or, the phenomenon where you’ve NEVER had that feeling before!!! (sorry, my favorite George Carlin joke). Anyway, it’s really deja vu when, after concluding an inspiring historical tour of a thousand-year-old-or-more monument, you are whisked into a side room full of fabrics, offered tea and given a shpiel you’ve heard at least 3 times in the past 3 days, with assistants in tw to roll out the different pieces in eye-battingly rapid successsions.

Difference between the wall hanging biz here and the carpet biz in Turkey? It’s Indian “chai” and not apple tea. But the disdain when you say you will think about it is universal.

not that it doesn’t have it’s rightful place…but rajasthan is NOT one of them! This is a land where colors from lapus lazuli and mustard seed stain brushes made of squirrels’ tales and camels’s eyebrows (really, not kidding) to create enduring timeless art. TIme-consuming and awe-inspiring. Adobe, please leave this corner of the earth alone.

Our blissful arrival in Udaipur was jarred a bit by the pyrotechnics of our first evening. Should I be scared? It was with great relief to learn the next day that it was fireworks from a wedding…

Other choice Udaipur sounds you just don’t get in SF:
The Muslim call to prayer five times a day
The beating sound of laundry against the rocks, well-heard from any vantage point across the lake.