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Published: February 27th 2019
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India, Day 5 - 7, Sunday-Tuesday early
The Taj Mahal - its very name conjures up visions of beauty, purity, perfection, and gleaming clean whiteness.
What a shame then that the town it's located in doesn't! What a hovel, steaming, turgid, turd ridden, falling down, traffic jammed, cess pit mess Agra is. The 'rough' areas of Delhi that we walked through weren't a patch on grotty Agra.
At least the hotel we were booked into was geared up for tourists, though internet was, once again, flaky and practically inaccessible in our room even though there was a router in the corridor immediately above our door.
We had an early start on Monday for sunrise at the Taj Mahal before breakfast. Not so early as to join the queue for 2 hours before opening, as apparently many people do, but early enough to get in shortly after 6:45am/sunrise opening time.
They are VERY strict on what you can/not take in to the site.
Allowed - yourselves, clothes wearing, wallet, passport, camera, phone, analogue watch, the bottled water you are given at ticket desk
Not allowed - anything else electrical including digital watches and power packs,
books incl notebooks, pens/pencils etc, cosmetics, creams/lotions/potions of any kind, anything edible or quaffable at all.
All the security checks we have gone through - metro, attractions etc - are gender separate - separate queue for men from women. This, along with the restrictive items list for the TM, meant that at the entrance security check whilst the three men on the trip plus the guide Abi sailed straight through, the ladies queue was 100 yards or so - all their bags had to be physically inspected ?. But the wait wasn't too bad, 10 minutes or so.
As you enter the complex you can't see the Taj immediately, even when getting past the entrance complex. You have to pass through another magnificent sandstone gateway building before you see the Taj.
And it is quite a sight when you reach the inner viewpoint.
There were plenty of people there but you couldn't call it crowded. And the sunrise light was pretty damn good, though on the more distant camera shots the poor air quality had a hazing effect on the pictures. But many photos were taken, and the light changed noticeably whilst we were there and
we are sure that when viewed on a full screen back home we will have some satisfactory memory shots.
The Taj was built by the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his favourite wife Mumtaz, who died in 1631 whilst giving birth to their 14th - ? - child (in 19 years of marriage ). Jahan employed artisans from all over his Empire, including central Asia and Iran. The white bricks for the internal structure were made locally, whilst the white marble came from Makrana, Rajasthan. It took 17 years to build. One of the reasons for its location, next to a river, is that marble 'dries out' and cracks in a too dry atmosphere. Being next to a river helps prevent this.
The Taj Mahal is perfectly symmetrical, the central point being Mumtaz's tomb. The 4 minarets at the outside corners lean very slightly outwards, just in case of earthquake so they would fall away from the main building. And it is as high as it is wide, 55 metres.
There are two, mirror image flanking buildings, but one is a mosque, the other an assembly hall.
One of the most beautiful aspects is
the exquisitely carved pietra dura inlaid with semi precious stones.
The colour of the marble changes as the sunrise (and sunset too) light changes and we were able to observe these changes during the 2 hours or so we were there for - entry tokens are time limited though we don't know how they enforce this or what the consequences for late exit would be.
You can walk on the immediate upper platform and inside the building but you are required to wear paper overshoes over your footwear. So we guess the floors are getting a continuous polish.
We understand that some significant renovation work is planned and later this year the dome and elsewhere will be covered in scaffolding. We are so glad we have avoided that horror! (We had it when visiting the Trevi fountain in Rome, which was empty and all scaffolded up).
As usual we had to run the gamut of streets hawkers and their wares - Taj Mahal snow dome anyone? Just 100 rupees, ~£1.10 (Incidentally, on Tuesday several of our group did buy TM snow domes and were saying they were leaking silver flakes almost immediately ❄).
And then
it was back for breakfast.
The Taj Mahal is not the only impressive structure in Agra. After breakfast we went to the so-called 'Baby Taj', the Tomb of Itimad-Ud-Daulah, 1622-28.
This is also a picture of loveliness. Much more dinky than Taj M, but its exterior is more finely and delicately decorated with colourful inlays. It is also somewhat overlooked compared to the grand Taj M.
Our final stop of the day was the Agra Fort, home to all the early Mughal emperors. Humayun, as in the tomb 2 days ago, was crowned emperor here in 1530. Most of the present Fort was built in the reign of Akbar the Great, 1556-1605. And although the group was there for 2 hours or so this only takes in around 30% of the total site. Most of the remainder is occupied by the Indian Army.
In the evening we all went to a - very touristy - bollywood style show telling the story of Shah Jahan's love for Mumtaz, her death and the Taj Mahal. Told & sung in Hindu we listened via headphones which gave us an English version. 10 languages were available via these headsets. Very
international. It wasn't exactly Riverdance or Shakespeare but was fun nevertheless.
Tuesday morning and we had a flood of almost biblical proportions. ........ in our room! The stopcock behind the toilet had a constant drip and so Paul had taken to turning it off, and back on again when we used the toilet. However, the tap didn't take kindly to this and on Tuesday morning, before breakfast, the tap came off in Paul's hand. The result was an horizontal jet of water that sprayed across the bathroom to hit the wall opposite. Although there was a drain in the bathroom floor by the time Paul arrived back from an urgent visit to Reception the water was flowing out of the bathroom and into the bedroom.
We went to breakfast and left them to it. They were still working on it when we got back, so we finished our packing and left.
Loving some of the signs we saw near the Taj with wonderful mixed up language:-
"Please use the bins to throw rubbish"
From the amount of rubbish thrown around wethinks many people have followed that instruction.
"Please don't entertain the street performers with
animals"
Good job we didn't bring our performing pet monkey with us then.
"No parking, tyres will be deflated"
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