A Round Trip....

They say that sometimes chance comes once in a lifetime... you should just grab them...
Well.... that’s exactly what i did!!!
I got a chance to visit Udaipur for an event... & I lapped it up!!!!

Deserts have sand.... or so I thought... however that is not the case with the city of Udaipur.
All I could see from the sky... as we flew over the city, was the barren mountainous terrain, coloured with a palette of browns, ranging from burnt seinna to raw amber .... with a rare clump of bleached green, hinting at foliage...

Udaipur city is about 20 km from the airport.
That is...approximately 45mins by car.
As the car ate up the distance, bringing us closer to the city, I could see snaking roads, carved out of rocks... & felt, the skin burning, scorching heat of the Sun…though it was November...

Fleeting glimpses of typical cluster of small houses... cropping out from in between the hillocks...
Broken, dilapidated walls of previously existing forts ...
I was cursing myself for not getting my handy-cam....
The scene suddenly reminded me of Satyajit Ray's famous detective 'Felu Da' s adventure of 'Shonar Kella'.

As we forged ahead, skillfully negotiating through nerve racking hairpin bends… I almost felt transported back into history.
The people were brown, weather beaten…warm, welcoming with their crinkle eyed smiles…
Some of the older folks wore colourful turbans on their heads…
while nearly everyone had both their ears pierced.
They were all ‘Surya Vanshis’ - Descendents of the Son God.
The women-folk wore brightly coloured clothes, the 'Ghoongghat' pulled low over their faces... good way to keep off the sun... I guess...

I was staying at one of the palaces…Shiv Niwas Palace … the lake palace.
As the car reached the modern grilled palace gates… all I could do, was to hold my breath in awe of the splendor. There was a security check… as we had to enter the VVIP area.
From the main gates there was still an uphill climb to reach the palace doors.
The door was a gigantic wooded structure embedded with brass spearheads and knockers.
The car stopped at last... and I jumped out, eager to let my visual senses absorb the scene.
As I turned around, the sight that met my eyes... assailed my senses... and robbed me of my power of speech... to say the least … I was held absolutely spellbound…

The Palace was situated high atop a hill... which is why I had a brilliant , bird's eye view of the neighboring area ....
I could make out the hills far-way .. from behind a thin veil of fog... as if the hills had something to hide...
When I stood all by myself at the gates of this huge beautiful palace...
I felt exactly like a small brown mouse, would feel, when in front of a hill.... totally awestruck & overpowered.

To think that generations of Royalty.. Regal Kings... Beautiful Queens & their powerful armies all strode this path...
I believe... by closing my eyes I could almost hear.... the neighing of the horses & the echo of their hoofs as they galloped across the cobbled path...
The beating of the 'Nagaras' & the blowing of the 'Singas', heralding some announcements...
The clanging of the 'Talwars' & 'Dhals' as the soldiers honed their martial skills to perfection...

As the sunset on this beautiful city... I stood by the railings of the green lake... watching the colours change....
Felt like capturing it all on my camera.... but couldn’t due to some stupid superstition.
The heat of the day lapsed into a cool comfort zone.
The dusk sets in well after 6:30pm, and as soon as the darkness sets in the whole palace glows with the light from the sodium lamps, lending it a golden hue...
At night, when 'comfortably cool' turned to 'Comfortable numb'... I stood beside the dark lake staring into its depth... I felt a strange affinity for the place... it was almost as if each brick & mortar of the of the palace walls wanted to tell me its own story....

There was small temple ... I used to visit it in the evenings... and as I stood with my eyes closed & hands folded in prayer, I could feel the presence of bygone kings and queens... almost as if they too are standing beside me to offer a silent prayer for the well being of their new generations...
I used to get goosebumps... all the stories that I read in my school, history books seemed to come alive in front of me...

I am a chronic shoppaholic .. so on the last day of my stay...I took a 'rick' and went around the city in hunt of goodies that I could take back home...
I did some shopping from 'Hathipole'... bought some traditional bandej /bandhni saries for Ma & myself...
...several kilos of different types of sweets...seriously fattening... but mouthwateringly tasty...
& finally got myself a soft 'razai'...

My return from Udaipur in itself was an adventure... with my bulging luggage .. I flew from Udaipur to New Delhi... The City looked rugged from the air... though it was bit more greener than Udaipur....
I actually had some time to kill before my departure from Delhi.. so I got out of the airport, hailed an auto & headed to CP... grabbed a juice there ...bought some small stuffs... then headed straight for the airport...

I couldn’t get a direct flight back home from New Delhi,...so I had to take a flight to Mumbai...instead...
Crazy wasn’t it... !!!
City of Mumbai ... the heavily congested Ariel view gives me a heart attack... as I always feel that I will defiantly crash into the sprawling 'Dharavi'... that almost rise from beside the runway...
at the airport...I got to know that my flight to Kolkata was delayed... so what could I do.. but SHOP!!!!
I left the Santcruz airport & went to Juhu beach... took a horse cart ride there....up to Feroz Khan's Bungalow....
The cart driver realizing he had a new comer, fleeced me!!!
I, then went off to Linking Road.. got a little ‘crazzzzzy’ with so many shops.. I was kind of spoilt for choices...
(Took A DEEP breath...) but restrained myself to buying only 2 pairs of beautiful sandals & a belt for my brother dear...
I had lunch in a small restaurant...and headed back to the airport...
The rest of the journey was unexciting... the flight took off at the time mentioned...
I always love to see the ariel view of MY city of Joy... its so refershingly GREEN... quite a sharp contrast to the much browner landscape of Udaipur, Delhi or a overpopulated Mumbai...
THIS... Folks, was HOMECOMING!!!