Pushkar - Spiritual oasis in the desert

The entire town is a highlight. The place has a whimsical spiritual air and along with its exotic architeture overlooking Pushkar lake is one of the most gorgeous places you will ever see. Many people come here to experience the spiritual side of India and it is a popular stop with Indian devotees as legend has it that Lord Brahma dropped a petal and formed Pushkar Lake. After a while you will find yourself being caught up in the atmosphere of this intoxicating little town and whether eating a dhal under the watchful eyes of the numerous cows or taking the puja with the pilgrims at the lakes edge - you will fall in love with the town...

Quick Tips:

Once there just simply relax. Accomodation is plentiful and because the streets are so narrow auto-rickshaw harassment is not as prevalent as it is in other Indian cities. Part of the experience is taking the puja on the ghats (lake steps) and once you have your "Pushkar passport" you can wander around unmolested by the pujaris. Accomodation is numerous but only really gets filled up during the November camel fair. Thousands of drovers and buyers come from all over Rajasthan to buy and sell camels. It is meant to be quite a spectacle with acrobats, snake-charmers, musicians, campfires and hundreds and hundreds of camels.

Best Way To Get Around:

In times gone by you would arrive across the Rajasthan desert by camel but now most visitors arrive by bus. There is no direct rail link, so most visitors arrive by bus from the nearest station which is over the mountains in Ajmer.

The best way to move around Pushkar is on foot and you will soon become expert in traversing the narrow lanes and ghats with goats, motorbikes, pilgrims and cows anyway. A note about the cows the only place with more cows in India is Varanasi and each one is holy and harmless. It is quite amusing to be sitting eating a vegetable dhal when a cow comes up and nuzzles you for food. But it is not quite so funny to bump into a brahma bull in the darkness. There is no street lighting in Pushkar and it is like colliding with a sherman tank if you bump into one at night

How can I describe Hotel Oasis? - Paradise really.... Situated only a few steps from the bus station on the way out of town this is one of the bigger, prettier hotels in Pushkar. It stands three stories high and is coloured bright sapphire. It''s rooms are spotless and run from 250 rupee with no air-conditoning, to huge rooms with double bed, crisp air-conditioning, silver mirror, a coffin-like bath and satellite television (800 rupees). My room was like this and was a wonderful place to come back to after the heat of Pushkar Town.

But the highlight had to be the staff. The desk was manned by the twenty-three year old Kailash who fell over backwards to be friendly. The hotel contained a tropical garden and a swimming pool and the first thing you did after exploring the ghats of Pushkar was to strip off and swim in the pool. Whenever there was a break on the reception desk Kailash, too, would strip down to his trunks and join us in the pool. Many a happy afternoon was spent splashing and playing in the pool while brahma bulls bullied their herds outside and camels sitting outside the trekking agencies watched us as if they had seen it all before. The food was excellent and as Pushkar is a strict Hindu town was strictly vegetarian, and after ordering it was amusing to see half an hour later a small boy arrive from the restaurant across the road and the hotel pretend they had cooked it.

One place I dream of going back to is the Oasis Hotel....

"What is your grandmothers name?"

"Francis..."

"She wishes you a long life. Do you wish to bless her?"

"Yes..."

"Throw the flowers onto the lake..."

So I sat barefooted on the stone ghat, feeling faintly ridiculous, with a teenage pujari sitting next to with red kohl smeared on his forehead. All around me were the bathing ghats of Pushkar (see photo). The air was humming with activity - sadhus bathed in the lake, stalls brimmed with birdseed and saried pilgrims shared the ghats with scrawny cows. But I was participating in one of the rituals of India and really felt I was getting close to this fascinating country.

As with most visitors, westerners are approached in Pushkar as soon as they leave their hotels by pujaris. Mostly teenage boys they try and steer visitors to the ghats and persuade them to take the puja. I would recommend this even if you haven't got a spiritual bone in your body, such as I, as you get close to the country and with your Pushkar passport you can wander around the ghats unmolested by the Brahmins and pujaris. We decided to particpate and were herded down to the bird-filth encrusted Varah ghat by our pujari. There we were ordered to take off our shoes and follow him out onto the stone breakwater and crouch down next to him,

He enclosed fifty red rose petals in my hand and asked me to speak the mantra after him. I felt ridiculous but complied, then red powder was poured onto my hands and I had to continue the mantra. Once I had finished I had to throw the rosepetals onto the water, and then my hands were cleaned by a silver bowl and a red dot was drawn on my forehead with kohl. I am now spiritually cleansed; a red and yellow piece of string was tied around my wrist to prove this.

It came as no surprise to be charged 500 rupees for this priveledge, so I pretended to get annoyed and beat him down to 200 rupees. He grumbled that it did not cover the cost of materials (just how much does red powder cost?) but in the end he accepted. I was allowed to put my boots back and was given a little packet of sweet sugar. We spent the rest of the morning wandering around the ghats taking sacrilegous pictures. The entire scene was fascintating; Brahmin priests patrolled the ghats, Indian youths jumped in and out of the water, cows followed each other nose-to-tail along the breakwater and sadhus poured the holy liquid onto their bodies while reciting a mantra.

And then there was the view of Pushkar lake itself, which must be one of the most exotic sights in Asia (see photo). A holy lake for thousands of years and surrounded by the hundreds of domed whitewashed temples and palaces. Each of the temples was built by maharajah's hundreds of years ago so he could have a private puja - they gave the town a stunning facade especially when reflected in the waters of the lake when the sun goes down....

The main lane in Pushkar is the Badi Basti. This is exceptionally narrow and goes back to medieval times. It twists and turns filled with shopkeepers, hippies, pilgrims, donkeys, camels, beggars and pujari's. All overlooked by ornate wooden merchant havelis with wooden brackets. As you trudge through the sand-covered streets India will assault you with its camel-drovers, flies, musicans, holy cows and smell of woodsmoke. If there is a smell to India it is woodsmoke.

At the end of the Badi Basti is the Brahma Mandir. One of the few temples in India dedicated to the creator deity and a mandatory stop on the pilgrimige trail. Before you enter you have to remove your boots and leave them with the chowdikar (old man) and then you enter risking burning your feet on the hot marble. The main sanctuary is open to the air and surrounded on all sides by shrines. An orange tower soars above the temple and a bright blue statue of Brahma stands underneath. It was very moving to watch the devotion of the pilgrims as they rang the holy bell and then kissed the floor.

Afterwards we decided to circumnavigate Lake Pushkar and set off into the narrow lanes. Every couple of yards was a holy cow. These were very sweet and would nudge you for food and if they got in your way you simply tapped them on the head and they move off. The Hindu credo states the sanctity of animal life and the cow is revered above all others. Theologians suspect that this was brought into the Hindu ethos thousands of years ago so that the peasants wouldn't eat their cattle in times of famine. But it extends to all animal life. There used to be crocodiles in Lake Pushkar but the brahmins would not remove them and took puja armed with one eye on the calm water.

We eventually emerged onto a ghat with a spectacular view of the lake (see photo)and its reflection of ivory cupolas, domes and palaces. This was set off by the soaring green Aravalli mountains and a cloudless sky. Nearby we saw a westerner smoking a chillum under a tree. Pushkar is spliff-heaven though not as drug orientated as Manali in the Himalayas. As we traversed the lake we found a breakwater brige surrounded by green meadows. Workers were cutting plants and we couldn't resist asking what they were harvesting - fresh jasmine was the answer.

That evening we found a restaurant on the roof of a hotel called the Moondance cafe. Our table had a sensational view of the rooftops and domes of Pushkar. They were taking final worship at the ghats as we watched and the sound of sitar music wafted up to us. Joining us was a spindly Israeli who had just come back from trekking in the desert. He had mistakenly worn shorts and his legs were burnt to cinders by the sun. He had a wonderful time but suspected the drover of cleaning his cooking pots with camel dung. But we settled back to watch langurs scamper over the rooftops and the sunset wash Pushkar with purple light...