Jaisalmer Fort

16 Oct 2010


Having been disappointed with the previous shirt I had made I decided to give the tailors here a shot. First got hold of some fabric – stripes of course – then started asking around for a tailor. I found one, with plenty of shirts he had made for other people:

More shirts than you can shake a stick at?

The problem came when trying to describe the concept of a double cuff to him. I gave up eventually and found another who was happy to give it a shot. Being more experienced now, managed to get both these shirts for the price of the other one; success!

In the afternoon we decided to do a tour of the fort, which once again included an audio tour. The fort was good but not a great deal different to other forts we had been round (although I’m sure many more trained eyes might disagree!).

Interesting with this for were the defences that were still intact on the walls of the ramparts. I was slightly surprised that some of them hadn’t been removed since they looked as though they might fall down at any moment (like parts of the walls of the fort – due to over development and the explosion of tourism).

Balls on walls!

The entrance to the fort was cleverly designed with two 90 degree turns on the way in. This aimed to slow down an attacking force, allowing time for the defenders to deploy their stone ball defences.

Cunning dog-legged entrance

The Jaisalmer Sate Flag

Wandering back to the hotel we noticed this place which seemed to be the main supplier of water pots for the surrounding area.

Where else would you put your stock?

As with most of India, there are pigs in abundance and Jaisalmer is no different. Just outside the hotel we saw these three picking through the open sewers for something to eat! No wonder they are believed to be unclean!

Pigs being pigs

Another bonus of the tailor here was the speed of turnaround. He made two shirts and had them ready to collect in just 6 hours! There were pretty good too, and most importantly they fitted.

Sweet

 That evening we decided to walk up to the sunset point up above the hotel and look over the city. En route we got a bit lost and ended up walking through a small group of shacks; home to this little girl amongst others. She rushed up to Olivia and introduced herself, then asked to be picked up. We got chatting to her and her family and stayed for about 20 minutes. They were extremely hospitable, even offering us tea and something to eat. Unfortunately we had already eaten by this point but it was nice to be asked.

Having said goodbye to this girl and her family, we rounded the corner only to be mobbed by loads of children. They were all dressed up, presumably for the same festival that we had seen in Jodhpur. They couldn’t get enough of shaking our hands, introducing themselves and taking photographs.

Mobbed

 Once they were satisfied with all the photographs we moved onto meeting family members, hence how I ended up this old boy!

Quite an amusing and unexpected evening’s entertainment!