India: seeing the Taj Mahal at sunrise and sunset

Written by Charles December 3, 2013

We landed at the Delhi airport, and the first thing I noticed was the temperature.  It was back to normal!  Or at least Puerto Rico normal, which is 75.   The second thing that I noticed was the smell.  After an 8-hour plane ride, you’d think that your nose would want to retire.  The smell outside though made the Chinese “non smoking flight” smell tame.  The smell was something like cigarettes/burning trash.  After driving 30 minutes, weaving between suicidal bikers, motorcyclists, car drivers, army trucks, and tuk tuks, we eventually made it to the hotel.  Tuk tuks are three wheelers; there are two seats in the back and one in the front for the driver.  They are Delhi’s taxis, and there are a hundred fifty thousand of them; the locals fit 6-7 people in them and use them as the main mode of transportation.  We ate Indian food, which is overly spicy, and I think I needed a fire hose to cool off my mouth.

The next day we flew in a tiny plane to Agra.  We went there because we were going to see the Taj Mahal.  We first saw it from the car, and it was white.  I mean tooth white.  When we arrived at our hotel that we are staying at for the night, we saw that you could see it from our balcony!  I thought that was pretty cool.  After that we went to lunch and had chicken curry.  It was spicy like everything there, but I liked it.  Then we went to see the Taj Mahal; we rode in a golf cart to the main gate.  There were cows in the street, horses pulling carriages, pigs wandering around, even camels pulling carriages!  The smell was awful because there was poop in the road, and the road was crowded too.  They had prayer music blaring in Arabic, I think, and everyone was honking the horns on cars, motorcycles, tuk tuks and even on their horses.  We finally got there and went through the gate, and then we hit the crowds.  There were wave after waves of people, and we went with the flow.  The funny thing though is that all the people were Indian.  Only about ten percent were Westerners. 

The guide told us that if we stand in a certain spot, you could draw a perfectly straight line from there, down the main walkway, all the way inside, and directly into the empress’s tomb.  I thought that was cool and creepy at the same time.  We first walked towards the massive building.  There were lots of people who wanted to take pictures with us.  Although some didn’t ask and just stuck their cameras in our faces.  We walked down the less crowded sidewalks and took lots of pictures.  Then we went into a mosque.  A mosque is a church for Muslims, and some were praying in there.  We had to take off our shoes and went in our socks.  Then we went inside to see the tomb of the Emperor and Empress, or at least that was the idea.  There were lots of people in there, and there was no ventilation, so it was hot and stuffy.  My dad got us out of there, but the guide wanted to show us one cool thing.  It was the semi-precious jewels that were carved and glued into the walls.  They made the coolest designs.  There was one stone that he held a light up to, and the stone glowed.  After that my dad made us scramble and get out of there.  By that time it was dinnertime, and we went back to the hotel.  Though it was not before we did some shopping.  Mom and William broke the bank again and bought silk embroidery.  I, the golden child, didn’t cut the funding for the trip; I was good and didn’t buy anything. 

At 6:00am the next day, we woke up and went to see the Taj Mahal.  It was the same golf cart ride there, only it was less crowded.  We waited in line for ten minutes, and then we could go in.  We went directly inside, but I saw while the sun was rising, it turned pink.  The gleaming white from the afternoon before had turned into a pinkish white building.  We went inside without a problem, and there were three other people inside.  One was the security guard, so that made two tourists.  We looked at the intercut carvings that were all done by hand, and everyone was amazed.  We couldn’t take pictures, so we can’t show you. L  I was amazed at the symmetry; the only place where it is broken in the entire building is where the emperor’s tomb lay next to the empress’s.  I was also amazed at that.  After seeing the Taj a second time, we got breakfast and headed to a fort.  The same guy who built the Taj built the fort of Agra.  If anyone has ever been to Puerto Rico and went to the fort in San Juan, the fort was sort of like that one, only in sandstone and with screaming monkeys.  All the gateways that we walked through, there were screaming monkeys, and the guide said that they are aggressive.  There were also lots of carvings there.  Then we went to a place where we saw how they make the carvings, like the ones in the Taj.  I thought it was cool, and my mom got a vase with the carvings in it.

After the workshop, we took the small plane back to Delhi.  We saw lots of Indian Air Force planes on the runway, and it turned out that the military uses that for a non-official base.  I saw one of the planes that has the big radar disk on top, and I wondered where it was going.  When we landed in Delhi, we went through the suicidal traffic back to the first hotel.  In the afternoon William, Ms. Jenn, and my dad went to the old town in rickshaws, but I stayed back with my mom and took a nap.  It was worth it though because they said it was very crowded.   At dinner we had an Indian tasting menu, and I tried everything.  It was all really good. That was our last day before going to Dubai, and I am really excited for it, even though I want to come back to India.

Written by William December 4, 2013

We went to Delhi and spent one night there. The next morning we flew on a private plane to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. At lunch I discovered that chicken curry can be yummy. Our hotel rooms had a view of the Taj Mahal. After lunch, we went to see it. When we arrived I noticed that it was made out of marble, and our guide, Raj, told us it was also made out of the semi-precious stones. You would think it is a palace, but it is really a mausoleum (gravesite) built by Shah Jahan for his third wife, who he loved the most. He wanted to build a simpler black version for himself across the river, but his son overthrew him and exiled him, making him build his own prison at the Agra fort. That prevented him from building one for himself. I thought it was pretty cool sightseeing, but there were a lot of people there. When we went inside, Raj showed us how one of the types of jewels lights up when a flashlight shines on it.

The next day, we woke up at sunrise to see the Taj again when it was less crowded and also because it looks like different colors during different times of the day. That time I had a better experience because there weren’t as many people. We got to see a lot more and took better pictures. I would recommend going to see it, and I also would want to go back. Next we went to see the Agra fort. When we came in, we saw monkeys, and they were screaming. Raj told us to keep walking forward, and Miss Jenn was trying to take pictures of them. She thought they were cute, but they really were evil. We learned that the moat was once filled with alligators and poisonous snakes so enemies couldn’t swim across, but now its filled with garbage and water. After that, we flew back to Delhi in the private plane.

That afternoon, Miss Jenn, my dad, Raj, and I went to Old Delhi, which made Times Square in New York City look empty. We took rickshaws to a mosque and then through the Muslim and Hindu marketplaces. It was pretty miserable for me because it was really crowded, loud, and I was tired from going non-stop that day. Charles and my mom didn’t want to have the crazy experience, so they took naps instead. We were on a really narrow street, and it was really crowded. Two wheels bumped together on the rickshaws, so people picked one up to help move it along. Above us, we could see monkeys climbing on the power lines. I wish I had stayed at the hotel for a nap!

I liked every part of India that we saw except for Old Delhi. A lot of the locals liked taking photos of me and Miss Jenn because they are not used to seeing people who look like us. Raj was one of my favorite guides on the trip so far; it was like having a local family member show us around. One of the funny things that Raj did was shove an old man out of the way of Miss Jenn, and then he said “he had no business being there.” At the airport, we saw some little local kids wanting to polish our shoes (even our flip flops), and Raj told us that they usually throw dirt on your shoes and then ask to polish them. I felt bad for those kids because their parents basically kick them out of the house during the day and make them go make some money. Overall I liked India, and I would recommend Raj as a tour guide (we have his card if you are interested!).