Annoying!: Namashkar India (Part 8: Starry Starry Night)

Perjalanan menaiki unta menuju ke tapak perkhemahan (takde khemah pun) kami mengambil masa lebih kurang satu jam.

Sepanjang satu jam menaiki unta tu, anda akan disajikan dengan pemandangan of the vast desert. Boleh lah feeling ala khaleesi waktu dia merentasi padang pasir nak pergi ke Vaes Dothrak tu (wait, ada padang pasir ke? I lupa dah)

The khaleesis

There are four of us, the tourists, and the team that brought us there was three men. Two of them is around 40s while the other one is still very young. In his teens, I guess.

So, sepanjang perjalanan tu I did talk with my guide. He asked me if I was a Sunni or a Shiite. Time dia tanya soalan ni kan, I macam tergamam sekejap, like how do I answer this guy? How? How? Terus dalam kepala I keluar semua stereotype about these Shiite guys who don't like the Sunni and all.

Because, pardon my shallowness, I don't know that India has all three; Sunni, Shiite, and Sufism. I remembered back in Varanasi, the Muslims are Shiite, but takpe lah, I jawab je lah because despite my nervousness, I believe it's a harmless question, so I answered,

"I'm a Sunni"

"Oh same, me too!" he replied.

Phew. Lega jap.

So, he went on telling me that the Muslims in Jaisalmer are Sunni. And he did asked me if I knew how to recite the Koran, and when I answered yes, he said,

"Lucky you, I don't"

"You still could learn, it's not too late" I told him.

"I could? You believe I'm not too old to learn? My parents were poor, they didn't have money to send me to school to learn the Koran. I hope my kids get to learn to recite the Koran"

Waktu dia bagitahu ni kan, I felt so sebak and terus I questioned my privileges. Not everybody is as lucky as us. We were the lucky ones. I harap the man and his family somehow managed to learn to recite the Koran someday.

Then he told me about his work. He said that he's actually a farmer, that he grew wheat here but because it's winter and it hasn't rain for a while, so he couldn't harvest them. He said he took the job as the guide because it gave him fixed money every month despite having customers or not, which is good for the family, he could buy foods and provide for the family. Life is really hard here in the desert, I believe.

Then after a while, we arrived to our campsite and we basically didn't do anything. They arranged and managed everything. We just got off our camels and went exploring the desert like an excited little girls we are!

Oh by the way, here in the desert, in the campsite, there are no toilets (durh) so, if you have the need to pee or poop, you can just do it anywhere in the desert. LOL

Also, here they don't have sand flies, but they have dung beetle! Banyaaakkkkkk

The dung beetle

So, Farah and I, we went to take pictures in the middle of the desert because it was approaching sunset and the view is so spectacular you wouldn't believe it!

Cantik kan?

I've seen the best sunrise and sunset view in my life in India. It was so majestic, cantik sangat!

Also, of course lah we sempat buat photoshoot syok sendiri kan.

Kan I cakap, for this post akan ada banyak gambar cantik.

Also, lepas penat posing, we lie down a bit and pose like a Vogue model that we are.

After sunset, when we went back to our campsite, we found our bed has already made. Thanks to our guide. And they were too, at that moment, busy preparing our dinner.

Yeay food!

We ate chicken curry that night, with some round rotis and potatoes (if I'm not mistaken). It was delicious! We were also given garam chai for our drinks.

Sorry, takde gambar makanan because semua lapar, we only care about our tummy.

Basically kan, kitorang kan kat tengah padang pasir kan, we don't have any lights pun. So, time makan tu, we used lights from our phone and api from the unggun api yang the guide tu buat masak je. So, kalau you guys nak datang sini, bawak lah headlamp siap siap kalau tak nak makan dalam gelap.

After dinner, basically there are no other activities to do except bersembang and tengok the stars. As early as 8 pm, the sky is already full with stars. Like, a lot of them! I admit, I bukan outdoor person, so I'm not exposed to sleeping outside my bedroom (except camping waktu sekolah dulu) so when I witnessed the beauty that is the stars in the sky, I couldn't help but feel so..so..appreciative? Grateful? It was so amazing!!

Nampak tak stars tu? This is no filter okayh

our view for the night

Also, since it was winter, the temperature was around 14 degree Celcius! So sejuk I had to sleep under the blanket. Like, my face couldn't stand the cold at all.

Ahhh rindunyaaaaa nak gi Jaisalmer tidur sana.

Pagi tu, we woke up early. As early as 5 am because we wanted to see the sunrise, also boleh main dengan unta!

Tabah je unta unta tu semua layan kitorang. Ye lah kan, bila lagi nak jumpa unta? Kat Malaysia hado? Nan hado okehhh.

Actually lepas main unta ni kitorang pergi main bergolek kat tengah tengah padang pasir tu sampai pening palo berguling ala hindustan entah macam mana Shah Rukh Khan dengan Kajol boleh bergolek turun bukit banyak kali, I buat tak sampai dua kali pun dah rasa mabuk teruk LOL.

Lepas sibuk main unta, bergolek and what nots, kitorang back to the campsite untuk breakfast! Hungreyhhhh! We were given bread, jams, and eggs for our breakfast, and around 8 am, we were ready to go back.

Roti dah selamat masuk perut

Ni lah tempat tidur kitorang!

Belanja sikit gambar lompat depan sunset the day before

So, lepas settle semua kemas and all, kami pun terpaksa mengucapkan selamat tinggal to the vast desert sebab kena balik dah. Sedih sebab seronok gila sebenarnya lepak sini walaupun takde benda nak buat but it's like it's just you, and nature. Rindunya!

Okay then kitorang naik unta lagi sekali for another hour before reaching to the place where a jeep is waiting for us. Kali ni, adventure sikit sebab kitorang duduk at the back of a jeep, no roof. (Actually I tak sure pun it's a jeep or not, but I guess so)

We were taken to a local village, to see the people who lives in the desert. Even one of our guide lives here too, and kitorang pun dapat tengok his house and his family.

Some of the kids from the village

My favorite picture

People in the Thar Desert do actually live in a hut like this

Farah mengganggu kehidupan seekor kambing

More huts

You know, shallow as I am, I don't know that I'd be able to see these kind of villages alive. I always thought that these places only exist in documentaries, but when I was there, I felt so small and so privileged that it's kinda sad to think in this era, there are still people who don't get access to normal house and electricity, and clean water.

I was actually in a kind of emotional turbulence when I went to India, so when I was there, and looking at all these, I felt my problems are very small compared to what they had.

Well, there's this one interesting stories told by one of the girls who joined the trip, a German, (when we were there in the village, the villagers would come to you and ask for things but the guide already remind us to NOT give them any things AT ALL because once you did, more of them would come to you) so there was this girl approached her and asked for one of her bangles. So this gal (the Germany gal) said to her (the kid),

"You've already had a lot of bangles on your hand. Why did you asked for mine? I only have one"

As if she understood what the tourist had said, the kid tried to give her one of her bangle. Of course the lady was surprise for the kindness, and of course she refused but it was overwhelming to think that the lesser of us has more to give and do not hesitate to do so some more.

So again, nikmat Tuhan kamu yang mana yang kamu dustakan?

Deep jap.

After the village, we went to this one abandoned city. I can't remember the name, but it has one interesting history.

The abandoned fort

The structure of the fort, upclose

The abandoned city (or a village), as seen from the fort

Well, here's the story of the abandoned city. You know how India has the caste class thingy? Well, back to hundreds of years ago, the village was a home to people who came from the Brahmin class. The Brahmins are believed to be the holy and untouchables clan compared to all other classes,

However, during that time, Jaisalmer was ruled by the king of a Rajput caste. These Rajputs are believed to be warriors so mostly, they are savages. They liked to kill, and war, and they eat everything, meats, vegs, EVERYTHING.

So one day, the king and his envoys and his troops, came to the village. When he was there, he has fallen in love to a beautiful lady from the village which happened to be a Brahmin. So being a king, he asked for her hand in marriage but the villagers were against the idea of a Brahmin marrying a Rajput because...well, caste.

The king, upon hearing the news, was so mad and told the villagers that they basically have two choices, first, to let him marry the lady, or, fled the village before the sunrise tomorrow or they will all be dead.

Guess what? The Brahmin opted for the second option and all of them fled the village leaving all their properties and home behind them. All because they don't want people of different caste to marry and sneak their ways in their caste.

So, itu lah cerita yang our guide told us. Tapi isu kasta ni memang masih lagi issue besar kat sana, it's still sensitive issue but what to do, benda ni dah dalam budaya dorang for ages so susah sikit lah nak kikis the stereotype kan.

By the way, sepanjang kitorang berjalan jalan kat these abandoned castles and villages, kitorang tak berapa nak senang duduk sebenarnya because KITORANG BELUM BELI TIKET BALIK DELHI LAGI! LOL

So, sambil tengok scenery, sambil sambil tu usha tiket. Nasib baik lah ada member baik hati bagi kitorang pinjam credit card nak beli train ticket. Lepas dapat beli Tatkal tiket tu terus masing masing macam...phew LEGA!

So around 1 pm, kitorang sampai to Abu Safari headquarters to bersiap and all before heading to our next destination.

Farah, being a kindhearted (but headstrong in the same time) lady that she is, she gave our guide a headlamp sebab dia kesian tengok diorang macam susah je nak masak dalam gelap. So baik lei.

Then sampai je headquarters, one of the staffs took us to the bus station to buy tickets to Jodhpur which only cost us Rs 200 per person. Which is what, RM14 for 5 hours journey? Macam Shah Alam ke Butterworth, tapi cheaper.

So lepas beli tiket bus tu, we head back to the quarters untuk bersiap, pack our bags, makan, print boarding pass balik KL because since Abu Safari let us pakai their computers and prints stuffs for free, why not lah kan? hehe

Then after settle everything, tiket bus dah beli, tiket train balik Delhi from Jodhpur pun dah beli, boarding pass balik KL pun dah print, we decided to have our lunch in Abu Safari rooftop restaurant to fuel up so that we are very much ready to head for our next adventure...JODHPUR HERE WE COME!

Monday, May 1, 2017

Namashkar India (Part 8: Starry Starry Night)

No comments: