Desert Days

Our next stop after Kerala was the state of Gujarat in western India. We didn’t have any particular reason for going there, it just sort of became the plan after we found a couple cool activities we wanted to do. To get there from Kerala we spent 36 hours on the train rolling northward, and finally disembarked in Ahmedabad. And wow - for the first time in India, the air temperature was actually comfortable. It had even been downright chilly as Julia stood near the open train door and watched the landscape go by just before dawn. Little fires speckled the roadsides with people gathered around them for warmth, and some demonic looking industrial orange flares shone in the distance.

Ahmedabad itself was a rather uncharming and smoggy city. We spent most of the morning in our hotel room sleeping off the train ride exhaustion, listening to an endless cascade of muffled honks from the street below. Ahmedabad definitely had a more run down feel than Chennai, and especially more so than relatively well-off Kerala. Here we were approached by the first child beggar and saw our first rat in India, two things that we had remarkably not yet experienced. On the train coming into town we also had seen more clusters of tent and shack residences than before, their inhabitants living in makeshift shelters.

Nevertheless, Ahmedabad was intriguing, our first window into a new region of India. Our hotel was fine, and we were even surprised to find 2 other Western couples there, the only others we saw in Ahmedabad. By midday we were hungry and ready to venture out for lunch. Although the Air Quality Index was in the 160s like Chennai, it felt worse, more wheezey and cough-inducing. So Julia put on an N95 face mask, and along with earplugs she was fully outfitted and sufficiently protected from the world to venture out on a walk with Colby to “Gopi Dining Hall” for lunch. (Funny note, we also ran into the two aforementioned tourist couples at this restaurant. Ah, the coincidences of all picking the restaurant listed in Lonely Planet). Here, we tried out the famous Gujarati Thali, the sumptuous unlimited multi-component meal: Vegetable dishes, legume dishes, curry soup, fried veg patties, rice, chutneys, crisp papadum, chapatti, and another fried bread puff, and a funky sweet sauce. It was a lot, and the waiters would keep piling on more food until you told them to stop! The thali was delicious, while being entirely different from some of the wonderful South Indian thalis we have had. Gujarati food is known far and wide for how sweet it is. That being the baseline, our puddingy desserts were so sweet that even Colby couldn’t eat them. The thali is also often accompanied with a glass of buttermilk. Our afternoon was spent digesting in a happy food coma.

Onward to Bhuj

The stunning scenery

After our one night layover in Ahmedabad, we were eager to move on to our actual destination: the city of Bhuj, a seven hour train ride westward across the arid scrubland of Gujarat. We blearily pulled ourselves out of bed at 5:30 am and headed back to the train station in the predawn darkness and chill. As the sun came up and the city stretched out, we rolled past mile after mile of tired-looking apartment blocks and cookie cutter rows of square houses, skirted with shantytowns propped up precariously in the strip of trash mounds between the train tracks and the main road. These homes are constructed by covering a frame of sticks and poles with layers of tarp, sometimes covered by a corrugated metal roof held on with bricks or tires. And even more rudimentary, some were simply A-frame tarps. Lots of people gathered around their fires, crouching next to them trying to keep their hands warm, or cooking, or lounging about, coming and going. All around were strings of laundry hanging up to dry, pots and pans and water jugs and cots scattered around, but not many other possessions. It was astonishing and saddening to see the poverty and piles of trash. There is something wrong with a society and economy that forces people into these situations. Living with just the bare necessities in a rural situation is one thing, but this urban setting seemed like a big step down in quality of life. Of course, the housing in Gujarat was by no means all shanties; they were greatly outnumbered by many rows of smooth squarish 2 story concrete houses as well as more fancy places too.

In Bhuj

Eventually the city gave way to desert scrubland with many farm fields. Clusters of people, mostly women, were crouched in the fields working, their bright multicolored clothing flapping in the wind. The landscape was sparsely populated, with only the occasional hut or tent area. But for how isolated it felt, it was mystifying how many people were out and about: walking down the parallel train tracks, hanging out in random dirt clearings, waiting for the train to pass so that they could cross from seemingly nowhere to nowhere, traversing the vast network of dirt paths among the endless landscape of big farm fields and scrubland. Where was everyone going? We also noticed, curiously, that squatting seems to be one of the preferred resting postures in Gujarat (no, not pooping, just crouching as they rested. All over the place!). As we passed through the cities and towns we peered down the dusty streets, with dogs and cows and goats and pigs and kids running around.

Gujarat is also a very industrial state so there were enormous warehouses and factories scattered across the landscape for much of the journey. The nearby highway was busy with cargo trucks carrying heavy loads of salt, concrete, etc. For how remote the landscape looked, it was almost constantly crisscrossed with enormous towers of power lines. It was kind of depressing looking, like an industrial wasteland. As we travelled through the landscape Julia was thinking “maybe this is why Lonely Planet says Gujarat is mostly overlooked by tourists.”

Dhrangadhra market

In India we have also noticed how a lot of the work that is done by machines in the United States is here done by hand. Small old tractors are used for plowing, but most of the hoeing, weeding, planting, and harvesting is done by hand, even in the big farm fields. People walked through the fields scattering white mineral fertilizer by hand, or sometimes spraying pesticides from a backpack sprayer wearing sandals and no protection. The farm fields in Gujarat looked like they were mainly commodity fields (such as cotton) worked by farmworkers, rather than diverse plots owned by the farmers themselves. We later learned from our homestay host that many people grow cotton and other water-hungry crops because they are more profitable on the market than more locally adapted plants; the irrigation of these crops has been irreversibly lowering the water table and soon there won’t be enough water left. Little settlements popped up around the farms, and around other work as well: railroad construction areas, brick ovens, salt mines, etc. Life looked so hard, endless work for little gain. Of course, a greater reliance on machines isn’t the solution to this. Instead, reimagining the way our economy and society works seems like it might offer more hope.

Goats on the 4 lane

When we got to Bhuj we stepped out of the train station and were immediately swarmed by tuk tuk drivers. It was annoying to be closely followed with echoes of “Which hotel?” “Where do you want to go?” “Tuk tuk, very cheap!” It is easy to get grouchy at people for not leaving us alone; but throughout India there has been this constant vibe of many people just trying to get by, so in a way you can sympathize with their forwardness. After walking around ignoring the drivers for long enough we came back to choose our own non-pestering driver. Then we were off, winding our way through the narrow, sunny, dusty streets across town. With the dust, Bhuj had a little more of a Wild West feel. We were pretty much way out at the end of the train line, on the edge of the village-speckled scrublands that morph into Pakistan after 80 miles. Most of the store signs along the road were written in the Gujarati script, and most of the food places were small sketchy-looking street stalls. We both had this feeling of, “What are we doing here? Where in the world have we found ourselves?”

A Fabulous Homestay

Despite this initial reaction to Bhuj, our wonderful homestay and adventures over the next few days turned it all around. With Google Maps we successfully pointed the tuk tuk driver to the homestay, and were welcomed by the family: Kuldip and Ankita, a young married couple with a 4 year old son, plus Kuldip’s parents and grandmother. According to tradition, when Ankita married she moved into Kuldip’s household. Four generations all under one roof - what a community! The homestay was located on a quiet edge of town, in a nice neighborhood of houses constructed after the 2001 earthquake destroyed much of the city and killed 15,000 people. Therefore, most of the houses in Bhuj were fresh and new, many with beautiful modern design details and nice style. Seeing the neighborhoods all newer than 17 years old was a constant reminder of the earthquake, still a big part of the local psyche.

We were tired and hungry from the train ride, and Ankita welcomed us into their backyard to sit down. The backyard was a bed of smooth clean sand bordered with trees and plants. Throughout India it has been very rare to find any bright green turf. As we sat in the shade with the perfect air temperature, wiggling our toes in the sand, Ankita whipped up a lunch of veggie-lentil-rice curry and chapatis for us. After so much rich restaurant food, it was great to have something similar to what we would cook for ourselves. Over lunch we got to know Ankita a bit: She studied English literature and is working at home right now taking care of their son and homestay, as well as personal passions of henna art and clothing designing. Meanwhile, Kuldip is a guide introducing people to the local textiles.

In the afternoon we went for a walk to explore the neighborhood, since we always like to orient ourselves in a new place. After almost suffocating in the heat and humidity of South India, we appreciated Bhuj even more: radiant sun in a cleanish blue sky, dry breeze, warm in the sun and cool in the shade. For probably the first time in India, walking down the street was actually a pleasure. The street was wide and quiet, bathed in golden afternoon light, and a perfect temperature. Walking down it gave us a real sliver of joy. Simple delights!

Beyond the weather, we also quickly fell in love with the fact that, since Bhuj is really not a tourist town, we were actually able to say hi and interact with people without feeling that they were only trying to hook our attention in order to sell us something. They actually just wanted to wave and say hi, exchange introductions, nothing more! That was a freeing pleasure as well, not to have to be so closed off for personal survival. We chatted with a group of friends from the engineering college. We sat with some kids playing with puppies. We posed for photos with a group of women who waved us over as we walked by. We passed by a group of boys playing cricket in a quiet back field. At the end of our walk, someone at the little farmyard across the road invited us to come say hi to their horses. All this fun on just a short evening stroll! On the other side, being in a non tourist town meant that we were even more of a stare-worthy, head-turning spectacle than normal. We definitely did not blend in.

We enjoyed more walks like this over the next couple days. We have found that just walking around the streets can be as much fun as seeing the “sights.” The next day on our walk, we ventured into two Hindu temples, one small and one large, where we were warmly welcomed and shown around by the attendants. At the larger temple, the attendant showed us how to do the circuit. In a particular order, you visit each statue or shrine for a particular ritual, which most often involved touching the figure's feet and then touching your forehead with your hands in a prayer position. We imagine touching the feet shows respect or supplication. We followed after him and mimicked his movements to his approval, all the while marveling at the grandeur of the temple.

After our walk we returned home and joined the family in their living room for an epic lunch cooked by Kuldip’s mother - vegetable and potato curries, sweet dal soup, rice, chapatis fresh off the griddle. Their family eats wonderful food from scratch at every meal, from vegetables bought fresh at the market. We ate most meals with them during our stay and enjoyed learning what Gujarati home-cooked food is like (amazing, to be specific!). One night, dinner was hearty millet pan bread to dip in a thick creamy curry made with chickpea flour. They also broke us out of our muesli-and-yogurt breakfast rut by serving things like idli (steamed fermented rice cakes) with homemade cilantro chutney and a chili-garlic paste. Throughout our stay, we slurped up mugs of masala chai, spicy and aromatic with fresh grated ginger. Back at home we will not use chai teabags again.

Exploring Bhuj

Aina Mahal

One morning we had the entertainment of standing on the rooftop watching a big crowd gathered down the road to hear the election results. There was a big election in Gujarat which we had been reading about in the papers for weeks. We stood and watched the dense cluster of a few thousand people outside the engineering college with drums and loudspeakers and cheering. Lots of police were stationed all around in case things got out of hand, but all went well. We didn’t have much context or knowledge, but it was still interesting to see what electoral hubbub looks like in another country.

The next day we psyched up to leave the neighborhood and went into central Bhuj for some sightseeing. The sun was bright and the streets were loud but it did not disappoint! First we visited the Aina Mahal, an opulent palace from the 1750s. Although it was showing its age, it was still marvelously full of over-the-top decorations, sculpted stone work, mirrors, stained glass, embroidered tapestries, and stone carvings. Its almost oppressive showiness reminded us of some of the elaborate churches we saw in Europe, just completely decadent. As we mentioned before, the big earthquake in 2001 destroyed or damaged many of the buildings in Bhuj including many of the historic buildings (you could still see collapsed rubble in some open lots). Therefore, the building was in some state of crumbling disrepair, but still impressive.

Next we visited a small folk art museum where we spent a long time gazing at the insanely intricate and spectacular local crafts: embroidery, beadwork, block printing fabrics, appliqué, and pottery. Perhaps the sparseness of the desert landscape subconsciously encourages people to make up for it with extra pizzazz in the colors and patterns of their crafts. The displays made Julia excited about getting back into crafts and eager to have a permanent space of our own to decorate. Next stop was the show-stopping white marble Swaminarayan Temple constructed after the earthquake destroyed the historic one. Gorgeous!

Swaminarayan temple

The streets of Bhuj again had a different feel from places we had been before. It had the highest street cow population density yet. We were curious: what do all these cows eat? Besides picking through trash, many people (including our hosts) put out dishes of leftover food scraps, a perfect urban composting scheme. In the central city we passed a boy walking down the street holding a newborn calf - right in the middle of a city of 150,000! We feasted our eyes on the colors of a long vegetable market lined up along one of the main roads, as well as the colors of the women’s decorative dresses. And wow, the streets are dusty. Finally, no busy street in India lacks the ear-shattering horns honking! People don’t only have lame single-tone horns, they also have ones that make different short simple melodies in order to be more noticeable amidst the din. Or maybe just for fun. In any case, we were happy to get back to our quieter residential neighborhood. Noise pollution is actually starting to gain notice as a public health concern in India.

One evening, Kuldip drove us to a hill outside of town, which we scrambled up to watch the perfect red orb of the sun set over the desert. After so much time in lush tropical South India, being in a new environment got us thinking about what kind of place we would like to live. Thanks to the UK Julia knows that being cold and wet makes her irremediably miserable and depressed. We have also learned that Colby gets magnificently crabby and snappy when he is too hot. Colby likes forests and bodies of water. Julia likes those too, but also felt very fond of Kuldip’s corner of Bhuj: dry air, beautiful temperature, open spaciousness of the desert, friendly streets, open doorways, people socializing outside, the ease of indoor-outdoor living. Another thing we both really like about India is how there aren’t things like K-Marts and Cub foods and gas stations all through the neighborhoods. It is more human sized, more real, more peopled, more personal. Although there is trash scattered everywhere, something about the scene doesn’t pull up the same angst you get when driving around the streets in the US, where you feel the decay of society, isolation, and consumerism. In a way, although there is less material wealth it seems to be higher quality here in some ways.

All too soon it was the last night of our stay, and Ankita offered to decorate Julia’s arm with henna. She made up the design as she went, getting into the creative flow with all sorts of beautiful loops and swirls. As we talked with Ankita, we were surprised to learn that she and Kuldip had an arranged marriage. Their families took them to meet each other for a few hours, they liked each other, and that was it. It surprised us, because what we knew of Kuldip’s family seemed relatively well off, educated, and connected with the wider world, so we assumed they had chosen each other. But that was just an assumption, and reminded us that many cultures still are very different beneath a surface that may look similar. Anyway, Ankita had more choice than her sisters, who didn’t even see their husbands until the wedding! We were also surprised to learn that Ankita is only 2 months older than Colby. Although her face looks young she had a strong and lively presence helping run the household and felt more like a mother figure than an almost-peer to us.

Temple ritual of pouring water

Our 4 night stay with Kuldip’s family in Bhuj was one of the highlights of our trip so far. It was fun to be in the homestay but also a little awkward. Although Kuldip speaks great English, communication with Ankita and Kuldip’s mother was a little confusing and there was always that stress of not entirely knowing what was happening. We always felt like we were intruding on their life by walking through their house. For instance, coming downstairs for tea we would pass through the darkened back room with Kuldip’s mother and grandmother taking their afternoon nap on the bed. It would be strange to have fresh batches of strangers constantly cycling through your family home, but the norms around personal space and privacy must be different than in the US. Anyway, the homestay was one of the most engaging and wonderful places we have stayed. They were truly lovely people, and Julia was reluctant to leave.

Wild Ass Sanctuary

Fortunately our next stop was lovely as well, an ecotourism camp on the edge of Gujarat’s Wild Ass Sanctuary, at 5000 square kilometers the biggest wildlife sanctuary in India. But wait, the first challenge was getting there. We would be picked up by Jeep in the nearby towns of Halwad or Dhrangadhra, along the road halfway between Bhuj and Ahmedabad. How would we get to one of those towns? We had swung by the Bhuj bus station a few days before trying to scope out our prospects, but left disheartened after facing the scene: inscrutable posters in Gujarati, a dusty field of half disintegrating buses, and a tiny ticket counter that looked unable and probably even less willing to help us. Fortunately there was a private bus company in town called Patel which Ankita kindly called for us and arranged in the Gujarati language, since we hadn’t had much luck when we called them in English. And so, we were saved.

Birds at the Wild Ass Sanctuary

After hugging goodbye to the family, we took a tuk tuk across town to Patel Travels and settled in to our shiny AC Volvo bus for the 4 hour bus ride. Besides occasionally glancing up at the gaggingly overdone and completely over-the-top Bollywood movie to which we were subjected, we spent most of the time watching the rather uninspiring landscape pass by. For all of the exotic glamour that people write about regarding their travels in India, you also see that 95% of it is far less scenic. Lumber yards, salt factories, auto repair shops, construction materials factories, with their tall thin pipes trailing a thin trace of black smoke into the sky. The street scenes as well get repetitive: carts selling fried snack foods, selling tea, crowded little shops, run down buildings, hotels, blocky cement houses, lots of men lounging in groups around their motorbikes, women and kids coming and going, laundry hanging to dry, stray dogs and cows, colorful fragments of trash caught in all the nooks and crannies, concrete walls painted with bright cement advertisements, yellow tuktuks, disorganized power lines, dust, clothing shops, produce vendors, people everywhere… a scene that repeats itself over and over in any town you go through. Most of life is pretty run of the mill, a fact that the guidebooks don’t fully make you realize.

Our hut couch

Eventually we stepped off the bus in the town of Halwad, which had even more of a Wild West feel than Bhuj. Indeed, we weren’t in Kerala any more: Halwad has only 50% female literacy. The popular local form of transport were these jacked up 3 wheel contraptions with deafeningly loud engines and room in back for a bunch of people to pile in. Anyway, we were grateful that we seamlessly connected with our ride who was waiting for us in an open Jeep style vehicle. We hopped right in and out of reach of a woman beggar with a baby who was following us, and settled in for the hour long ride to Eco Tour Camp. We jiggled our way down mostly 1 lane (but paved!) rural roads.

Blue Bull / Nilgai

Eventually we arrived to the camp on the edge of the vast Wild Ass Sanctuary. When night fell we were surrounded by pitch black on all sides. We had let our parents know they wouldn’t be getting our nightly emails for a few days. But still, unfailingly - full cell signal! We had to laugh. We can’t stop marveling how different it is now than the days when our parents were traveling. Anyway, we stayed at the Eco Tour camp for 3 nights. The owner, Devjibai, grew up in the area and his middle aged sons do the wildlife safaris. We also enjoyed the company of an amicable young helper from a nearby village, who served us tea and meals and had picked up some good English. The food and accommodations were simple and comfortable, and it was a very pleasant place to spend a few days. As our first night fell, the desert air grew cool and we cozied into our hut listening to crickets chirping and wild dogs yowling, hoping the geckos wouldn’t climb into our bed.

The next day was our big safari day. As the sun first peeked over the horizon we climbed into the back of the Jeep along with one other Dutch tourist, the nippy desert air mixing with the smell of an incense stick burning on the dashboard, with Vijay as the guide. We drove on and on into the sanctuary, some areas peppered with shrubs and grasses, others completely bare dirt. Right away we spotted some Nilgai (“blue bulls”), big strange creatures that look like a cross between an antelope and a cow.

Wild Asses

Throughout the day we also spotted lots and lots of the wild asses. There are about 5,000 of them total, and this sanctuary is the only place in the world where they live. Julia felt very fond of them. Peaceful, sweet, and very calm creatures, just standing completely still staring out at the desert, or nibbling on the low vegetation. They were easy to find and didn’t have the dashing, rare excitement of things like tigers or elephants. But Julia resonated with their steadfast, passive, and contented-looking nature. They were cute.

Flamingos (only a small percentage of them!)

Next, we approached a far-off shallow lake with enormous colonies of flamingos. However, the guide said it was too muddy to drive closer and we would have to get out and walk if we wanted to get closer. So we eagerly pulled off our boots and squelched our way closer to the flamingos. We relishing the feel of the salty mud clinging to our feet, though it was difficult to walk, as if wading through deep snow or sand. The sound of the flamingos was otherworldly, just that constant stream of noisy flickering melody like the seabird colonies in Shetland. When a portion of them decided to take off, it made a whoosh that we could hardly believe: was that really wings?

Old Flamingo Nests

Next Vijay drove onward across the beds of fantastically cracked, dried up dirt for miles and miles into the heart of the desert. Where the heck were we going? How in the world did he navigate? What if the car broke down?  It was like being on a boat in the middle of an ocean of dirt. Surrounded on all sides with an expanse of nothingness, we wondered: what wildlife could be here? But finally, many miles in, some rows of small humps rose out of the flatness: an old colony of flamingo nests. During the monsoon season the entire area is completely transformed, as the heavy rains turn it into an enormous shallow lake of brackish water. Fish come in from the sea and algae grow. It was almost impossible to imagine this incomprehensibly large expanse of cracked dirt all covered in water! But nevertheless, we saw the evidence: the flamingos rake up these mud piles where they lay their eggs and sit on them. It was a strange sight, feeling like we were in such a desolate and lifeless place, but then imagining all the flamingos. And even now, we could hear the flickers of bird song. A little wasp buzzed by, a dragonfly, another little insect. What could anything possibly be finding to eat? It was remarkable to find any life at all there! It was definitely the most silent place we could find in India. Besides the breath of wind and the occasional birdsong, the overwhelming silence almost rang or pounded in our ears.

Salt Pond

Throughout the day, we also passed many salt ponds. Salt work is the main industry of the villages around the Little Rann of Kutch. Since the groundwater is so salty, they have operations where they pump groundwater up into big rectangular pools out on the barren plains. Then the workers tend it throughout the dry season as it goes through a series of evaporations to get it concentrated into salt that can then be trucked out for industrial purposes. There are about 15,000 salt workers all around here. In fact, our camp owner Devjibai came from a salt worker family. As we drove around, for feeling completely in the middle of nowhere there were actually a fair amount of people buzzing around the vast expanses on their motorbikes, coming and going from their work at the salt ponds. What a bizarre landscape to call your workplace! And what punishing work.

We came back to camp for lunch and a siesta, and in the late afternoon went back out on an evening safari. More blue bulls, more wild asses, plus lots of birds: cormorant, egret, owl, cranes, kestrel, eagle, and a few other birds of prey whose names we didn’t understand or remember, but were still cool! It was fun to sail through the desert with the mild air, wide open landscape, and pretty pastel sky, feeling entirely windswept. It was amazing to see how many creatures could make a living among the seeming scarcity. The next day we relaxed around camp and did some small walks into the sanctuary.

The following day, we gathered our bags and climbed back into the Jeep for the hour and a half ride to the Dhrangadhra train station. Although the Jeep seemed to have been built before shock absorbers were invented, the rest of the ride was beautiful, with the falling afternoon sun washing the scenes around us in golden light. We drove past bird-filled wetlands, tiny villages of farmyards and concrete houses, farm fields, desert bush scrubland, salt flats. We snaked our way through a few groups of cows and goats being herded down the road. Groups of women draped in a rainbow of colors gathered in the streams and ponds to wash clothing. People walked down the roadside carrying big bundles of twiggy firewood or plant matter on their heads. Women balanced shining silver water urns on their heads. And of course we had the familiar feeling of people staring at us with heads turning until we were out of sight. After the long bumpy ride into Dhrangadhra, we boarded the train to our next stop: Bundi, Rajasthan (yes, another unfortunate overnight train ride). Although Gujarat is not a big tourist destination we were certainly glad we had come!