Wish with all your heart. Wish that one day you will go to Bundi. And wish that when that day dawns, the ingredients are just right. That the day you do go to Bundi is a day in the month of sawan, blessed by an animated south-west monsoon. That there is a heavy downpour for a couple of hours in the morning after which the weather relents, but not much, just a wee bit, so that it drizzles on and off all day. The clouds drift from one mountain-top-lookout-tower to the next, often revealing blues you have never imagined. The breeze stirring the skies occasionally comes down to ruffle your hair, clouds roll down the mountainside and wrap all manner of things in a moist blanket, the sun is present but only just to make it day and is content to let the clouds hold sway.
View of Bundi
When you have these ingredients in place, Bundi is a few notches better than perfect. Then your options are wide open. You can amble along the lazy lanes and bazaars, going from havelis to baoris to mosques. Or visit temples and figure out why Bundi was also called ‘Chotta Kashi’. Hire a bicycle or a mobike or a car and cruise across Bundi, often coming across people packed in Sumos or tractors, cooking, bathing and playing in the numerous tanks, lakes, streams and waterfalls. Or spend the day in the royal enclave ruminating on love, romance, worship, architecture and military strategy. Look through the palace jharokhas and get enchanted by the orange-red-yellow brush strokes in the evening sky. Or just sit at a rooftop restaurant, sipping the ambience. Follow with your eyes the monkeys and langurs, travelling from the palace on their highways of walls and roofs, spread across houses and hotels, to steal clothes, find food, pick nits and play playfully. In the evening, hike up to the fort to gaze at the tiny drop that is Bundi hiding in the fold of a green leaf that is the Aravallis.
