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Jaisalmer has many many hotels for its small area and population, but heck, the city survives on heritage tourism. There are hotels right in the fort, inside the market, on the outskirts, towards deserts, on highway and one right inside a temple complex!

Mandir Palace / Mandir Mahal / Badal Mahal / Taajiya Mahal : ITC-Welcome Heritage property and one of the better addresses of Jaisalmer since it also happens to be the residence of the Royal Heir-apparent (Maharawal Brij Raj Singh).

We got this info after spending a day and a night there. Mandirpalace is also open to Day Visitors (Rs 20, I guess) to look around and see the temples and very elaborate, expansive and magnificent jaali work. The place is marketed and branded by ITC but is essentially run by King’s staff - polite, not necessarily sophisticated - pretty pleasant.

It is located at Hanuman Chauraha and you can’t miss the Taajiya Towers (also known by this name) or Mandir Palace. The story is that before migrating to Pakistan, some of the Muslim artisans built the tower like the structure for Taajiya processions, some sort of last offering, towards the royal lineage. There is a temple complex inside, and hence the name. It’s a heritage property so all rooms are different.
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In the second week of November 07, Saravanan’s work took him to Bangalore and Gayatri (our 5yr old daughter) and I accompanied him there. He was busy all the days at the exhibition while we savored Bangalore. I think it was a great way to celebrate my birthday! Here’s how we spent it…

Three whole days - Bangalore, Gayatri and me…

The first day was spent in a sight seeing tour of the city in a mini van.. ISKCON temple, Tipu’s Palace, the Bull temple, Vishveshwaraiah’s industrial and technological museum ( science museum from now) and a jungle safari in a van at the Banerghatta national park. Also enjoyable was the ride in the tourist van with Gayatri on my lap cuddled close to my heart. We wanted to visit some of them again, at leisure, the next day.

The second day was charming, fun filled and exciting. Gayatri and me … well I could honestly say, I accompanied Gayatri to the science museum. We had breezed through it during the day tour the previous day. Today, we spent three enchanting hours there… discovering principles of science, building with sponge bricks, assembling Chinese puzzles, playing virtual simulated video games where we were part of the football practice and had to block the balls coming our way! I know that every time I visit Bangalore I am going to visit this museum and head straight for the fun science section on the top floor.

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As you all know, San Francisco Bay Area is pretty much the Desi Capital of the West. With the technology industry relying increasingly on the smarts and sweat of Indian engineers, the flood of migrants and visitors from India continues.

One of the interesting phenomena out here is the out of town visitors that all of us get - and the typical places that we take them out to - to show them the sights and sounds of the bay area. While most of these are perennial favorites with any visitors, as usual Desis tend to be more conventional and congregate even more to the most popular of these places.

Today I’m gonna describe one such trip we made recently, on Sunday, December 30, 2007 when my Uncle, Aunt and Cousin were visiting us from Shanghai. My favorite route takes me from Fremont north on 880 then across the Bay Bridge to my first stop at Treasure Island. As many of you would know, the Bay Bridge connects the East Bay (Oakland) to San Francisco. The bridge consists of two spans with the Treasure Island in the middle. There isn’t much to see on Treasure Island itself, but the views of the San Francisco skyline from the island are spectacular. You can see the Golden Gate Bridge in the background, the infamous Alcatraz (remember “The Rock” starring Sean Connery) prison on an island in the middle of the bay, etc. A tip to budding photographers - since San Francisco is to the West of Treasure Island, the best time to take photographs is in the morning with the Sun behind you. In the afternoon, the glare of sunshine makes it difficult to get good pictures of the city skyline. But then, like my cousin - a serious arts student from Shanghai said - “what’s the point of taking perfect pictures? :-)” so the more creative types amongst you might just relish the challenge.
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It was Wednesday evening when Sourabh came & asked to go out of Delhi on Weekend. Immediately everybody started looking at him & responded yes in a very strange way. This reaction was not due to the short notice for outing but everybody was surprised that he is not going home on the weekend. Without giving any thought to this idea, everybody said Yes & then asked where you want to go? Ultimately Jaipur was selected & we planned to leave early morning of Saturday.

We started at 5:30 from Noida & reached Jaipur at 1:00. Don’t assume that it takes 7.5 Hrs for Jaipur from Noida; this was due to no planning & a part of our luck. Saurabh & Ankur brought Kachoris from Ravat(A shop famous for Pyaz ki Kachori in Jiapur) while we were busy in identifying the right Hotel. We had one piece of kachori & one Dhokla. kachori was really good. Then a local boy managed to convince us for showing a Hotel nearby Bus Stand. In a hurry we decided to book the rooms in the hotel suggested by that boy.

Again without any information we thought of going for shopping & asked an Auto-driver to suggest a good market nearby. He suggested Maharani Market by giving a good reason that this market is famous for Rajasthani things & other markets like Bapu market/Indira markets are normal markets, which are far away from this place. We asked him to take us to the Maharni Market. He dropped us outside a big gate & told to go inside. After few minutes we realized that again someone has made fool of us due to the reason that we had no information. Immediately we came out & took another Auto for Bapu Market. We spent 3 Hrs for exploring Bapu Market/Johri Market/Indira Market/Nehru Market & Sanjay Market. We were thinking of one thing that why there is no market called Rajeev Market??? These markets have a unique style where all the shops are of same size/style. Whole market is very symmetrical & a particular street is known for a specific item. Bapu & Johri Markets are the famous markets. You can find Bedsheets, Jaipuri Maharani Saris, Jaipuri Quilts, dupattas, bandhni suits, Rajasthani pagaris etc. As the name is telling, Johri Market is famous for Jewellery.

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