Jaipur (part III)
I'm reconsidering my motivations for trying to save money by staying in the cheapest places I can get. The first night in Agra set a very low bar, which I seem to have taken upon to be the standard to meet. It's as if I'm trying to challenge myself to do things the most difficult way possible, just to prove to that I can. Those at home might know that I do this a lot in my regular daily life too. It's good for expanding your limits, but obviously is way more exhausting. I'm feeling that deliberately putting myself into a position of deprivation because I think that's somehow the best, most impressive way to do things, may be attracting the kind of energy resonant with that kind of intention. I'm not comfortable with the attention I've been getting from some of the hotel staff, and other guests as well. There's a fellow who's been trying to lasso me into conversation with him, and within 15 seconds of meeting him, I got the creeps. Again, traveling is making me a lot more sensitive to my intuitions. When at home, I have a lot more energy to allow some interaction with people who I'm not at all interested in engaging with, but here and now, I have no reserve for that kind of thing.
All this to say that my next stop will probably include nicer accommodations.
***
Manoj, the driver that Nelson and Vitoria have hired helps me to book a bus ticket to Udaipur tonight! I'll be experiencing non ac sleeper car for 9 hours. We'll see!
In the car, stopped at a jam, a woman bearing a baby with snot dripping from his nose taps in the window for money. This happens a lot. Nelson asks if he should give something, and Manoj replies "No, this is just a business."
Turns out Nelson and Victoria will be going to Udaipur as well tonight, so we will meet up there again, and I will take them out to dinner! (once I find a place to stay)
***
We drive up a windy, dusty road up to monkey temple. Two dead cows lie by the side of the road, flies buzzing around their rotting bodies.
The temple is huge, beautiful, and built into the side of a mountain, home to 2000 monkeys, countless pigeons, and purportedly 3 leopards.
Our guide (we couldn't shake him from the entrance, then he charged us 500 rs at the end of his rather irritating tour) proclaimed himself as monkey master. I internally shake my head at this. Monkeys are too smart to have a master. And there are too many of them to imagine that you could exert any sort of influence over them. As he was proudly boasting this self proclaimed title while taunting a group of monkeys with peanuts from a bag, one of them gets close as the others jump at the peanuts in his hand, and quickly snatches the bag away from his other hand and runs off with it. I told you so, monkey master. Don't ever fuck around with monkeys.
***
At the hotel, puppeteers put on a little show. The oldest of three brothers is 15 and wants to talk to me. I'm pretty curt with my answers as I have been with all who seem interested in me, because inevitably they want to sell me something, or take me some place. But this boy seems more mild mannered than others and we chat for a bit. He tells me he never tries to impose anything on anyone, and that respect is the most important thing.
Somehow though, I end up buying something I have no interest in, mainly out of a gently implied guilt trip ("we do not go to school ma'am, we only do puppets"). There was something so subtle about this, but I ended up feeling manipulated into it, and came out of it not very happy. There is a lesson for me from this. Watching that words match actions. And that I make sure I'm clear about my bottom line.



