Carved in Sand

R E F L E C T I V E N O T E

O N O U R 4 D A Y T R I P T O T H E W E S T E R N I N D I A

B Y S H I K H A R B H A R D W A J

C R A F T E X P O S U R E

Our teachers decided us to take to Barmer and Jaisalmer to get us an exposure to the crafts that are practiced in these regions and always has been practiced the same way as it was.

On our way to Barmer we stopped to get a factory visit at Jodhpur, where we saw, how furniture is manufactured at huge scale, mostly for the first world countries. How wood is extracted from the tree trunk and seasoned and finally used to make cheap furniture. They had a huge space and was divided accordingly, specific to the function necessary. The factory had fewer floors and since they had huge land so, the most work was carried out at the ground level. There were a lot of antiques stored mostly from the rural areas of Rajasthan and Gujrart. Doors, locks, tiles, pianos, boats, utensils, to name few.

The wooden Carving is famous of Barmer and we went on to see that first at their Showroom and then to their factory where most of the things are done by hands. Few of us tried our hands on with wood turning and others with carving.

We also went to see the Kiradu Temple which is situated 35 kms from Barmer in middle of nowhere. We missed a turn and it was definitely tough to find, in that desert town. I was literally awestruck to see the level of craftsmanship, as it existed 100 of years back. There were three temples that still stood with few ruins separated on the empty plots. To achieve that level of accuracy and sophisticated detail, the team of craftsmen must have practiced the skill onto something else before. It is easily seen that since there are very less buildings in the surrounding and just the temples, so the temples might serve as a great function to the kingdom, then and a very important piece The temple was all made in yellow sandstone, locally sourced. There were so many temples which makes it harder as to what the people of Kiradu used to believe in.

The temples were lifted on a huge platform of about 6' tall from the main ground. There were 3 temples we came across, 2 facing towards east while 1 just in front of the other two towards west. The only reason the temples still survives is because the rain in the region is little to do any damage to the magnificent architecture of the temples. Other natural calamities like earthquakes only might have disfigured the structure.

There were 2 small temples and 1 big one. I keenly examined the big one. It had lot of pillars and arcs. The prominent shapes that I saw were square and triangle made by the arrangement of pillars and square, octagon and circle on the pillars of the temple. Apart from this, there were motifs of sun, flower and wavy like curves everywhere. There were dragons and kalash mostly on all pillars. Dragon's mouth were somehow had two birds at the place of their canine teeths.

That morning we always went to see sunrise on a sand dune hill near to our Hotel in Barmer. I collected few stones and watched the sun come up. While coming down it was more like snowboarding only if we had board and we could have possibily called it sandboarding.

We departed for Jaisalmer for our 3rd day in desert.

We had 5 hour journey ahead of us, and the roads had no or absolutely little road lights. we stopped by a dhabba with nobody in sight for miles and miles, it was dark as black and eyes keep searching for a little spark of light but there was none. We had normal cheap dhabba food, which we mostly find on the highways of India. Since, we were so many, it took like forever to make food and then eat so, we finally reached Jaisalmer half dead around 1 in the night. Refreshed ourselves and made the bed and slept.

We wake up and had the breakfast at the roof of the hotel with a spectacular view of the fort and went towards the fort on foot. This way, i was able to capture the streets of this golden city. We gathered at the foot of the fort and joined the guide who was willing to share his stories with us about the fort museum and jain temple. We ascended our journey ahead and saw the tribal ladies selling jewelry and stuff and there was a musician playing an instrumental piece. The whole fort area was lit as if it was gold, the air was dry and clean. The sky was clear with no clouds for miles and miles.

We went to Jain temple and saw the amazing architecture which resembles a lot to the temples at Kiradu in almost every way. The level of stone carving was less here at jain temple. I bought some postcards for my wall at home.

We went on farther moving in the narrow streets of the fort area towards the Fort of Maharaja. It was a small and uninterested walk in heat. We had a group photograph at the city view point near a canon. And then came back to the center to eat and drink something.

And on three auto riskshaws, we went to see the Patwon ki haveli which had magnificent stone carving facades and amazingly detailed interior and painted walls, wooden roofs and storage facilities with a basement in it. The level of work was amazing to see and made my heart full somehow.

The Lothari's Patwon ki haveli was worth a visit with a lot to see. it was the perfect museum. Old measuring weights, collection of locks, old paintings and antique furniture. the garments of that era and collection of wooden combs, the kitchen utensils, and amazing set of furniture to see.

I was happy to see the vintage ludo and chess set with the dedicated table to play on.

There were ancient arabic astrolabe to see with the arabic inscriptions on it. I was really delighted to see it all at one such place.

On the evening, we went to see the Bada Bagh which is 6 km north of Jaisalmer on the way to Ramgarh, There sits a set of royal cenotaphs, or chhatris, of Maharajas of Jaisalmer state. And the place had a calm vibe to it maybe because the temperature dropped suddenly and the air became more light. It was a therapy to see that day the sun go down.

Next morning the whole group went to see the place where all this magic is done on the yellow sandstone of Rajasthan.

We saw how the water and iron drills are used to cut the Stone in slabs. There was a lot of waste stone, thrown away and could be possibly used somewhere or the other. The water used in the process of cutting is recycled and used again and again due to shortage of water in the region.

The tools used to stone carve are very simple, just a hammer and different sizes of chisel but the time to make a piece takes forever .

Yellow sandstone is quite easy to handle as compared to the other stones. It is basically soft and mostly uniform and chip offs only where we strike it. People work in the adverse conditions with hot sun shinning throughout the day and sand all around them.

We went further far to see the stone turning and polishing. There was stone everywhere and saw the intricacy of the work and patients that goes into making, the carving was highly sophisticated and to witness it with our eyes was a great deal. Those were few of the best craftsmen, I saw, working.

We went back to hanuman chowk to carry our journey ahead onto the desert.

After some rest at hotel, we went for our await desert safari, we took onto the jeep around 10 people hanging to it. Going up and down and speedy curves, it was thrilling. And I lost my portable thermos on the ride and yeah its alright, someone would probably find water in it.

We halted for about half an hour at a checkpoint, for our selfies and photos mostly. and every checkpoint had a dedicated colored flag to give the driver an idea of where they actually are.

There were camels waiting for us to sit on and take us a round and so we did. Vinayak on front and I on the back seat had a humping ride around the dunes. We sat for few more minutes to enjoy another amazing sunset and how can I possibly forget down the dunes race, which I eventually won without falling and voluntarily went out of the final race where there were just four of us left.

Shubham ma'am found the phone which had the wallpaper that said,"Bhopidike" on it. And I said it's Aadhya's, and she wasn't believing it but then eventually did. On that amazing twilight, we went running extremely fast on a single lane road with full music on. Oh, that was breath taking and I would definitely like to experience that again and again. We went for a cultural night with traditional food. Two ladies performing to the fullest and extraordinarily. Next, we packed ourselves to come back.