Mehrangarh Fort

Dreading what it was going to take to get out of going to the little town outside Jodhpur, I headed to meet the man who had wrapped my parcel. I got there quite a bit early and sat to wait for him. It didn't really occur to me to just not show up. I had told him I would come and changing my mind didn't make it any better to duck out without any explanation.

He arrived in due time and I sat down to tell him that I thought I was going to need more time than I would end up with after going to the little town. He seemed adamant that I would only need 2 or 3 hours. But I know me and I just wanted to be sure. If I had to give up one or the other, I would rather give up the town and be sure to see the fort. In the end, he had gone to get gas for his motorbike, and said that in the sort of tone that conveyed that he kind of expected something in return for it. Of course, it didn't seem to occur to him that whether I gave him money or not for the gas, he was still going to use it in the coming days and weeks, and nothing was going to change on that score. But I didn't bother trying to point that out, because he made a great deal of show about being offended again when I asked how much he would be wanting from me for the gas. We ended up splitting the gas, which had mysteriously gone up in price overnight from 90 to 110 rupees per liter. Again I decided the better part of valour was to not go there. Besides he still insisted on taking my address so he could send me the sitar as a gift. So if it does show up it will be a cheap, but possibly quite nice, souvenir.

And in the whole discussion about going and not going I still ended up being there for the better part of an hour. Yes, there was no way in the world the little trip was only going to be 2 or 3 hours leaving lots of time for the fort. (Somewhere in this I also informed him that, while Jaisalmer sounded very nice, it was in the completely wrong direction to that where I was headed and would take too much time, so I was going to take the shorter side trip of the desert just outside Jodhpur.)

He still insisted that he would take me somewhere, since I had paid for fuel. Then he would be using some small part of it to do something for me. I really do think he did mean well, but he did have a quite overacted offended look when the subject of how much money to pay him came up. He told me that before I went to fort I could check out a nice park and zoo in the city. I could spend a short time there and then head up to the fort. So he took me there, where we parted. Part of me wishes I had gone to the town with him, but when I saw him arrive at his shop, the rest of me went, “Ugh! Now I have to go.” That pretty much made my decision to beg off the right one.

I checked out the park. I tried for a long while to find the zoo, but it was quite difficult. And then it was closed when I did find it. There was a small museum on the grounds as well that proclaimed that tourists really ought to visit it because it was so interesting. That sounded like a suspicious claim. Things that are actually interesting don't usually have to go out of their way to somewhat plaintively tell the world so. So I didn't go there either. I did meet a bunch of people who insisted that I take photos of them. This was becoming a theme in Jodhpur. I kept running into people who were quite insistent that I take photos of them. And they just honestly wanted their photos taken. They wanted nothing in return, except to see the photos that is.

After leaving the park, I passed through more convoluted streets in search of the hill and the fort. Again, I had people pointing the way, often not waiting for me to ask. But everyone I met was very friendly and greeted me with great big smiles. Jodhpur seriously makes a good case for being one of the friendliest places I have ever visited.

While wandering through the winding streets, I passed this remnant of fortress wall, and it seemed almost built into the houses in the neighbourhood.

At length I made it to the hill and the path up to the fort. While I was heading up, I met a group of three boys who were coming down. They stopped me and asked for a pen. This seems to be a fairly common request. I have been asked a lot to give someone a pen as a gift. Unfortunately, I need the couple of pens I have and I haven't given any. Then they asked me for money. I said no to that as well. One of the little punks then got behind me and reached into the mesh pouch at the side of my backpack and pulled out a tube of mosquito repellent. And took it. I called out after him that he was a thief, but I didn't do anything more than that. In retrospect, I decided that was probably a mistake. He got away with it and so he is more likely to do it again. I would have been better to at least try to chase after them. So when I got to the top of the hill and the entrance to the fort, I reported it to the security people. I told them, I didn't really care about the mosquito repellent, but if they saw the punks, could they grab them and scare them. To my probably ever-lasting surprise, after all the things I have heard about police and security corruption in this country, they had me sit down and try to describe the boys. They asked if I had taken a photo. I was unable to help them much. They went out to try and find them. I went up and bought my ticket and was about to go into the fort, when one of the security people came up and asked me to accompany him. They had been trying to find the boys. I was a bit shocked. It was only a tube of mosquito repellent. In Canada, if a visitor were to report something like that, they might roll their eyes as they made even a token note of it that would go in the circular file as soon as the visitor left. And a local would likely be laughed at. In the end, I was asked to take a photo of the boys if I saw them again and take it to the police. I was quite impressed with the whole episode.

Then I headed into the fort. As part of the ticket, they have an audio guide to take into the fort. It is really helpful and it really made the whole thing easier to understand without having to shell out for an actual guide. And it is at one's own pace, so there is no pressure to go at a particular speed through the fort.

The fort is quite imposing and intricate as well. It is about 7 hundred years old and has various influences, as it was added to and changed over time by several rulers. And then it sat empty for a hundred years or so before a concerted effort was made to restore and make it a draw for visitors. When they initially started restoration, before grants from government and conservation groups were received, the first monies for its restoration came from bat guano, they being the residents at the time. It was really hard to believe that a magnificent building like that would be left abandoned to the elements and the bats. That has happily changed now.

I had heard that one of the things to do from the fort is to sit on the ramparts and watch the sun set. I considered sitting there until sunset to do that (and drat it, the package wrapping man had been correct, it had only taken 3 hours to get comfortably through the fort), but then it seemed to me that that was backwards. It seemed that it would be better to watch sunset with the fort as some sort of backdrop. I figured there had to be some good perch from which to do that. I headed down from the fort to find it. Off in the distance I had seen a hill with some fortress wall draped over it. The angles seemed right to me and I thought that maybe it would make a good place from which to watch the sunset. I wandered in that direction, but there seemed no way to get to it. I searched from one direction with no luck and then tried another direction no better luck. Along the way I had met more people who wanted photos taken.

I finally found a water storage area that had been dug out some time long ago. I was standing near it wondering how to get up the hill, which I could now see, and it was very close. While I was standing there, I met more people who wanted pens and their photos taken. Then a boy came up and talked to me for a few minutes. Then he pointed at the hill and asked if I wanted to go there. I said yes, so he beckoned me to follow him. He took me to his home. And then inside. And up through their walls and onto the top roof-ish area. They had a great view of the fort. Unfortunately I had been wrong about the angles and the sun was setting too far away to be really nice. And there were clouds at the horizon that were going to cover the sun anyway. But the boy took me down into his home, which was communal in some fashion, with four families all sharing the home. They all worked together to make some sort of snacks that they sold in the market. And they were all acting as if I was an old family friend. They brought me tea, and gave me cookies. And they talked to me and asked me questions and answered mine. It was another of those really surreal experiences I have been having here in India, another family that invited me into their home and treated me so well. I am going to leave this country with such good memories.