Touring the Golden Triangle

Asia » India
September 1st 2009

Published: September 1st 2009

As part of our program, those studying at the University of Delhi are allotted a paid trip along the so-called “Golden Triangle” route. It covers Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur, yet seeing as we live in Delhi and in fact imprisoned by it, we really only needed to see the latter two cities. So last Friday, accompanied by our wonderful program coordinator, Uncle Viji, all thirty or so of us piled into a big white bus that read TOURIST on the front, and we headed to Jaipur, the capital of Rajasthan. I really had not experienced this kind of traveling since coming to Delhi, opting instead for cheaper, more inconspicuous, and altogether easier independent travel. So the sightseeing, fanny pack-wearing, too-much-sunscreen-on-your-nose style of tourism was an altogether new experience for me. We decided to embrace it, and in fact, relish it.
The road from Delhi to Jaipur is a brief introduction to Rajasthan, with the sky being more blue, the farmland more green, and the landscape more rugged. But India is so packed full of settlement and people that most roads at least have dabas and vendors running along side them, giving the illusion that India is just one big village. Or at least I haven’t been to any roads without this kind of development outside of Yamunotri. So it didn’t really hit me that we were out of Delhi until I began to see carts being pulled by camels instead of oxen or horses.
We reached Jaipur in about seven hours, having stopped for a late breakfast along the way (with a group of our size and potentially inebriated states of mind, doing anything takes longer than Viji wants it to. But Viji is so nice that he never comments on the issue). Like most all India towns and cities, there was no real introduction to Jaipur or pronounced landmark to signify our arrival; all of the sudden, Viji told us that the dilapidated buildings around us were in Jaipur, a city of three million that we were told was “a smaller city.” Smaller than what? Delhi? Everything is smaller than Delhi. But we did see sandstone forts standing atop exotic cliffs above the city buildings, and we instantly knew that this would be a popular place among tourists.
Viji is the kind of man who looks like he has always had children and loves to eat big dinners with the family. He has big glasses and a mustache, a round figure, and a youthful smile that is either brightly on display or replaced by a concerned and serious look. We all love him to death. We loved him even more after we discovered his style of travel. We were put in a hotel about fifteen minutes from the center of Jaipur, and what a hotel it was! The lobby itself was complete with a doorman dressed as a Rajput guard and was decked in white marble and a golden chandelier. Someone even took our bags! There were a few fancy restaurants, a garden, maybe a hundred rooms, a rooftop bar, a swimming pool, an exercise room, business conference halls, etc. Our rooms were furbished with the most comfortable bed I had slept in India, a luxurious comforter, plasma screen televisions, a minifridge, a microwave, and best of all… a shower! We were all in Heaven, and would have been content to wile away the trip in the swimming pool. But we had sights to see.
Before the sights, however, we were treated to a lavish buffet meal. Apparently Viji knew the owner of a certain chain of hotels (he must have saved his life or done something of equal gravity, because to put our motley crew up in a four star hotel is no ordinary favor), and so we got to stay for a large discount. The buffet was a delicious selection of gourmet Indian food, Italian food, American food, salads, soups, breads, deserts, and juices. Much better than muesli and goat milk, to say the least. We stuffed ourselves silly, and would do so again three times a day for the rest of the trip.
Finally, we got out of the hotel and went to the Pink City, as old Jaipur is known. This central part of the city is a few hundred years old, and so named because of the reddish color of all the buildings within its walls. Jaipur is primarily known for its bazaars, which are some of the most frenetic in the subcontinent. Most handicraft souveneirs, jewelry, and textiles are sold wholesale from Jaipur. But it’s not the variety of products on display that makes this city frenetic. It is the relentless hawkers, vendors, and scam artists. This, coupled with Jaipur’s steady flow of unexperienced tourists, means for an exhausting excursion into the bazaars. People will sell everything: all manner of handicrafts, shoes, toys, postcards, pens, lights, their own prosthetic limbs (I’m not kidding, two people on my program were asked by two different Indians), camels, carts, you name it. Getting off of the bus was a nightmare, and I literally had to push through plastic elephants, pink baby clothes, and a smiling man with a miniature brass water pump who screamed, “You like?” into my face. We left after an hour to go back and eat at the hotel. I’m assuming that Viji just wanted us to see what we were getting into. This was a whole new kind of excitement. Usually, the stress comes from navigating, communicating, finding places to eat and sleep. But with everything paid for on this trip, the stress came being a tourist in India, and not just a student. I pity those unfortunate tourists from middle America who spend a week on a tour bus in India, getting off to take pictures and give in to hawkers, then climbing back on board to dwell in the safety of their little bubbles.
That night we ate another meal, swam, watched television, drank mojitos. When in Viji’s care.
We ate another meal the next morning. I can’t get over this “eating meals.” Peanut butter and jelly just doesn’t cut it every day. Afterwards, we headed out to Amber Fort, which sits about 10 kilometers north of Jaipur in a once secluded location atop the cliffs. Now, there is a town built around the bottom of the hill that leads to the fort, but its presence still has a majesty that has been untainted by the hawkers. We got off the bus and then took an elephant ride, which was more than a little distressing. We later found out that there was a demonstration going on the same morning that we rode the elephants, protesting the poor treatment of the elephants at Amber Fort, which has led to the recent death of a few due to exhaustion and maltreatment. The elephants seemed only a fraction of their former glory, giving off an aura of sadness that was unmistakable (and this isn’t just the animal lover in me). Elephants are very intelligent animals, and despite the excitement I had at the thought of riding one (this, of course, was before we arrived at Amber Fort), their run-down appearance and tired movements were overwhelming. I am even ashamed that I rode one. When I got to the top of the hill, we were assaulted by more hawkers, these ones having taken our pictures on the ride up and trying to sell them to us. I had just about had it when one hawker tried to sell me a picture of two people I had never seen before, and then proceed to argue that it was indeed me. I shuffled past and waited next to the gate while Viji bought our tickets. The outing was not off to a good start.
But once we had the tickets and got inside, the exotic locale that we were in really came to life. I noticed how remarkable the architecture of the fort was, how complicated the passageways, and how difficult it would have been to storm these walls a few hundred years ago. India has a rich Medieval castle history to rival Europe; it’s forts and palaces are simply a different style from the well-known castles of Germany, Britain, and France. We wandered the fort for a few hours (an extra hour because a few of our group got lost) before returning to the big Tourist bus and then enjoying another meal at the hotel. I delighted in a heaping plate of pasta, chicken, ice cream, steamed vegetables, naan, curried potatoes, dal makhani, and tomato soup.
Later that day, we headed to the City Palace in Jaipur’s Pink City, which was basically a museum. We also passed the Hawa Mahal, an instantly recognizable building that was built so that women could see passing parades from its windows without going outside to the chaos below. We also did a little shopping. We also were attacked by more peddlers, who apparently could smell us from miles away. Each time we would prepare to exit the bus, we observed a chaotic scramble in which useless junk was thrown over shoulders and men desperately stumbled over to our door. The large group was taking its toll on our touristic endeavors. We wanted nothing more than to go back to the hotel and act like the little princes and princesses we felt like. Riding in a sheltered tourist bus will really put a distance between oneself and the outside world. I was beginning to see the weekend excursion as less of a trip into India, and more as a getaway from India.
The next morning, we checked out of our hotel and headed toward Agra, but not before stopping at Fatehpur Sikri, an old abandoned city built by Emperor Akbar. The city only lasted about fourteen years before the capital of the empire was moved to Agra. Akbar is known, besides drastically expanding the boundaries of the Mughal Empire in India, for bringing a degree of religious tolerance to the empire that would become a model for centuries to come. I wouldn’t call him a liberal just yet, however; his palace was essentially a playground for his numerous wives and hundreds of concubines. It had magnificent architecture, however, and was deservedly a tourist attraction. A highlight was the gigantic mosque, which was almost as big as the Jama Masjid in Delhi. The hawkers, though plentiful, did not even seem to bother me here, as I had become numb to all those who were not within my EAP group (undoubtedly a syndrome that afflicts most tour bus tourists). Nonetheless, I couldn’t help but wonder what idiots were buying the little plastic boxes the hawkers were selling as ivory, or the copper jewelry that they claimed was Akbar’s gold.
That afternoon, we reached Agra and checked into another glorious hotel under the same management as the one in Jaipur. Another meal. Another swimming session. After a quick nap, we were riled up again by Viji and crammed into the bus. This time, we were going to the mother of all tourist pit stops in India: the Taj Mahal herself.
It is very rare that something with as much hype as the Taj Mahal could live up to its expectations. The building would seem to be the most photographed structure of all time, except perhaps the pyramids or the coliseum. As a result, I had only moderate expectations, this perhaps because I was more than a little jaded by this point in time. But the Taj Mahal did not disappoint. In fact, it made all of the hawkers and waiting seem like mere trifles on the road to a great prize. The Taj Mahal is truly one of the wonders of the world.
We could see the top of the dome over a large red sandstone wall at the entrance. It was evening time, and the sun would be setting in an hour or so. The peddlers were tired; they seemed to have ransacked their tourist quota for the day. The overweight Midwestern tourists were on their way home, their sweaty khaki shorts scrunched up under their buttocks and their red faces hidden behind big black sunglasses. Viji gave us our tickets and we headed inside.
We were simply awe-struck. The story goes like this: Emperor Shah Jahan, the same who would move the Mughal capital to Delhi and create Shahjahanabad, loved his wife so dearly that after her death, he did not leave his room for months. When he finally emerged, it was only to build a monument to his wife, whom he referred to as Mum Taj; the most beautiful woman in the universe. He began what was to be the Mum Taj Mahal, not completing it for a full twenty years. Upon completion, the main tomb (there are two large buildings to the sides of the Taj Mahal itself and one large entry building at its front, all of which are set around a garden and canal in perfect symmetry) weighed over 250,000 tons, all made from white marble. The marble was carried by over 1000 elephants from Rajasthan. The tomb was built in the same manner as the pyramids, with a sand ramp being built along with the building so that the heavy marble could be dragged to the next layer. By the end, the sand ramp was six and a half kilometers long. The true cost of the complex is difficult to determine, although it is estimated to be exorbitantly expensive even by today’s standards. After the building was completed almost 400 years ago, the emperor wanted to build another one. His son decided enough was enough and threw his father in jail for the rest of his life, but allowed him a window with a view to his beloved Mum Taj Mahal. When Shah Jahan died, his two daughters buried him within the tomb next to his lover.
The building looks absolutely perfect, and our tour guide informed us that it was, save for Shah Jahan’s sarcophagus, which sits to the side of his wife’s central one, purposefully throwing off the inside of the tomb’s symmetry (only Allah can be perfect). The pristine condition is maintained every Friday, when the Taj Mahal closes and is renovated by a group of masons descended from those who originally constructed the Taj Mahal. The whole complex looks as though it could have been built yesterday. We wandered around the complex and inside the tomb, unable to comprehend where we were. The only thing that brought us back to reality was the array of comical poses struck by various tourists. I watched one man try to get the “holding the Taj Mahal” pose perfectly for a good five minutes. I held my outward laughter, though, as I had secretly done the same with a few friends.
Our time at the Taj Mahal eventually came to an end, but an image of the imposing white building, glistening with a yellow tinge in the setting sun, and rising up from the surrounding countryside like a city on a cloud, will forever be etched into my memory.
The next morning, we had another meal and took the bus to Agra Fort, which was, at this point, redundant. Too many forts in one weekend is just beating a dead horse. A fort is a fort, for the most part. It’s one saving grace (and I know I sound like a spoiled American, right now, but that’s who I was the whole weekend) was its view of the Taj Mahal. After another meal at the hotel, a final blowout extraveganza with macaroni and cheese, crème brulee, and mocha cake, we packed up our bags and headed to the bus. On our way out of Agra, we stopped at one more monument, thankfully not another fort. It was Akbar’s tomb, which was an elegant and masculine salute to a great emperor. There were wild antelope grazing on the lawns beside it, and the architecture was grand and exotic, especially with the addition of a few palm trees.
On the drive back to Delhi, I took note of the blue sky once more. Even from my tour bus, I could glimpse a side of India that is always enchanting; the shine of the sun, illuminating the grey contours of Biblical nimbus bodies, and then pouring over the greens and browns of the Indian farms, oxen, dogs, men on motor cycles, women in saris, all floundering under the same open sky that mortals share in the vast stretches of the American heartland. I liken the scene to one from a John Steinback novel, or perhaps a Salman Rushdie novel. If the sky is correct, I suppose their the same. This is a sight that never ceases to amaze me, and no matter what my state of mind, the Indian countryside always instills in me that primitive tingling in the spine that all humans share when they see the sun set; it reminds me what I came to India for, and what I will return to when I leave.
But until then, I will not get on another damned tourist bus, because I just can’t justify the looks I got from Indians through the tinted windows.

Touring the Golden Triangle

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