The Fair in the Desert

The Pushkar Camel Fair (and reports of New Zealand cousins of Kevin’s) were on the mind as we piled into the Innova ala Rajiv early-ish on Tuesday morning. Pushkar, is a small but very sacred town in the desert famous for hosting the only Brahma temple in the world, a lake, and the already mentioned annual camel fair.   The latter, which attracts thousands of foreign and hundreds of thousands of Indian visitors to the town, is in fact, a traditional agricultural fair.  Horses, mostly pure white or pure black, prance excitedly while being checked out by curious buyers. Purplish sticks of sugarcane find themselves arranged in large and small stacks. Camels, some pulling carts, others saddled up for rides and most, like so many NBA stars, with their hair shaved in geometric patterns laze around the sand dunes looking simultaneously sublimely content and terribly bored.

The drive down took about three hours (including a garden-based lunch at a roadside Indian cafe). Our hotel was situated in the back parts of the outer suburbs of Brahma’s town but proved a very pleasant surprise indeed.  A pool, lots of green gardens and small but pleasant and clean rooms. The water was very HOT in the shower, a very rare happening in this hot land.

After unpacking, the Catos headed off to see the local sights. The Rabes lounged in and beside the pool and had a nice lunch in the warming winter sun.  After lunch the Rabes (one of whom is the principal scribe of his blog) boarded a camel cart drawn by a creature named Moti (Hindi, for Pearl) and driven by a wizened and slightly confused old codger in bright yellow-green turban, named Dewa (Hindi, for god) and set out for the fair.  For 90 minutes they rolled through the rural spaces of Rajasthan in great comfort, under a palanquin set upon two very smooth truck tyres.  

The fair was fun. Just as such things are supposed to be. Gypsy families contorted themselves and navigated high wires. Camel rides for everyone and lots of salty, oily and very sweet snacks offered up for sale next to stalls selling cheap clay or plastic toys, fake blossoms and nasty looking jewelry.  There were lots of touts but none were offensive or too pushy. The Rabes moved among the crowd unhindered except for by the frequent and regular requests for personal information: Country, name, level of personal happiness being experienced at the moment.  

Luckily, they had the wit to get back on the camel cart by 430 as Dewa lost the way at one point and took us through the quarries of Pushkar.  Moti, for her part, got fed up with pulling the damn cart up the slippery sand. Esther, in response to the humped beast’s irritation, cried a bit.  But eventually, as the dark night air turned nippy, we rolled to a stop at the hotel and with the Catos enjoyed some wood-fired pizzas and salads before heading for bed.