14.03.09

We arrived early at our hostel, so had to sleep in the common room until 9.30 a mwhen we could finally check in. The hostel- Pearl Palace- wreally nice- with very clean rooms and a roof top resturant where there was live musicnight. We had a sleep and then went to Janta mantar- which is an observatory with some huge sun dials and star maps carved out of stone. We then saw Hawa mahal- Jaipur's famous Palace wall which was huge and red and intricately carvedith a lot of windows, where in the past the women int he palace could apparantly watch parades int eh streets without being seen. We heard that jaipur had a few bars including a pub- so we decided to make it our mission thatevenming to go out and find them- as we had not been drinking for ages now! We went to Macdonalds first and were approached by a one-handed indian man who spoek good english and seemed quite friendly- calle dIshma. As we got talking he told us he owned a club in Goa and said we should come to see him when we got down there. We said goodbye and Jai our rickshaw driver told us which bars might be best and cheapest for us to go to. We went into the first bar around the corner from Macdonald's- it was a bit more like a restaurant and yet again we were the only women in there-but it would do-as it had cheap vodka! Ishma turned up int he bar as we were drinking and said he knew a good bar we could go to if we wanted- so we said we would for one with him, as he said he was meeting some other foregin friends of his later. The bar was howevere slightly too posh for us and we decided not to drink there. We then went on to another cool bar and met his cousin, but decided aginst going to a disco witht them - as we wanted to get up the next day and weren't too suer about wethere we couldr eally trust t. When we got home we read in our travekl guide book abotu how there were often people who acted over firendly and lured you into thinking that they were just friendly inidans when actually they would eventually 'harm you financially' by getting you to sell and traffic things for them....we then decided we didnt trust Ishma.

Jai was our rickshaw driver fot the day again- he was quite young and nice and it was nice to have a joke with him as we went around the city. He showed us a jain temple, the famous amber fort of Jaipur, a really nice bollywood garden (with lots of fountains and beautiful coloured flower trees) and a moneky temple. This temple was up a v steep hill and you could buy nuts to take up and feed the monkeys with. It had a really good view of the city from htre top and Rhi and i fed a few monkeys on the way around- although some of them were sdlightly scary as they had huge fangs and could be quite agressive- but luckily thry kept their distance! However- just when we thought we had gotten away lightly whilst feeding the animals at the temple- as none had chased us- we heard a galloping of hooves coming down the hill behind us and e saw a bucking goat sprinting in our direction. i screamed and Rhiananon quickly jumped on the 50cm high wall to the edge fo the path- not much protection- but luckily he ran apast and jumped ont eh wall a bit further dfown from us! A close call...the indians seem to be used to the animals and looked at us as if we were mad to be screaming a goat!lol!

On the way back to our hostel we hea our names being called from a car window and Ishma had somehow managed to track us down whilst we were driving through Jaipu. We had to stop to be polite and he said we hsould come to a party that night. We said we would think about and tried to squirm out of it saying we were tired ( as we didnt want him to try and scam us into buying any gemstones or the like). We hoped we wouldnt see him again- but his 'bumping into us' seemed slightly too planned to be a true coincidence.so we became even more suspiscious of him! We didnt meet him that night and just went for dinner and had an early night instead.

16.03.09

Our friendly rickshaw driver jai took us around today again- he and his friend Sunny came with us to the zoo and took us to a mother Teresa home, where we spoke to one of the sisters about the qwork they do there. Sunny took us to a firend of his family's house-so we couldget Henna doen for free by the girls who were doing diplomas in mandi. The dad of the family made us bowls out of leaves and we chatetd and drank chai with thtem. We were then taken to Sunny's friend Rakesh's shop where he got out packet after packet of rubies- both me and rhiannon were getting ready to be scammed into buying some gemstones- but Rakesh actually gave us some for free! We then went up tp tiger fort and watched the sun set. We got into a long conversation with Sunny and Jai about young people's views on love and marriage in India compared with England.It was strange to hear how they didnt believe in love and were not really looking forward to getting married- as it was not really to do with love but just the joining of two families-often for material gain. We continued this chat in a bar, where we were approached by men asking if they could kiss us- when we said no- one of them spat at me! At first i thought i would let it go -but then i had a change of heart and was not going to put up with being treated like that - so i went after the man and made him apologise!Soon after though he tried to kiss rhiannon- who had to physically push him and then be restrained by Sunny!It was quite nice to get our own back though! Jai took us home and we took our first malaria tablet....followed shortly by me being sick continuously until 8am the next day when Jai picked us up to take us to the airport so we could fly to Goa!

17.03.09 - 21.03.09

We were staying in Anjuna- where we met up with Miron who we had met in Udaipur and stayed at the same guesthouse as him - called Evershine. He had hired a moped as it was the easisiest way to get around and he gave us rides around the town....which we late found out was illegal as you are only meant to have two on a bike maximum....but it was fun a ll the same. For the first few days i was in bed trying to get over my latest illness. When i was feeling better we went to he beacdh went to a market at night and generally relaxed.

It was finally time to leave, we said goodbye to Miron and got our overnight train to Mumbai. The Indians who were travelling to Mumbai on our train seemed alot more western - they wore western clothes etc. - which boded well ,as we were missing western things a bit! We arrived at 6am and managed to check-in- although they made us pay for the whole night- so the next night we decided to go in a cheaper dorm room- so we didnt get totaly ripped off. We had a look around Mumbai and were pleased to see there were pavements and shops and it was a lot nicer and cleaner than the other places we had been to, with few rickshaws and cows about.We had a boat trip around the harbour and saw the coll sky-line with its skyskrapers and rather disgusting beach. We also went up to the hangin gardens and walked along the esplanande. Whilst walking around we were approached and asked if we wanted to take part as extras in Bollywood fil, teh next day!- We decided it was a once in a life time chance- and although our flight was at 11pm the next day we could squeeze it in- so we agreed to be picked up at 7am the next day.

24/03/09

We went to macdonalds at 7am and met up with the other westerneers who had been picked out to be in the film. We had a 2 hour coach ride to the film set- which was an abandoned theme park in the middle of nowhere. The scenee they were filming was on an aeroplane- supposed to be just before the plane is blown up. We had to go through costume- wherer we were given an array of winter coats trousers and jumpers to wear- which was unbearable as it was sooo hot outside. After that we got on the plane - which was just an old small jet- parked in the car park of the theme park. It was very sureral to be sitting on a plane without it moving anywhere, wearing winter clothes inteh middle of summer! Luckily me and rhi were sitting in prime positions. I was sitting right behind the main actress and rhi was sitting behind me to the left of the main actor. They filmed a scene with the actors getting on to the plane, then the take off scene and the scene with the terrorist! The director had to direct me telling me to do up my seat belt and have a pretend conversation witht he man sitting next to me...which was quite amusing! After filming for 2 hours it was finally over- we were glad to get off the plane as it was so hot and the filming was quite boring because there was no dialogue int he scenes.We were given lunch and then taken back to Macdonalds- not before getting stuck in a traffic jam for hours! It was a really fun day- as we got to see how a film set runs. The actress we saw was apparantly quite famous and although the film does not yet have a name it is mentioned already on imdb- so hopefully when it comes out we can find it to see our on-screen debut!