Place to see: Barmer, Jodhpur, India

About this place:

"Travelling to the edges of the world does not require traversing long distances. They may actually be found, folded between the seams of modernity", said my fellow traveller casually when our travel agent asked if Barmer was for real.

Destination Barmer is meant only for the footloose. Roughly 200 km away from Jodhpur and 650 km from Ahmedabad, Barmer is accessible by both road and rail.

Situated in south-west Rajasthan, Barmer shares administrative and cultural borders with the Rann of Kutch in Gujarat and Sindh in Pakistan. The potpourri of language, ethnicity and attire can be heady even for someone coming from a big city such as Delhi. Faces that could easily be placed in some distant Mediteranean village to the local dialect, a mixture of Marwari, Sindhi and Gujarati, interspersed with loan words from Persian, set ones imagination on fire. Stories on how some families may have travelled with their merchandise from Persian towns, lost their way in the desert and decided to stay, come to life.

In this sun-bathed land, it is a tradition to offer water to anyone stepping into your house even before enquiring about the purpose of the visit. A reflection of the warmth of people here.

Barmer town, which is the district headquarter of Barmer is known for its Jain temples and a small fortress overseeing the town. Known for its handicrafts, Barmer is peppered with villages, specializing in different crafts. Applique motifs of trees, leaves, flowers, animals in hues of pink, red, green, black seek their inspiration in nature. Dhanoo, a small town 40 km from Chooten, is well known for such craft. Shawls woven from local wool, a part of the traditional attire, are soon becoming a part of contemporary fashion in the metros.

Regular stopovers at roadside dhabas and local halwai shops that dish out fried delicacies are a must. Gulp these down with some delicious lassi, a thicker version of the drink available in north.

Travelling in and around Barmer, you will find roads playing eternal hide and seek with the desert. The sand takes over parts of the road leaving the traveller to fill in the blanks with tyre trails.

The terrain is mostly dry and bare. Camels and donkeys are the only signs of life over long stretches. If you're lucky you may spot a gazelle, in isolated places. Although dry and bare, the sand and sky lend themselves to a magical symphony. The dunes create patterns in sand that could inspire weavers for years. The orange evening sun, and the moon light generously lend their colours to these patterns and imprint them forever in the traveller's memory.

No poem, nor prose can sufficiently describe the feeling as one observes the bright blue sky slowly fade into darkness. A darkness that is slowly lit up by infinite specks of white. One just sit there and wonders, how much we miss in our big cities that have "everything".

I jerk back to reality as the train screeches to a stop at the noisy Jodhpur station. I physically journey back towards the daily drudgery of work and pay. Though my romance with the place and the people continues.