Orchha: “Hello Auntie!”

Writing from: Varanasi on the non-drinkable Ganges.

I’m not going to say much about Orchha. It wasn’t really much of a town, and the people there seemed a little money-hungrier than we have come across before. Therefore small children ran up the road after us shouting “Hello pencil!” and “Hello chocolate!” at the top of their lungs with none of the smiles or giggles of Bundi or elsewhere.

Orchha

I also got quietly outraged by a group of young ‘men’ taking my photo when I clearly asked them not to. (All credit to M for not breaking their necks, when he clearly wanted to).

F off, please

Maybe we’re a bit India-weary after two months of touts, haggling, rooms that smell of cabbage, and toilets that flush onto your flipflops.

A couple of good things about Orchha though:

The fact that it looks like the world after the apocalypse has hit it. Voila.

Apocalypse now

Vultures and parrots on top of the crumbling Royal Palace.

Old stuff agogo

A small girl reached out to shake my hand and said “Hello auntie”. Wikipedia (fountain of all made-up knowledge) says “Use of the English words ‘uncle’ and ‘aunty’ as suffixes when addressing people such as distant relatives, neighbours, acquaintances, even total strangers (like shopkeepers) who are significantly older than oneself.” Her parents thought this was hilarious. I worry the sun is making me leathery and yoda-like.

It is the place where I finished my first ever sock. In a restaurant where rats ran in and out of the kitchen, jumping off shelves and around jars, causing a French woman to feed her dinner to a passing street dog and say to the owner “You should beeee ashaaaaaamed of your restauran’, eeet eeeez full of rats!” before storming out.

A bit proud

I am rather proud of the sock.

Yay!

I wasn’t so impressed with my dinner…