Everyone was excited when the day of Jaipur Elephant Festival arrived. We had just got to Jaipur and into our hotel the night before. I woke up alone in the bedroom the next morning. It turned out it was 9:30 a.m. I opened the door a crack and peaked through to see three members of my family drinking chai at a table outside of our hotel room. (Chai is a very milky kind of tea that is almost everywhere in India. Usually it’s very sweet.) I managed to get Mom to notice me inside and she came in and told me what the plan was for the day. I had forgotten all about the Elephant Festival. I was so excited when she mentioned it in our plan.
After breakfast we had to get clothes for Holi the next day (Holi is an Indian holiday that happens in the beginning of spring. They throw colored powder everywhere and it’s lots of fun.) because we didn’t want to get the clothes we’re traveling with colored. When we had found some clothes for a cheap price, we came back to our guesthouse to drop off our clothes and drove away to the Elephant Festival with the owner of our hotel. His name is Diggie. He is really nice and the night we arrived he gave Adam and me chocolates and Sprite.
I was so excited to go to the Elephant Festival! When we got there we had to get seats in the front row for Adam and me because we couldn’t really see over the heads of all the other people. While we were waiting, an announcement came from the loudspeaker. “There will be a few activities after the procession has ended,” it said in a booming voice. “Please come to the front table if you are interested and get further information.” My dad was interested so he went over to check it out. When he came back, he told us he signed up for a race where you have to carry a pot of colored water on top of your head.
After about another 30-45 minutes of staring at the open field, the first elephant came into my line of site. There was the head, neck, and hind legs of a lion painted on it’s head. In the lion’s mouth was a small animal that, to me, looked a lot like a deer. But the coolest feature of all, I thought, was the lion’s eye. It was actually the elephant’s eye. That way the lion could blink! Of course, the first elephant was the best. The parade of elephants never ended. After quite some time I spotted something that didn’t look anything like an elephant. A camel! Lots of camels! Next came lines of dancing ladies, all with long flowy skirts twirling in the air. Then more elephants. It was such an amazing sight!
Finally the procession ended and it was time for my dad to go out onto the field and do the race. He got a shirt that said “The Jaipur Elephant Festival” on it. He was out on the field and then the speaker called “On your mark, get set, go!” He ran pretty fast but he didn’t win. The pots were really big and heavy. On his way to the finish line, he spilled his pot and it soaked about five different people with pink water, including him. Then the pot fell to the ground and shattered. My dad wasn’t the only one who broke his pot, though. It was fun to watch.
After awhile people started going onto the field and my family just had to go on too and see what was going on. We walked right up to the winning elephants. It was pretty cool seeing them up close. Adam and I got our picture taken with the elephant that got a trophy.
Then we noticed a big crowd in the center of the field. We came over to see what was happening. There were lots of ladies doing a dance with flower petals and men playing drums and singing. The ladies threw the flower petals up and spun them around in trays. After awhile the crowd of locals and tourists joined in, including my family. There were flower petals flying everywhere! Then people started throwing colored powder everywhere and we decided to get away because we didn’t have our Holi clothes. Then there were the “Holi-works”. Holi-works is a name my dad made up. It was like fireworks, but the colored powder shot into the sky instead of sparks. We decided not to get too close because we might be sprayed in powder.
Finally it was time to go. I was kind of sad to leave all the fun. The Elephant Festival was one of my favorite things in India.
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