Shopping in Jaipur

Baba the Jeweler and his happy brother

Fire Pit by Pool - cool evening

Ruby, Emerald and Diamonds help the local economy

Dinner: Naan, Rice Pulio, Chicken Murg, Indian Wine

Lock to our room

Dinner in the Courtyard

This was our first full day in Jaipur. The Literary Festival starts tomorrow. We knew our driver Vijay from previous trips. He feels like family to us. We are very happy he will be with us for all of our time in Rajasthan. I try to read the Hindi signs and he is constantly correcting me. It is the only way to learn.

Jaipur is chocked full of tourists right now. The Pink City has just played host to the President of India and now this event is about to start. The Literary Festival starts tomorrow, so we have a free day.

This is going to be our shopping day. I thought I needed to buy a new SIM card for my India phone, but amazingly, my old SIM card is still active and I have lots of money left on it. Unlike America, you but a phone and then buy a SIM card  with a certain amount of money worth of calls on it. There is no monthly bill. When you have nearly used up your cards value, you purchase more value and it is added to your SIM card.

It turns out it is VERY difficult now for a foreigner in India to buy a SIM Card. Passport, Visa and photos are required. We went through a maze of problems assuming my old SIM card wouldn’t work, until we discovered it was fine. The Gods of Telecom were with us.

The first stop we planned to make was to see Baba, the Jewelry maker. A friend of ours in Silver Lake, had a friend who had bought Jewelry from Baba and was very happy. The name / number of Baba was passed on to us. We also had Baba’s address. It was of no assistance to us. In a very Indian thing, our driver called Baba from our car. A man on Motorcycle appeared shortly, and guided us to Baba’s. This is not at all unusual, because roads aren’t well marked and all is confusing.

Baba sells gems. Rather then being in a jewelry store buying finished necklaces, rings, etc. you select gems from loose stones. Once you have a stone you like you work with Baba to decide how it is to be set. It is a fun process and we spent 4 hours looking, learning, negotiating and buying. I am glad we had plenty of time.

As we finally left Baba, a guy on a motorcycle offered to lead us to a textile shop. We weren’t up to it, and said no thanks. For what ever reason, we changed our minds and signal to him we will go to the shop. It turned out to be lucky for us, the store had all kinds of throws, rugs, bedspreads, etc. Each was more interesting then the previous. The owner asked me if I was interested in a vest, and I said sure, what do you have. He took me into another reason where they have bolts of fabrics. Long story short, I bought a custom suit. This suit will be totally tailored to me, from scratch. Total cost $ 350. Amazing.

We then drove to the Digge Palace to get our registration completed for the festival that starts tomorrow, but the place was in chaos as they prepared for the hoards. It all starts tomorrow. We returned to the Samode Haveli for drinks by the pool and a wonderful dinner of  Daal, Rice Pilaf, Tandoori Chicken, roti and dessert.

By the way the bright star by the Moon is Jupiter. I looked it up today!