abstract: Tourists are beckoned by the colors of Rajasthan. Splashed over gelatin or equivalents, these colors draw the magic of their aesthetics from contrasts. The women of Rajasthan defy the drab monotone of a semi arid environment by riots of in between them, however, signified that they were used more in hunting. Our host, indeed, had spent his last working years as a warden of a game preserve. So he symbolized still another step in the transition of Jaipur’s society.
This family, as it turned out, was even more fully such a bridge between the past and the future.
The owners’ daughter also lived with them. She joined us later for dinner, having just returned from work. She was the only one in the family who wore western clothes. She was a professional, she said, “a clothes designer.” This was around the time India’s Prime Minister was visiting the U.S. and the American President had just given a State Dinner in his honor. Indian papers proudly featured the story of the American First Lady wearing a dress designed by an Indian to that dinner. When I brought that subject up, my young hostess said that she knew the designer. This hostess was a rare divorced woman in India. “The rate of divorce in India is only 15%,” our tour guide had said. My hostess was attractive, but tonight she looked tired, maybe even sad, maybe even bored with this business of hosting strangers that her jovial retired father seemed to enjoy.
