The city of Jaipur is the capital of the Indian state of Rajasthan. "Jai-pur" means "victory city", and "Raja-sthan" means "land of kings" - so as you can guess, this is a city with a proud military heritage. In fact, it was ruled until 1947 by a dynasty of Maharajahs who still hold a ceremonial title. Jaipur is also nicknamed "the pink city", because back in the 1800's one Maharajah had the city walls and all the main streets painted pink. To me it looks more like a salmon color though.
In Jaipur we saw...City palace, an old palace of the Maharajahs that had been converted into a museum
Jantar Mantar, a collection of gigantic astronomical instruments in stone. One of them is a 75-foot-tall sundial, called ".. Yashan", meaning "Giant instrument". This guy might have been compensating.
The Hawa Mahal ("Palace of Winds"). A tall but narrow building overlooking the main street, with lots of little windows so the harem could look out on passing parades (yay women's rights.)
Mackenzie's favorite site: The Rambagh, an old palace of the Maharajah's that has been converted into a really nice hotel. We ate dinner here and then walked around the grounds. Maybe we will stay here next time we come to Jaipur :)
The Jaigarh fort: a big fort atop a hill. It had amazing views of Jaipur, as well as the world's largest wheeled cannon (more compensating?) - which has only been fired once. Think of it like the Death Star.
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