‘Why was I doing this?’ ‘ Was I trying to prove something?’ and ‘ What if things didn’t go as planned?’
It was the first time I had planned a trip like this. Something which even my father didn't approve of.
But, What about the saying to follow the heart?
The thoughts kept dancing in my head until a few hours before leaving.
With a bag pack hung on my shoulder, I paused in front of the main door of my house, before making a final exit.
The cab the expressway glittering with lights, even during such wee hours. I still wished for the sun to wake up early from its good night sleep.
Finally getting down at the railway station buzzing with people offered me a sense of peace.
I enter the platform and walk past by men, woman like me travelling alone and a group of young girls sitting carefree on their suitcases, laughing heartily.
Their laughter brings in a glimpse of time I travelled with friends from Delhi to my college near Jaipur.
The old times flood in as I see more girls entering the coach I am seated in. It reminds me of a bus journey from Delhi to Jaipur, during college.
The bus filled with girls as we all studied in a woman’s university near Jaipur. And sometimes a few fortunately unfortunate men, would be a prey of our glares and jokes.
As the train started moving, the first rays of sunlight shone like the bud of a new day beginning to bloom.
Getting down at Gandhinagar railway station in Jaipur, I booked a cab to Nadia homestay.
Ina housing locality, the cab dropped me at my destination. A middle aged woman, Nadya, assisted me towards her white double storied house.
She said as we entered into the small yet cozy room ‘ You can come downstairs anytime to have food or fill water from the RO. Treat this like your own house.'
It is an economical homestay for solo woman travelers, which lured me further into doing what I wished for.
I freshen up, change into a fresh pair of clothes to go downstairs. A narrow passageway opens into a living cum dining room.
Aunty is in the kitchen making roti’s. It is a typical household atmosphere, with only one difference. I am in a stranger’s house, a house in an unknown place with a growling stomach.
After enjoying a simple yet delicious meal, I return to my room and doze off in the cool air, sprayed by the water cooler.
A young man enters a huge red brick building. At the entrance, he bends to touch the ground with his hand like bowing in front of a God's idol in a temple.
There are a few people sitting on the steps of a large amphitheater, practicing dialogues from a piece of paper.
Walking across the amphitheater, I enter into an area housing art galleries. One of them is open today. A huge hall with a series of paintings hung on the wall invite me into their world.
A girl enters excitedly along with me and asks the artists about the paints used in the paintings.
A man with grey beard on the sides of his brown face, replies with a smile ‘ these are photographs that look like paintings’.
I hear his loud voice echoing as I stand in front of one of the exhibited photographs. ‘I was able to do this after 30 years of experience in photography. Now, I only do nature photography in my own garden.’ Says Mahesh Swami ji.
Later, browsing through one of the previous exhibition albums, I read his 14 year old daughter's thought provoking articles on issues like LGBT, marks based education system and rape.
As he tells me more about her, my eyes are filled with admiration for a father who doesn't try to shield his young daughter from the harsh realities of life.
As I sit in the RSRTC bus to embark today’s journey from Jaipur to Tonk, I soak in the resemblance of the numerous such journeys done in the past while travelling to my college from Jaipur.
Though the destination is different today, but the scent of the past wafts through the window bringing back one such morning from more than a decade ago.
It is a cold winter morning, with light sunshine. We are wearing sweaters and jackets to beat the cold.
The parts of dark blue leather seats are hidden with portions of flowing yellow and pink dupattas. Yellow handles hanging from the roof.
I sit in the middle as the window seat is occupied by an old man wrapped up in a red shawl, with my friend sitting on my right.
The fast beats of a Rajasthani folk song combined with the roaring sound of the engine, hum a dangerously silent tune.
I keep looking outside after every 5 mins to check if we have reached. Meanwhile, the foreign hands enter towards my thighs, fingers crawling slowly beneath the red shawl occupying an enemy territory.
I surrender without even fighting the battle.
This memory makes me recall an article I read yesterday by the photographer's 14-year-old daughter, about how woman should step up to take responsibility for their own safety.
I resonate with her article much more than my 22 year old self would have.
The bus halts, bringing me back to the present . The man sitting besides me turns his face towards me, as I ask him if this is the Tonk bus station.
His kind voice startles me as he replies politely. ‘The next stop to this one’ and he reminds me again as the bus finally reaches it's destination.
The wind is turning cooler as it is soon going to be time for sun’s shift to end. The cool wind brushes my face. I sit clutching onto my grey colored bag pack on a motorbike, behind a man riding it.
I ask him ‘ Where are we?’ as we are outside the city limits.
‘This is Kota highway’ he replies.
‘But why are we here?’ ‘ We could have easily found a place to eat in the town.’ ‘ Should I ask him?’
Manoj ji had picked me up from the Tonk bus station in his bike. A grey ponytail hanging lose over his back a little below the shoulders with a white cap over his head.
We spoke about the places on my list, which were mostly closed. A wave of disappointment hit me, until he reminded me of a well-known art form Namda. His father was one of first Namda artists in Tonk.
We rode towards a housing locality and stopped in front of a large iron gate. It was his brother’s house. His brother and his wife are Namda artists.
I sit still in the huge drawing room, with a cup of tea served by a woman with her pallu tucked in her waist.
She brings a plastic bag full of handmade artifacts mostly used as Christmas hangings for their market in Europe.
She and her husband took me to their workshop in the back of the house, which is stacked with sheets of colored Namda.
I kneel down to hold the artifacts piled up on the floor. The rich hues of red, green, white, pink behold my eyes as I run my hands across their coarse texture.
'The exporters come to me whenever there is an urgent order.' she says in a confident tone.
'I just say that I will try but they have the trust on me that I will deliver anyhow.'
'The local Muslim woman help me with it. They are hard working and artistic. Even if I call them today for an order to be delivered tomorrow, they would be right here working day and night.'
As I decide to leave for the next destination, we walk along till the main gate of the house. We say our goodbye like being a part of the same clan .
Covering my face and head with a purple dupatta, I sit cross legged on the bike.
We stop near a shop in a dusty lane, Manoj ji’s brother wanted to show me another famous artwork in Tonk. I enter the gate to find a lean young girl in a black shirt standing. This is 22 year old Anjali's studio.
She takes out a couple of paintings made on plyboard and some with clay and acrylic paints.
I move my hands over the canvas to feel the smooth acrylic paints flowing on the board, making me pause for a moment to embrace the messed up beautiful piece of art resembling life.
Not too far from here is the factory where the industrial felt is manufactured.
The raw dirty sheep's skin is turned into clean sheets of industrial felt.
A tall man with brown skin and black eyes greets us with a smile. They enthusiastically walk around the machines with different functions to process the raw Namda. We go outside to the open backyard and see huge sheets being hanged over a wire like hanging clothes under the bright clear sky.
The sun starts to show it’s true colors by the time we leave the factory.
The bike traverses on the narrow lanes and the rugged roads , towards old Tonk. The tall mountain with the yellow dome shaped check post at top runs throughout the city.
Manoj ji stops the bike in front of a broken boundary wall. The green grass growing wildly over the two neglected graves. One of them is on a platform, at a height of 8 feet from the ground and is referred to as 'Raziya ki mazar'( Raziya's tomb) by the locals.
As told by the locals, Razia Sultana fled after she lost the battle in Kaithal and came here with her slave and alleged lover Yaqut. The nearby mosque was also built by her father Illtumush.
Manoj ji wants me to see something. So, he asks me to take off my shoes to climb up the grave.
I hold to one of the corners of the stone and use my knees to climb.
The hot stone pricks my feet as I take off my shoes. I put my feet on the wild grass to escape the hot surface.
The rectangular thick stone on the top of the grave is carved with an octagonal star and a Turkish mehrab typical of the Sultanate period.
The ASI had rejected the claim of an Urdu lecturer Dr Syed Sadique Ali who claimed that the stones represents an ancient script with an expression 'Razia Sultana, the sultanate of Delhi'.
The other grave is much smaller and at ground level. Therefore, it is known to be Yakut's grave, a slave appointed by Razia’s father for her protection.
Manoj ji started the bike as we leave to go to ‘Mohandas ji ki bageechi’ which is also close by. Mohandas ji was a sadhu and Gunni maharaj was a mystical Sufi saint. There are stories about their deep friendship as told by the locals.
It is said that Aurangzeb didn't approve of their friendship. He got both of them imprisoned as Gunni maharaj refused to break his friendship with Mohandas ji.
They were asked to move the wheel of the heavy handriven millstone to grind wheat in the prison, and magically with Gunni maharaja's slight push the wheel started to move on its own.
He said, 'Hindus and Muslims, take name of your own God' and the wheels started rotating on its own.
We stand to move towards the door as it is time to leave. There is a huge tree outside in the compound with a hole in between.
There is a snake's head popping out from the tree hole like saluting the man who rescues them.
Oh, yes, Manoj ji is a snake rescuer too apart from being a photographer and a well-known journalist in Tonk.
He helped a snake charmer who was wrongly accused of a theft and as a favor, the Kalbelia took him to a jungle and taught him to catch snakes.
Now, he also works in the forest department, rescuing snakes from homes and leaving them in a nearby forest.
As he rides on the Tonk highway taking me out for lunch, my mind has the audacity to doubt his intentions.
He showed me his school which had an interesting name 'Kothi Natamam' as the building couldn’t be completed by the nawab. The nawab of Tonk built both schools and madrasas.
After all, how could I trust a man I just met today in an unknown city?
Manoj ji stops his bike near a roadside Dhaba. He brings his family or people from outside here for lunch.
We talk about his family, his sons who are engineer's like me and about his multi faceted life as a photographer, journalist and a namda artist.
After lunch, he parks his bike near the nearby toll booth. He walks ahead of me to stop the bus and asks beforehand if the bus is going to Jaipur.
Hurriedly entering the bus, i try to look at him to say goodbye but the bus had already moved.
While taking a seat in the bus, I think about the previous night when I expressed my interest to visit Tonk to Yusuf ji, owner of my homestay in Jaipur.
He is the one who called Manoj ji in Tonk to help me with this trip.
As my eyes gaze from the window at the sky colored in hues of orange, they glisten with tiny drops from a vast ocean.
The ocean of mankind holding us together irrespective of gender, religion, culture or any other differences.
While having a conversation about work and travel with Yusuf Uncle sitting on the sofa besides the dining table, Nadia aunty is preparing a traditional Rajasthani dinner( Daal Baati churma).
A typical household atmosphere which I didn't belong to before tonight.
Following my heart led to love. Love which lay in a pool of fear in unknown waters.
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