Storybook Orcha
Orcha, (meaning ‘Hidden Place’) is like another world. It hardly feels discovered. Only a few thousand people live here, with one main street in the town. A fortified island on the Betwa River that runs past this sleepy township used to guard three 17th Century palaces of a powerful Rajput kingdom. Around the complex firetrees ignite the countryside with orange blossoms. The air inside is cool and blissfully peaceful.
There are plenty of dark nooks and crannies to explore on the multifloored Jehangir Mahal. I found the perfect balcony, right on the top floor behind a carved screen that looked out across the river and temples on the other side. I chewed through ‘Vernon God Little’ the most achingly funny read. Indian Ringneck parakeets played around the area, but the big vultures were my eye’s favourite prey. On the far end of a ledge was a vulture’s nest. Mummy was massive, and probably defensive, so with a 10metre drop down I didn’t get too close. The next day I got my chance when an Indian man led the Canadians (Solange and Dan, who had unexpectedly shown up) and I to a back entrance to a little window. Mother and chick, nuzzling, just a few metres away.
Next day a festival swelled the town. Sellers of religious doohickys, flowers and food set up in the small square, as did the pilgrims settling in for the night. No one gave me any explanation, but a party’s a party I guess. One women who was getting married was showered was blessed and offered money by the wedding party. Next day old women were crying (tears of happiness?) for her. The boys on the street didn’t notice. They smacked drums and danced with supreme gayety. We watched all this from the birds eye perch of a restaurant roof.
In the square I had a copper ring made and engraved in minutes by a boy tapping these out with the crudest tools. It says ‘RAJ’ with a few squiggles. Double thumbs up – only 10 rupees (nz 30c). By bike I rode around the greater area of Orcha in half a day. Some fascinating line drawings and paintings of demons, gods, war and life were still clinging on The Laxmi temple ceiling. For some reason I always, just have to climb to the top of these temples. The final steps of the Chaturbhuj temple (to be turned green that night) were just stone slabs spiraling up a turret. Precarious. Down at the river, which looks across to vine-ensnared Chatris (cenotaphs to Orchas rulers), Hindus bathed amid the boulders. So much to soak in in such a small town.
The good times had with Dan and Solange plus a few of their friends delayed my departure. But the night the thunder and lightning started in Orcha, I left with some Dutchies I’d run into in Jaipur.
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