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Sunrise
Sunrise through the smogOur plan the day after I arrive is to head off bright and early to Agra. We are off to visit the Taj Mahal. India however, has another plan for us. The car that arrives to ferry four adults, Catherine, Tim, their son Hugh and I, (the two men are over 6ft tall) and our four backpacks is impossibly tiny. Although anything is possible in India, this is not. We know, as we try to squeeze everyone and everything into this tiny car and then we get angry and head straight for the tour office in Connaught Circle in Old Delhi to go and have a rant as we have booked a large car and will not be fobbed off with a small one. We arrive in a temper, eyes flashing, hair flying to be greeted by three very calm Indians who express extreme concern at our plight. After a number of cups of chai we are off on our way to Agra in the right sized car. Our driver is Subush, a Punjabi without a turban; his description not ours. We do not click with Subash. We are four strong minded adults and we have now added a third strong Content source World Travel Information www.hysjw.cn
Veiled
The Taj Mahal rises out of the smogminded adult to the party.

This 250km trip takes the better part of the day along an Indian freeway which is jam packed with every type of transport imaginable. There are cars, tuk tuks, rickshaws, hand-pushed carts, tractors with trailers, brightly decorated trucks, motor bikes carrying mostly three to four adults. We even see two steam rollers chugging down the road towards Agra ferrying each carrying a load of people in bright clothes. All these vehicles are hooting at each other. Indian drivers do not use rearview mirrors, they expect to be alerted to who is behind them by hooting. Hooting is also used to inform the vehicle ahead that you wish to pass or depending on the tone of the hooting whether you are happy to stay behind them. After six hours of the visual and auditory assault we are shattered and very relieved to arrive at our hotel in Agra. We decide to head off to visit the Taj first thing the next day although Subash has a different plan and tries to force us to visit the Taj that afternoon. We lock horns with Subash and after a heated exchange he agrees, now very amicably that Source of this article www.hysjw.cn
Peeping
Still pure in spite of the corroding smogan early morning visit to the Taj is just the thing and what he would have recommended all along.

We are at the Taj at 7.00 in the next morning. It is a rigmarole. We have a very nice guide Mathew, who informs us on the drive to the Taj that we are not talk to anyone as everyone will try to scam or pickpocket us. We are not allowed to take any electronic equipment into the Taj, except our cameras. It will cost 850 rups each, we get free water. Our guide Mathew is a well spoken gentle Christian from Kerala. He leads the way into the Taj, through all the security where there are separate queues for men and women.
It is cold and the Taj is shrouded in a chemical fog. Three emotions are at play in me at the same time. One part is trying to connect with the awe and atmosphere of the moment as the Taj floats before in me in the fog, clearly a extremely large and substantial structure but at the same time ethereal. Another part is trying to comprehend who built and why they would built such a monumental mausoleum to a dead wife in a Muslim culture and lastly I feel furious at the fact that the chemical fog is clearly destroying the marble of this structure turning it a horrible yellow colour. Shah Jahan, a Mugal emperor built the Taj Mahal as a memororial to his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal, after she died giving birth to their fourteenth child. I am sure she would have appreciated this admiration and dedication of love from her husband but I suspect that this modern day abuse of the feminine may have offended her.

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