Pushkar Fair blog - My story of meeting friends!

Pushkar Fair, or Pushkar mela, as it's locally known, is an annual fair in the town of Pushkar, Rajasthan where camel and other livestock are traded among the local communities. The fair goes for for about five days from Karthik Ekadashi to Karthik Poornima, but the festivity remains in the air for much longer. There is a belief that on the fifth day lord Brahma sprung from the Pushkar lake, and so it's an important day for Hindus to come and take a holy dip in the temple lake.

Over the last many years, it's also become a favorite place for photographers to capture the beauty of Rajasthan. I love clicking people and Pushkar fair is the prefect time for this! Plus there is great music, food and lots of fun rides at the fair.

Pushkar is a small town and if you know someone, you will surely bump into them! Though we did miss a close friend, we kept bumping into NIDians everywhere, starting from the musical concert on the ghat. And with NIDians, its always a chain...it keeps extending and extending. Having made the first contact, we soon did everything which we wanted to for the complete Pushkar experience.

A set of women arguing to make some absolutely non-essential purchases!
We met numerous NIDians here, the concert was great too!

Little Hanuman
Studious kid at the shop!
Needless to say...I am inspired with the hair!

Akash took us to a restaurant which served chilled beer, and we had that with dinner. Just as we were getting a little tipsy, more charsi friends from NID found us and we chased them to their hotel terrace for some out of the world moments. It was great to get updates on people we are no longer in touch with, hear interesting gossip about people we were in touch with, and generally talk crap about our own selves!

Ah the beard!
The crooked tooth lady!
Cataract man, but he still stared hard at me!

The clock turned its hand, and it was soon 2AM, which was also our deadline for leaving for our hotel...a couple of kilometers away. Filmy drama followed, we lost our way and walked in the wrong direction, least bothered about sleeping and more interested in animated discussions. Of course we reached back safely and slept blissfully, and also ate humongous amount of food the neat morning. But this is what Pushkar does to you, you can do all sort of random stuff and still get up early morning, eat an English Breakfast and behave like a perfect well-groomed couple :)

Laughing camel
Beautiful hot air balloons in the morning from the terrace
Very pretty lady, M's favorite!
Meeting friends also means that you get some great recommendations for eating even more food, especially sweets. And Pushkar is famous for Rabri Malpooa, which is a must to gorge on! Foreigners love Pushkar and so almost any decent place would serve great pancakes, I especially liked the nutella pancake with some black coffee. The place is pure vegetarian, but you might find eggs in some obscure corners if you look hard enough.

The ever attentive Indian policeman :)
Another pretty lady :) Red rocks!

The fair is high on music all through the day, but evenings come alive with live dance and play performances at the mela ground. Its a must watch, and trust me you would love it! The songs, dances, costumes...everything is pure Rajasthani to the core and essentially out of this world! One can sit for hours and enjoy the show, taking food, cigarette and loo breaks in between.

The dance!
The dance again!
Meditating Krishna...in the middle of the dance performance!
Also highly recommended (at least by me) is walk at the ghats late in the night. We went there around 11PM, and the place was absolutely deserted. There are enough policemen around to make you feel safe, yet they remain inconspicuous. You can click the numerous ducks floating around, or just click some beautiful night shots; or just walk and talk. You can also walk hand in hand, sing stupid songs, make movie-like promises, jump steps, pretend to be dead, or basically just fool around.

The typical Indian Sadhu! One day I will have beard like him...
Women getting ready for the holy dip!
Another Sadhu, quite an interesting one!

Comments

  1. very true-two pretty ladies:)
    I always admire the use of colors in such traditional clothes!

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  2. Another set of great shots! Love these street photos, they are so genuine and the colours are so vivid.
    DeeBee

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  3. Great colors and wonderful pictures .

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  4. HOW DO YOU DO IT!!!! Amazing clicks!!! Loved each and every one of them sire!!
    Loved it!
    Update ur other blog too sire!

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  5. Beautiful photographs... love the photo of the hot air balloons and that of the Sadhu...

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  6. Amazing colours! And hot air balloons in Pushkar? That is so cool.

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  7. The pictures are so colorful and lively that I feel part of the fair! Too good, man. You're a master with the camera.

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  8. Lovely colorful pictures. I know Skywaltz Balloon safari was at the fair wondering the balloons are there! I have been up over Jaipur in one of them :D

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  9. Fabulous potraits and great expressions captured. Great work Siddhartha.

    www.rajniranjandas.blogspot.com

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  10. Kya yaar! Har baar dil jeet lete ho :)

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  11. All portraits are great pictures in that country.

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  12. i wait for thee pictures....from your blog!!

    and its worth waiting for!

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  13. More great photos Sid - As always a great style. The beards on the men in Pushkar are getting a bit too long though!!

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  14. @Ola: I agree, very pretty ladies :)

    @DeeBee: Thanks a lot, and I love the street shots too...people on the road just pull me towards them :)

    @Dhiraj: Thanks man!

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  15. @RedHanded: No big deal actually, all you need to do is enjoy clicking and the results would be decent enough :)

    p.s. updated the other blog too!

    @Dominic: Thanks man, I wish I was there on the balloons :)

    @Neha: Yes, that's super cool!

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  16. @Mridula: You are damn lucky...I envy! I also want to do it soon...

    @RNiranjanDas: Thanks a lot :)

    @Chintan: Thank you madam...am always afraid to put up the next post, lest I may disappoint you :(

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  17. @Fabio: Thank you, I guess I do agree on the portrait bit :)

    @Shruti: Haha...am glad to know that :)

    @Natalie: Thank you! Don't say that about the beards, if only my skin stops itching, I would grow mine at least a foot long :)))

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  18. simply beautiful !!! one more place added to my wishlist.

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  19. Wow, beautiful photos! Everything is so colorful, and you captured such great expressions!

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  20. More fantastic photos. Great work!

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  21. You paint such a wonderful picture of community and social union.

    I love all the looks here, but please don't do that to your hair.

    ;p

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  22. Superb candids..!

    (Do you really need the word verification? I got rid of it from my blog..)

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  23. Wonderful shots. The mood of the people is captured very well.

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  24. Your pictures photographs bring boundless joy to the beholder. Simply superb.

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  25. @ShadowsGalore: Thanks a lot, am sure you too would love the place!

    @Amanda: I agree, its all so colorful...hard to find gray or black anywhere there :)

    @Ash: Thanks a lot :)

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  26. @Jules: Thank you so much :) Seriously not do it to my hair? Not even experiment? :(

    @Sridharan: Thanks!

    I also removed the word verification it a while back, but that lets in a lot of spam messages...

    @Rajesh: Thanks a lot :)

    @RRamakrishnan: Thanks a lot :) I am glad you enjoyed them so much!

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  27. I saw the hair picture and I was just thinking of how it must have inspired you when I read the caption. And that beard. Ah. I love the title. Makes me wantto visit Pushkar. And follow you around while you click your pictures. Sigh.I love the pictures you take of water.. You make it look beautifully majestic.

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  28. @Zeba: Ah yes...I am always inspired by the image of long hair :) and, of course, long beard. I will surely try it once before I bid adieu to the world...

    Thanks a ton for your feedback, its often one of the best on the post. Btw you might hate traveling with me, am a bad bad bad travel companion!

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  29. LOL oh my gosh those pictures are incredible!!! LOL I love how you captioned them, and especially your writing style! It looks like an amazing place to go, I wish I could visit it one day. Btw, what are NIDians?

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  30. @PunkChopsticks: Thanks a lot, and thanks for dropping by :) It surely is an amazing place to go...

    As for NIDians...its the people from my post grad school NID (National Institute of Design) :)

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  31. Lol no probs! Your blog just seems so interesting!!!

    Oh yeah, and in response to your previous comment
    @Siddhartha: You have such an AWESOME name!!! LOl yeah, cheating is frowned upon I know, but it really is all for the fun of it. This is incredible! I've never actually met someone who hasn't cheated before! Hello!!

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  32. Hi Joshi,
    Great article and photos! Each photo and person on it tell it's own story and history. Very interesting and intriguing people.

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  33. @PunkChopsticks: My name is awesome? Haha...ok thank you :), I can thank my parents for that!

    @@NiceArtLife: Thank you very much :)

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  34. What amazing pictures! As an American, this is definitely something I don't see everyday. Also, good luck with the beard. I have a smooth baby face, and if I try to grow a beard, it looks like weeds trying to grow through concrete. Not a good look.

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  35. How can anyone not admire the interplay of colours? Such a feast for the eyes, Sidd. :)

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  36. Thank you for a colorful journey into an intriguing land. You have again captured the soul of the people. Just amazing.

    Bises,
    Genie

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  37. great photos, congratulations to your blog

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  38. So many fascinating and colorful images. Bravo.

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  39. Vos photos sont REMARQUABLES, j'aime beaucoup les portraits. Vraiment superbes. Bravo!

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  40. nice collection of photos on the the occasion of pushkar

    thanks

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  41. @BrandonAndBryan: Thanks guys, I guess it would be so much interesting as you see it rarely...but its always fascinating even to me!

    As for the beard, I will wait for the right moment to start growing it that long...

    @eyeinthesky: Thanks a lot, and yes the colors are always so beautiful...

    @Genie: Thanks a lot! Though I am yet to go a long distance before I can claim to do justice to my subjects.

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  42. @fabio: Thank you!

    @kala: Thank you!

    @maia: Merci beaucoup, j'apprécie vraiment vos commentaires:)

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  43. Love the rich colors in your pictures! India is truly the land of colors!

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  44. Thanks Anji, India surely is full of colors! Good to see you here...

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  45. Great series of Pushkar, a place full of color and life.
    Makes you want to visit.
    The fabulous and expressive portraits.
    Greetings.

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  46. @Javier: :) I am glad you liked the pics, and am even more sure that you would love the place...colorful and peaceful...

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  47. Are you a photographer??

    Awesome clicks!

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  48. Thanks a lot Deepika :) I am no photographer...though I enjoy it more than most other things that I do :)

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  49. Good set of colorful pics! Lucky you to have rabri malpoa.

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  50. Glad you liked them Kusum, and rabri malpua...well...yum :)

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  51. Joshi,
    your photos are full of poetry. Congratulations, see you soon,
    ele

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  52. Joshi, I still remember your post about Palitana and that time I was completely blown away by the beauty of the place and your photographs. But when I checked your blog again, you make me amazed again by those great shots of people that you took. Really nice work!

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    Replies
    1. Thank you so much Bama :) I am glad you enjoyed the pictures on the blog and that you came back to see more of these!

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  53. quite wonderful i love the descriptions and the people you captured!

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  54. Great colorful photos! I've never sen any hot air balloons in Pushkar (nor in India)...amazing sight

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