Pushkar is a rather small town set in a valley up a mountain road from the much larger nearby city of Ajmer. It is considered one of India's holiest cities and is full of Hindu pilgrims visiting its temple dedicated to the creator god Brahma, one of rather few temples dedicated to him in the world. Pushkar has one major mostly-pedestrian thoroughfare which snakes around the edge of its holy lake, said to have been created when Brahma dropped a lotus flower.

Similar to the Ganges shores at holy Varanasi, Pushkar Lake is surrounded by 52 bathing ghats for ritual purification, several of which are overrun with priests or those posing as them insistent on taking tourists for a puja (prayer) by the water for a negotiable donation . As well as a puja and blessing the tourist gets a Pushkar Passport, a red wrist band that proves to the world one has made the pilgrimage to Pushkar. Yes, I let myself get suckered into it for 200 rupees (about $3).

Unfortunately, after the rather long drive from Jodhpur we only had a half day in Puskar before continuing on to Udaipur. The sights weren't too extensive but it was fun to take in the backpacker hippy vide of the town. Pushkar is one of numerous places in India and Nepal so popular with Israeli travelers that most signs are in Hebrew as well as English, a good place to mellow out for an extended period of time after completing stressful military service is suppose.

Being a holy city, Pushkar is another place where Bhang (cannabis plant product) is widely available in drinks, added to restaurant meals, and sold as other edibles. I wasn't convinced I got the full experience from the "special" lassis I tried in Jaiselmer so figured I'd try again in Pushkar since I might not have many other chances in the other places I would be visiting . So I ordered a Special Lassi in a restaurant and replied "strong" when asked by the waiter how potent I wanted it. It was tasty enough but also most than twice the size of the lassis I had several days before.

Shortly afterwards I met some of my fellow travelers for dinner at an Italian restaurant not too far from our hotel. Pushkar is a holy city, which means bhang is legal but alcohol is illegal. This is still India, though, so when you order a beer in a place where it's illegal the can just comes wrapped in aluminum foil to be drunk from a coffee mug. About halfway through dinner the bhang suddenly hit me, and I thought "I better get back to the room while I still can walk". I left my rupees to pay for dinner on the table and made a quiet exit from the restaurant, my head spinning all the way back to the hotel and up the stairs to my room. I crashed on the bed, the room spinning around me, bright colors flashing through my head, lying for hours in an almost paralyzed state where rolling to my side involved major effort. "Should I tell my roommate in case I can't physically move when my alarm goes off at 5:00 A.M. for our early departure?" I wondered.

When my alarm rang, though, I felt fine and incredibly well rested. My roommate Paul also noted that I didn't snore that night for the first time since he had been rooming with me. Maybe bhang is a cure for snoring? Anyway, I guess I finally figured out what I'd missed over the years by sticking to booze and not joining my stoner friends and acquaintances in their cannibis.