other hand, their language component is INCREDIBLE. They spend almost half their day studying Hindi and have gotten so good--Aviva's Hindi is almost as good as mine even though I took it for a year and a half at Wesleyan. They also spend the last month of their program doing an independent research project anywhere in India they want to, which they organize themselves. While it sounded like an amazing opportunity, it made me grateful that the Alliance sets up our internships for us (not that that part of our program is in any way perfect, but that's another story that I'd be happy to talk about via e-mail) and that we get to spend our last month in our homestays.

After hanging out for a bit, the four of us went to dinner--where we had the most delicious north indian thali ever--and then to see Patiala House, a recent Bollywood film, in an amazing, beautiful old theater. I finally got to check "see a Bollywood movie in a theater" off my list and it was pretty fantastic. Although I understood basically nothing despite studying Hindi, I was able to follow the plot enough to enjoy myself--and to clap and whistle along with the crowd during climactic scenes.

Aviva, Julia, and Christie in the theater where we watched Patiala House.

The next day we headed out to the Old City to meet Aviva and go shopping. Jaipur is really hectic and we got harassed way more walking down the street than I ever do in Pune, but shopping was fun. The Old City is completely pink (Jaipur is called the "pink city" because many of its buildings are painted in pink, a color traditionally considered to represent hospitality) and it really does feel old--so much older than any part of Pune.

Inside the Old City

Shopping in the old city was a blast; everything is way cheaper than in Pune and there was lots of stuff you can't find in other parts of the country. I bought three pairs of shoes (not ashamed), some bangles from a boy we saw making the bangles in an alley off the main road, and an amazing leather satchel, which is something I've been looking for for the past several years.

Since the next day was Holi, many shopkeepers were also selling colors (the powder that everyone throws on each other or mixes with water and shoots from squirt guns). I had kind of a freakout seeing the fulfillment of all my India dreams about to come true and bought some bright green powder. Walking down an alley later, a few guys in a shop stopped us and asked us to color them. We opened our bags and threw some color onto their faces and they threw it back on us. After having been shouted at by rickshaw wallas and had motorcyclists stop and ask me my name all day, it was really refreshing to have a genuine, non-harassing interaction with men.

A vendor in the Old City selling colors

Shopping in the Old City. Sorry the image is flipped--I don't know how to rotate it on Blogger.

The boy who made my bangles

The bangle shop

Elephants walking through the Old City on their way to the Elephant Festival

Fabric shopping

After shopping and stopping for some delicious sweet lassis, we headed to the Elephant Festival, a giant touristy festival that Jaipur throws every year around Holi. We watched a parade of painted elephants, some costumed dancers, ridiculous tourist activities like tug-of-war and balance-the-pot-of-water-on-your head-while-walking, mingled with some creepy Indian men who wanted to color us, and then headed out.

A random Italian (I think?) man who asked to play with Christie's colors and then ended up spending the next half hour painting her face in an elaborate pattern. Again, sorry for the rotated image.

This elephant had a tiger painted on its face--the tiger's eye was the elephant's eye. It was pretty cool.

Hanuman and some demons dance it up.

Afterward, we went back to Aviva's program center with all her program mates to make the critical decision: where to spend Holi. The SIT staff had warned their whole program that Holi was dangerous in Jaipur and that it was not safe to go out on the street, which had originally been our plan. As a result, their staff had booked a hotel for their whole program where they were planning on playing in the courtyard and invited us to come. We texted all our Indian friends to ask their advice and went back to the hotel to see what tourists had said online. It turns out it really is unsafe--forums on the topic were full of horror stories about girls getting groped just trying to cross a street from one building to another and drunk men attacking people. So we changed our plans and decided to join Aviva's program. Needless to say,  I was pretty disappointed by this. I felt grateful that the SIT staff were so welcoming and that we had a place to go, but since I had been looking forward to celebrating Holi in India for the past four years, I was upset that I would be spending it with a group of American kids rather than out on the streets with Indians.

But, surprise surprise, the next day turned out to be one of the best days of my life (Zach is judging my cheesiness as he reads this over my shoulder right now which is a rude and annoying thing to be doing in the first place) and completely lived up to all my expectations. 

We started by getting into our Holi clothes (cheap white clothes that we never intended to wear again) and heading up to the roof of the hotel to get a look at the "crazy" streets. Turns out they were completely empty. . . but we did see a group of kids playing in a construction site down the street and off we went to join them. After scaling a wall and jumping through a few bushes to get to the construction site, we played an epic round of Holi with their entire fma

Christie and I play Holi with the family 

Eventually, we headed back to the hotel (got groped on the way by some men who stopped their bikes to play Holi with us), welcomed the SIT staff as they showed up, and had a massive celebration that lasted the entire day and included an open bar (!), a massive dance party, lots of squirt guns and powder, and awe tasty snacks. Aviva's program mates and staff were the most fantastically nice people ever and the entire day was amazing.

 Christie, me, and Julia after playing

Aviva's program's staff actually hired a band to start the day off

 The festivities

 More of the festivities

Exhausted and tie-dyed, we went back to the hotel, showered off, and I headed to Aviva's to spend the night. Her house was spectacularly, lavishly beautiful. It was three stories tall, had marble surfaces everywhere, and even had a yard with grass in it (which Aviva and I, as past Earth Housers, both had strong opinions about--she said they water it constantly). Her host mom, a wedding planner, was really sweet and served us a delicious dinner. North Indian food is definitely heavier than what I'm used to eating in Maharashtra but it's really tasty. Aviva and I planned our post-trip travel plans (which unfortunately have now been called off since she won a Davenport grant to study farming in Kerala--I'll talk about my updated travel plans later) and had a long catch-up chat as we fell asleep that night.

Aviva's room on the roof--so purty! 

The yard. Cray cray.

The effects of Holi

The next morning we had a tasty egg paratha for breakfast and I headed out to meet Julia and Christie to hike to Nahargar, a fort on a hill above the Old City. The hike was hot but the fort was amazing--it had views of the entire city and infinite rooms with beautifully painted details.

Nahargar

The view from Nahargar--sorry for the rotation.

One of the rooms inside the fort

Pigeons chillin'

Afterward we ricked through the Old City to Hawamahal, the wind palace. We stopped to haggle for our leather satchels and then headed in. Hawamahal was built to be a place where women (i.e. brothel women) could look out at the city and feel the breeze since they weren't allowed into public. It is more of a really tall wall with stairs going up to the top than a palace--it doesn't have bedrooms or sitting areas, but is mostly full of small nooks with windows.

The roof of the Hawa Mahal--you can see Nahargar behind it.

The facade of Hawamahal

Afterward we downed some lassis at Lassiwalla (a famous lassi bar), stopped by Aviva's program center to say goodbye to everyone, and caught our plane home.

In Jaipur they sell lassis in adorable little clay cups.