Omelette makers
There's a famous rivalry between the two omelette-stand operators just outside the old market in Jodhpur. One of them, a man of about 60 with henna'd hair, got a Lonely Planet writeup that called his business, then a regular food stand, 'the Omelette Shop'. In response to demand, he stopped selling everything but omelettes. He had 'Lonely Planet Recommended' painted across the top of the stand, got his clippings mounted, and talked to Reuters about how the review had changed his life. Across the way is a young upstart who set up his own omelette stand and is more aggressively charming with the tourists. According to Reuters, they don't get along. I mention all this 1) because of the amazing effects of one sentence from a Lonely Planet writer who was too lazy to get the name or type of the original business right; and 2) in case anyone needs an idea for a screenplay.
Banana sellers
In the same little square as the omelette makers, there's an old man in sunglasses who sits cross-legged on a wooden cart between a pile of melons and a pile of bananas. Every day I'm in Jodhpur, I ask him for two bananas, and every day he slices off three as if by accident, makes a little 'whoops' gesture, weighs them in an ancient balance scale, and carefully picks out the correct amount from the handful of change I hold out. If I worked for Lonely Planet, I'd make him famous as the operator of the tiniest, most endearing scam in India (the old 'extra banana' dodge).
Middle-aged men
Quite a lot of the middle-aged men in Jodhpur henna their hair. My host says it's because it's cooling in summer, but that middle-aged men also do it to hide their gray. Adding henna to white hair turns it a shocking orange colour. I passed one grumpy and dignified-looking man of about 60 with orange hair who was also wearing a bright purple t-shirt that said 'Don't Play Weak Shit'.
Tuktuk drivers (also, cattle)
I took a tuktuk to the fort and back. On the way up, the driver stopped to show me his scrapbook, suggested some other places he could take me, and asked if I wanted to buy any Viagra. On the way back, he slowed down to try to convince a western woman to get in, explaining afterwards that it was for my sake, because she was a good height for me. Then he killed the engine and coasted all the way down the hill, swerving serenely around potholes, donkeys, kids on bicycles, other tuktuks, and cows. The cows make way for no one. The more I see of them, the more I think some of them just have bad attitudes. They've been living in the city too long, and are less a herd than a kind of bovine street gang.
Sellers of mysterious goods
On the main drag that runs through Jodhpur just outside the old city, I think I see a supermarket through a tinted window, and walk in. It turns out to be something else; there are bolts of cloth on shelves, but also bottles of something, and some other things I can't identify. There are four sleepy old men sitting around inside, and they all turn to watch me. I try to figure out what it is they're selling, hoping I'll then be able to behave in the way someone who was interested in that sort of thing would behave. I fail to do any of this, make a halfhearted show of looking around, and slink out. I have an idea that, as well as carbon offsets, I should be able to buy general tourism offsets -- you pay a certain amount of money, and someone is hired to go where you were and not behave like an idiot.
Alcohol vendors
I saw an 'English Wine and Beer Shop', and bought a bottle of Indian (Maharashtran) Shiraz. It cost an amazing 655 rupees. I had to keep reminding myself that this is only $12. In India, 500 rupee bills are too big to be used easily. 655 rupees will get you a couple of nights in a cheap hotel, 5 to 10 meals in restaurants, 65 large bottles of water, around 300 bananas (ask for 200), or something over 30 omelettes on toast. It's very nasty wine -- murky and strangely spicy.
Shoppers
The streets just outside the old market are a bit quieter than others. They're also so full of bright colours -- saris, street signs, spices, paint, hair -- that everywhere else I've ever been seems drab. Every now and then, set back from the street, you can see the upper floors of some beautiful old building that's been swallowed up by plywood shops like a ruin by the jungle. The shops, which are still tiny and tightly packed, sell everything an Indian family needs. There's amazingly little overlap between what an Indian family needs and what I would buy at home; mostly because people in Jodhpur actually cook their own food from basic ingredients and maintain homes and livestock, while I buy mostly prepared food and get the shakes if I can't get good wireless access.
There's a famous rivalry between the two omelette-stand operators just outside the old market in Jodhpur. One of them, a man of about 60 with henna'd hair, got a Lonely Planet writeup that called his business, then a regular food stand, 'the Omelette Shop'. In response to demand, he stopped selling everything but omelettes. He had 'Lonely Planet Recommended' painted across the top of the stand, got his clippings mounted, and talked to Reuters about how the review had changed his life. Across the way is a young upstart who set up his own omelette stand and is more aggressively charming with the tourists. According to Reuters, they don't get along. I mention all this 1) because of the amazing effects of one sentence from a Lonely Planet writer who was too lazy to get the name or type of the original business right; and 2) in case anyone needs an idea for a screenplay.
Banana sellers
In the same little square as the omelette makers, there's an old man in sunglasses who sits cross-legged on a wooden cart between a pile of melons and a pile of bananas. Every day I'm in Jodhpur, I ask him for two bananas, and every day he slices off three as if by accident, makes a little 'whoops' gesture, weighs them in an ancient balance scale, and carefully picks out the correct amount from the handful of change I hold out. If I worked for Lonely Planet, I'd make him famous as the operator of the tiniest, most endearing scam in India (the old 'extra banana' dodge).
Middle-aged men
Quite a lot of the middle-aged men in Jodhpur henna their hair. My host says it's because it's cooling in summer, but that middle-aged men also do it to hide their gray. Adding henna to white hair turns it a shocking orange colour. I passed one grumpy and dignified-looking man of about 60 with orange hair who was also wearing a bright purple t-shirt that said 'Don't Play Weak Shit'.
Tuktuk drivers (also, cattle)
I took a tuktuk to the fort and back. On the way up, the driver stopped to show me his scrapbook, suggested some other places he could take me, and asked if I wanted to buy any Viagra. On the way back, he slowed down to try to convince a western woman to get in, explaining afterwards that it was for my sake, because she was a good height for me. Then he killed the engine and coasted all the way down the hill, swerving serenely around potholes, donkeys, kids on bicycles, other tuktuks, and cows. The cows make way for no one. The more I see of them, the more I think some of them just have bad attitudes. They've been living in the city too long, and are less a herd than a kind of bovine street gang.
Sellers of mysterious goods
On the main drag that runs through Jodhpur just outside the old city, I think I see a supermarket through a tinted window, and walk in. It turns out to be something else; there are bolts of cloth on shelves, but also bottles of something, and some other things I can't identify. There are four sleepy old men sitting around inside, and they all turn to watch me. I try to figure out what it is they're selling, hoping I'll then be able to behave in the way someone who was interested in that sort of thing would behave. I fail to do any of this, make a halfhearted show of looking around, and slink out. I have an idea that, as well as carbon offsets, I should be able to buy general tourism offsets -- you pay a certain amount of money, and someone is hired to go where you were and not behave like an idiot.
Alcohol vendors
I saw an 'English Wine and Beer Shop', and bought a bottle of Indian (Maharashtran) Shiraz. It cost an amazing 655 rupees. I had to keep reminding myself that this is only $12. In India, 500 rupee bills are too big to be used easily. 655 rupees will get you a couple of nights in a cheap hotel, 5 to 10 meals in restaurants, 65 large bottles of water, around 300 bananas (ask for 200), or something over 30 omelettes on toast. It's very nasty wine -- murky and strangely spicy.
Shoppers
The streets just outside the old market are a bit quieter than others. They're also so full of bright colours -- saris, street signs, spices, paint, hair -- that everywhere else I've ever been seems drab. Every now and then, set back from the street, you can see the upper floors of some beautiful old building that's been swallowed up by plywood shops like a ruin by the jungle. The shops, which are still tiny and tightly packed, sell everything an Indian family needs. There's amazingly little overlap between what an Indian family needs and what I would buy at home; mostly because people in Jodhpur actually cook their own food from basic ingredients and maintain homes and livestock, while I buy mostly prepared food and get the shakes if I can't get good wireless access.
