The Beauty of Bundi

The scent of jasmine was wafting on the air as we entered the garden. Garlands of roses were put around our necks and we were handed glasses of rose water and soda. Welcome to Ishwari Niwas in the city of Bundi. When the Brits left, the Maharajahs and families had to leave the palaces to the Indian government and take other residences. Ishwari Niwas is the home of the cousin of the last Maharajah of Bundi and part of it has become our guesthouse.

Bundi is a city of 150,000 in Rajasthan state. It features many intricately carved step wells, cenotaphs and the glorious Garh Palace, perched on the hillside like a stone bird of prey. Unfortunately for Bundi, decaying monuments are all over India and are not big draws for Indian tourists, and they do not specialize in anything like gemstones or silk to draw the foreign tourists. They are just a lovely town trying to get by.

It has its charming remnants of bygone eras. The movie theatre is named "Randeep Talkies" probably from when talking pictures first came to India. We saw the house where Rudyard Kipling was staying when he wrote part of "Kim." When he saw the palace he famously said it must have been made by goblins. There is a roadside dentist who does cleanings and surgery for those who cannot afford to go to a dentist's office. His "office" is a spot on the dusty ground along one of the main roads of the city where he displays false teeth on a small table. Jogi, our guide, says his infection rate is high. No shit.

The impressive Garh Palace and the cenotaphs of past rulers are beautiful in their own sadly ruined way. The last Maharajah was a bit of a playboy and created a mess when he left all his estate to a drinking buddy and not his family. His nephew, fairly reasonably, said "uh uh, this is our ancestral home and wealth" and it's been tied up in the courts ever since with no one maintaining the properties. It must be galling for older family members who remembered the glorious palace before independence to see the disgraced state it in in now.

Jogi arranged a delightful afternoon for us yesterday where we set out in a convoy of jeeps. My jeep was from 1960, another from 1942 and I didn't get the date for the third one. They were in perfect shape and all kitted out with axes, shovels and rifles. We went off to a village outside Bundi called Thikarda. It was one of the tidiest places I have seen in India. People maintained their homes and the streets. Children followed us with the ubiquitous cry of "one photo" although they were never satisfied with just one photo, and adults brought their babies to us to be photographed. We learned about different house materials and visited a Kinhari potter. BL and H took turns throwing pots on the electric wheel with guidance from the potter's assistant.

We left there for the Maharajah's hunting lodge where we had a delicious supper under the stars. Jogi had one of the jeep rifles at the ready, loaded with a soft, hollow ammunition that just leaves a sting, in case we attracted aggressive monkeys. We sat there, eating and drinking and laughing around tablecloth covered tables on the roof of a ruined lodge under a perfect starry Indian sky, guarded by Indians with rifles. It felt like we were British colonists from days gone past. If that was their lives, no wonder they loved it here.

There was a tricky moment getting back. Just 50 feet from the guesthouse our jeep came nose-to-nose with a bus on the one lane road. There was a pole to one side of us and construction on the other. We had a trailer with the supper tables, chairs, etc. attached to us and two other jeeps on our tail. The bus had two other busses on its tail. No one could back up. The other jeeps made it around on the sidewalk but our trailer just jackknifed when we tried to back up. The passengers from the buses got out and began to gather around the jeep. Tempers began to flare. Jogi told us to get out and run to the guesthouse right away, which we did. Fortunately, he was able to resolve it and joined us soon after.

Now it's off to Udaipur...