I have lived in Jaipur for over 16 years now. While it wasn’t love at first sight, the city has grown on me. I have explored its gullies and scoured its bazaars for the best bargains, seen its amazing heritage monuments, tasted its foods, and slowly and surely fallen in love with the city.As the names of the places where Tuesday’s blasts took place flash across the TV screen, the reports repeatedly tell viewers that these places are part of the ‘walled city’. When friends and family from all over the country ring up to ask if we are all fine, I can sense something in their tone that says, “but that’s far from where you live, isn’t it?” “Yes we are all fine”, I tell them and leave it at that. But I want to tell them that it is not really all that far off. And that I know a thousand people who live there. They work or study in my college, work in my husband’s office, they are shopkeepers whose shops I frequent, they are friends and they are acquaintances.Johari Bazaar has been a favourite haunt and not least among the reasons is the famous LMB restaurant there. You have to eat the dahi vada and aloo tikki to believe it. Everytime you want to buy silver artefacts, chunky jewellery, gold ornaments or trousseau sarees, Johari Bazaar it will be. Parking is tough to find but I have always thought I was lucky because I would manage to squeeze my car into a parking slot just after one or two rounds of the bazaar. I also frequent the Katla or the cloth market through a narrow passage from Johari Bazaar, where you get the most amazing tissue and brocade fabric at wonderful prices.Sanganeri Gate is the place to go to if you want to eat vegetables and fruits cultivated in fresh water. The Hanuman Mandir in the vicinity compels passers-by to bow in obeisance. The temple opens right onto the main road which leads into Johari Bazaar but unlike the many who stop to pray I have ventured inside just once. For someone who has not visited Jaipur and especially its walled city area, it is hard to imagine how organised, exciting and grand it is. Tripolia Bazaar is the place to pick up hardware and sanitary fittings. Two things in this market have always fascinated me. The first is the Sarka Suli, a tower for public hangings. The second is the private entrance to the City Palace, exclusively for the members of the royal family of Jaipur. Both are a symbol of what used to be. Another reason for my visits to this area is the Kagazi or the dealer for paper to stock up on registers, copies, chart paper, wrapping paper at wholesale rates.Around and a little beyond Choti Chaupad are several dresswala’s (rentals for fancy dresses and costumes). I often go there to pick up the costumes everytime the children have to perform at a play in school. Like me, most of the mothers I meet there moan about the inevitable trip back the next day to return the hired goods. How can I forget to mention the numerous Jaipuri juttis, suits and ghagras I have bargained for and bought outside Manak Chowk, near Hawa Mahal?Every developing city in India today has its share of malls, but Jaipur is special, because its vibrant old bazaars are still accessible and frequented by tourists and even people who live outside the walled city. There are a hundred reasons why I have gone to all these places. And thousands more why I shall continue to go there. The writer is assistant professor, Subodh Institute of Management and Career Studies, Jaipur
