Day 3: The Taj Mahal and More

After arriving in Agra late in the evening on Day 2, we went directly to our hotel, aptly named the Taj Hotel Resort, and collapsed into bed. We were very happy to be out of our last hotel, and in a place that looked much nicer. The Taj Hotel was about "800 meters" from the East Gate of the Taj Mahal, and pretty much directly across from the ticket office to get into the Taj, so we felt like we were in a prime location.

Bright in the morning on Day 3, we woke up, got dressed, and walked over to the ticket office. There were different ticket windows for foreign tourists and Indian tourists. The foreign line was much longer, and then we discovered, Indian tour guides were actually getting in to the Indian line to purchase tickets for foreign guests. Oh well. We waited and finally got our tickets, then I thought about getting an audio guide, only to be told I had to download it on to my cell phone. Since I didn't have internet service on my phone in India, that was obviously not going to work!

With your ticket (which costs 750 rupees per person, or $11, by far the most expensive monument we visited), you are given a pair of disposable shoe covers and a free water bottle. Both came in handy. We then departed the ticket office and took a bicycle rickshaw up to the East Gate (our delay in the ticket office made us nervous we'd miss sunrise at the Taj). I shouldn't have been worried though, since the East Gate was still closed when we got there. Only in India, the monuments open late. 

Finally making it through the East Gate

We finally made it through the security lines (men and women were separated and checked by guards of their own gender), and started to approach the main gate to the Taj Mahal. The excitement was pretty palpable. Unfortunately, the sky was also very hazy. 

And then we went through the gate, and there it was:

Our first look at the Taj Mahal

And wow, was it magnificent! I had read countless travel blogs and books which all said "The Taj Mahal's majesty cannot be described accurately with words or in pictures." I always thought it looked pretty impressive in pictures, but having experienced it, it's completely true. It's really HUGE, which I don't think you get in pictures, and it is so perfectly placed and constructed. The gardens leading up to it, the way it sits on the raised marble pedestal so that it looks like it's floating above, the white marble which literally glows....it's ethereal. 

Our first picture with the Taj

After getting to take a few looks at it, we started to walk down toward the Taj through the gardens. There are a TON of native Agrans on the grounds of the Taj, who offer to take pictures of you for a small fee. We decided to indulge, as the photographers (used in the loosest sense of the phrase) seemed to be good at shoo-ing other people out of your photographs, and also promised to get us in the pictures. Let's just say that I've used the "crop and rotate" feature on my photo editor a bit.

There were quite a few silly poses too...remember when I said that Indian tourists like to pick up the India gate by the top? They do it to the Taj too. We mostly refrained. 

At this point, the sun started burning through some of the haze and you can see that the marble was starting to glow. We decided to make our way towards the actual mausoleum so that we could take pictures up close and personal with the Taj.

As we got closer to the Taj, we had to put on our disposable shoe covers, and then we spent some time on the outside of the Taj just examining the intricate carving and stonework. The Taj Mahal is made out of white marble which has a certain amount of translucency. If you shine a flashlight on it, you can see through it somewhat, and it lights up as if from within. The Taj Mahal is also inlaid with tons of semi-precious stones (lapis lazuli, carnelian/fire stone, jade, emerald dust, onyx, etc.) and these stones light up somewhat too.

We then went into the mausoleum and saw the tombs, which were amazing. I was also very impressed with the number of tourists who were there, and still how quiet everything was. I felt like everyone who visited understood the sanctity of the space, and were all impressed by how spiritual it was. People overall were very polite and respectful of staying out of one another's ways for photographs as well. It was a really great tourist experience.

We spent quite some time hanging out on the Taj Mahal afterwards (outside you can sit on the ledges, and look over the Yamuna River in the back), because really, when are we ever going to get to say that we chilled out at the Taj Mahal again? The weather was absolutely perfect, and it was a really magical time. This was definitely one of those "Holy Crap, Can You Believe we are in INDIA?!" moments. 

Now, one thing you may have noticed was that there was scaffolding on three of the four minarets which surround the Taj Mahal. You must understand: this is absolutely predictable and typical for any vacation that I take. National Monuments are cursed around me. I have photographs standing in front of the Acropolis in Greece, covered in scaffolding, the Statue of Liberty in New York City, covered in scaffolding, the United States Congress, covered in scaffolding, and I'm pretty sure a few others, too. Before we went to India, J and I joked "oh I bet the Taj will have scaffolding all over it!"....

Not joking :(

Thankfully, the scaffolding was only on some of the minarets. At the end of the day, we had a good laugh about it.

One other interesting thing about the Taj. Because of air pollution and the concern for how it might damage the Taj Mahal, the city government of Agra has enacted a ban which precludes any motorized vehicles from coming within 100 meters of the Taj Mahal complex. That means, for landscaping purposes, the Taj gardeners cannot use tractors, but instead, use this:

After we had our fill of the Taj (about 3-4 hours) we walked back to the hotel. I started to realize that my shoes were rubbing in a couple of spots, but decided to ignore it at that point in time. Big mistake. We freshened up, had some breakfast provided by the hotel (which was very good), and then we went outside where we found V.K., the auto rickshaw driver who had driven us to our hotel from the railways station the night before. We had agreed to let V.K. take us to some of the other sites after we saw the Taj, which in retrospect, was probably a mistake, but honestly, we had quite a bit of fun being the victims of V.K.'s mercenary capitalism. 

Our first stop on our afternoon tour was the Tomb of Itimad ud Daulah, or as its known in Agra, the "Baby Taj Mahal." The entrance fee was much lower, but it was also disappointing to see how run down this monument was when it's so close to the Taj.

There were beautiful paintings inside the mausoleum

We saw our first monkeys at the Baby Taj!

Beautiful minarets without scaffolding

Please come inside.

It was like sitting inside of an Escher painting.

Fewer precious metals, here they inlaid the designs with cork.

Thinking about using this one for the cover of my first album.

On the banks of the Yamuna River.

When we walked along the backside of the  Baby Taj, there were a bunch of children playing down on the banks of the river. They saw us with cameras and went nuts, begging us to take their pictures. This is one of the kids. After I took his picture he immediately demanded 500 rupees, which seemed a little steep. We gave him some, but not 500.

After we left the Baby Taj, we went to the other side of the river to get a good view of the Taj Mahal. We decided not to go through the Moonlight Garden (Mehtab Bagh) but instead, walked next to it. In retrospect, probably should have gone through the Mehtab Bagh, but then again, I wouldn't have met this guy!

At the end of this sort of broken down construction area, there was a nice view of the back of the Taj Mahal. I was very surprised to see how crowded it had become in the later afternoon hours.

After seeing the back of the Taj Mahal, V.K. was pushing us hard to go do some shopping. I still wanted to get one more site in, but did not want to take on the Agra Fort that afternoon, so I picked the Jama Masjid. Which is, according to Lonely Planet, a very dramatic mosque with a checkerboard marble pattern and high soaring ceilings. 

Lonely Planet failed me on this one. V.K. took us to the Agra Fort train station and told us to walk through the train station and to the other side, where the Jama Masjid was located. First, the Agra Fort train station was much dirtier, smaller, and scarier than the other train stations we had been through. There were also wild monkeys hanging out on all of the elevated walkways, and these monkeys looked pretty aggressive. I began to get a bit nervous, because our train OUT of Agra was scheduled to depart from the Agra Fort train station....at 4 AM. It did not look like the kind of place I really wanted to be at 4 AM. 

We traipsed through the train station over to the bazaar at the bottom of the mosque. Obviously this was a very Muslim populated area, which was a little bit jarring, given my ethnic background. This was definitely not a popular tourist part of town, and we got a LOT of stares, and a lot of people taking surreptitious pictures of us. We made the block through a very crowded area until we found the entrance to the mosque. We walked up, and had to deposit our shoes before entering the mosque...and this is really the only monument in India that I wish I had not deposited my shoes for. We had to cross a large open area which was covered in pigeon poop. There were a lot of people there begging for money, and overall, it did not seem like anyone was excited to have a tourist there looking at the mosque. We made a quick lap then left. Also, it was the hottest part of the day, so this entire endeavor felt like I had just undergone the Bataan Death March. 

We got back to V.K. who was ready to take us shopping for some of the "lovely Mughal arts and crafts" offered in Agra (read: take us to his buddies' shops where he would get a cut of our purchases). But sure, why not, it's a good way to kill the rest of the afternoon. 

V.K. first took us to textile shop. I bought a few pashmina scarves which were very lovely (but which I suspect may have caused me to develop a rash), and J impulse-purchased a kurta. We're looking for a good opportunity for him to wear it. Then, we went to a jewelry shop, where the shopkeeper pushed hard for me to buy some Agra Star Sapphires (in retrospect, I actually really liked the set but still felt that it was overpriced). Then we went to a marble factory, and we actually did end up buying a small coffee table made of white marble.

I am sure someone will tell me that I probably overpaid for it, that I got ripped off, something like that, but you know what? It wasn't that expensive to me, and I liked it, and I had fun buying it. So I consider it a successful shopping venture. 

Our last stop was to a rug making factory, where we were taught how these beautiful Indian cashmere and woolen rugs are made, and I was even allowed to "burn" the stray hairs off of a rug so it wouldn't slip on the floor. The rugs were WAY out of our "impulse purchase" price range, but still so beautiful to look at!

Afterward, we asked VK to bring us back to our hotel, and relaxed a little bit before dinner. I picked a place popular on Trip Advisor which was not within walking distance, so we set out to find another auto rickshaw. A boy about 14 years old came running up to offer us the auto rickshaw. We agreed, and got in with him and his "business partner," who looked slightly older (aka possibly able to legally drive), but who spoke not one word. They took us on a less-traditional path through "The Village" section of Agra, which was old homes, very narrow winding paths, and cows and dogs standing in your way on every turn. It was an adventure, to say for sure. They waited for us while we had a nice dinner (though I started worrying that perhaps we were not having an "authentic" Indian experience since we were eating in a restaurant recommended by Trip Advisor and full of foreigners, and J calmly listened to me), and then they took us back to our hotel. 

Except, when they tried to take us back to our hotel, they realized that many of the main roads in Agra had been shut down due to the "Taj Mahal Festival" that was occurring on the same street as the hotel. And the 60 wedding processionals that were also occurring. Apparently, we came during Agra's High Wedding Season. And weddings are a BIG DEAL in India and roads just shut down for these wedding processionals which last a long time.

Our guides were ever determined to get us back to the hotel, so they started taking us back through the Village. I noticed a dearth of other auto rickshaws in the Village, and began to suspect that perhaps auto rickshaws were not exactly allowed in this part of the city. My suspicions were confirmed when we came round a corner and saw a sewage truck, pumping a septic tank and taking up the entire alleyway. We were stuck. Our little friends were very resourceful though, and began backing up the auto rickshaw to take us down another alleyway. Several of their friends emerged from different homes, and, after staring at J and I for a little bit, began to help push the auto rickshaw back to another alley. Then the auto rickshaw's wheel fell in the gutter, which actually was below the edge of the street. No worries! The group pulled it out after some consultation, and we were back on our way. I only felt like I might be in a bad situation for about 30 seconds.

We got back to the hotel and pretty much collapsed. It was a very busy day, after all.