Finally!!! After one year in India I finally went to see the Taj Mahal!
It took a friends visit to take the time and go there, and it was worth every minute of it!
My friend Rian came to visit me and as it was her first time in India we tried to experience all sides of India within the week she was here. Luckily she has a very open mind and thinks everything is exciting and intreguing, and that quality is immediately grasped and understood by the Indians...I have never seen so many people that wanted to take a picture with her!
The weekend we took it easy...shopping in Hauz Khas in my favorite shop (Country Collection, always good for something beautiful) and then a South Indian thali for lunch on saturday, and on sunday a walk and lunch in Lodi Garden. Monday we had booked the "Nigel Tour" - Nigel is a 86 year old English gentleman who came to India whilst in the Army and never left. As he puts it he "wanted someone to bring him tea and a newspaper at 7 in the morning", and in India he could have that. Nigel knows everything about Delhi and its (British) history, and took us on a very comprehensive tour through a Sikh temple, a step well in the washerman-quarter, the ghats at the banks of the Yamuna River where bodies of deceased are burned, the old expat neighbourhoods (this is where the Europeans lived around 1900) and the place where Delhi began...King George the 4th announced here in 1911 that Delhi would be the new capital of India, only to have his architect decide one year later that the spot wasn't good because it flooded during the monsoon...there you are. After lunch we visited Old Delhi, with its bazaars and narrow streets, its crowded alleys, its (literally) breathtaking spice market and glittering wedding street. At the end of the day we were exhausted, only to find that Nigel would happily have continued!
Tuesday was Ghandi's birthday and this year we spend it by the pool...the weather was perfect, the water still bearable (winter has started and it is now rapidly cooling down) and everywhere it was quiet...perfect!
And finally wednesday we went to Agra. We took the Shatabti express at 6 in the morning and arrived in Agra at 8...the train ride itself was an experience, with all the food and tea being handed out and Rian eyeing every package with curiosity...and the gentlemen sitting in front of us eyeing her with curiosity....
We were met by a Bollywood star (not really, he works for the travel agent, but he COULD have been a Bollywood star) and taken to our car with our driver for the day, Yugesh. Yugesh (we named him You Guess because we couldn't remember his name otherwise) took us to the Taj...and there we were, at 9 in the morning, with glorious views on the biggest monument for love.
The Taj Mahal is obviously a tourist destination and often these attractions are overpriced and overrated, but in this case it was worth every Rupee...in one word, perfect!
By the time we left the crowds were coming and we became a tourist attraction ourselves (mainly Rian, I must admit)...many people wanted to take our picture (or basically, their picture with us in it posing as their longtime friends from Australia) and this time I let go of my "here we go again" and followed Rian's enthousiasm, and laughed my head of!
Then we went to the Fort, which actually was as beautiful as the Taj. From the Fort you can see the Taj, lying in the distance at the bank of the Yamuna river, like a painting from long lost days. It was in this Fort that Shah Jahan was emprisoned, looking at the grave of his beloved Mumtaz Mahal for 8 years, until he died. Serves him right...rumour has it that he chopped off the hands of the craftsmen who build the Taj so they would never again build something so perfect (and looking at India as it is now, it seems he succeeded...).
Still, the Fort is the most beautiful Fort I have seen since I arrived in India, with the Amber Fort in jaipur coming second.
After lunch we drove to Fatehpur Sigri, the ghost town build by Shah Akbar. The town was deserted soon after his death due to water shortages, and the buildings remain as a testimony of the time...beautiful, quiet, hot...and unfortunately full of "guides" who attach themselves like flies in the desert, pestering tourists with scary stories that they will never be able to understand the town and all it's monument without their help and guidance. fortunately the Lonely Planet had warned us for these guides and the fact that most of what they tell is made up anyway. Still, we didn't see the Jama Masjid and probably part of the buildings due to the guides following us...suddenly, I was fed up completely with the harassing and the constant whining for money, money, money...in India, everybody wants money. From us, that is, because we have "many Rupees". keep on dreaming.
We ended the day with beer and snacks in the Taj palace hotel, end then were taken back to the station by our Bollywood guy, who literally put us on the train, to be met by T and mr. Gill two hours later at Delhi Station. Wow! What a day!
