Just saw the movie The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. It’s a fun light-hearted film about older people staying at a hotel in India. The city scenes were impressive and got me thinking about India.
Friends of ours have traveled extensively in India. The extreme poverty and calousness toward the poor is disheartening. In one instance they had to walk over a man who could have been dying on the street, something I would not relish or easliy forget. I had written India off my list of countries to visit for just this reason. But… the city scenes in the film were beautifully shot and made a trip “there” look idylic.
But where is “there”? I missed the beginning of the film and had no idea where it was filmed. The London location is mentioned in the credits, but nothing about India except a long list of credits for “first grip” etc. IMBD to the rescue ( www.imdb.com ). The film was shot in Jaipur India.
The images of Jaipur (google/images) are facinating, though you will quickly identify the “tourist” sights with their tens or hundreds of shapshots. That aside, there appears to be much to recommend Jaipur as one destination in India. Our friends also mentioned that the extreme poverty and roadside trash drops off as you leave the cities. Tentatively I’ll add Jaipur and India to our list of places to live for a while.
Interesting, it is relatively inexpensive to live in a hotel in Jaipur. The first hotel I found on Trip Advisor, Sunder Palace Guest House, looks good. 45 average to poor reviews and 450 good to excellent reviews. Always check the bad reviews, though sometimes they are plants. The price?? $15/day for a couple. That’s $450 a month at the flat daily rate, very inexpensive for hotel accomodations. And the guest photos of the hotel show pride of ownership for the owners. All in all it looks like a good place to stay. It’s not in the city center.
Jaipur hosts a number of festivals and has gardens, monuments, and temples: http://www.jaipur.org.uk