2-07-09

I realize that everybody goes to Agra to visit the Taj Mahal, but we have yet to do this. After eating breakfast at the hotel restaurant, which offers no view of the Taj the close proximity which makes it a prime tourist destination, we headed strait to the bus station so we could visit Fatehpur Sikri. This palace and mosque was built by Emperor Akbar the Great to be the capital of the Mughal Empire. The entire complex was built in sixteen short years, but was lived in for only 14 years. Jahengir, Akbar’s son, moved the capital to Agra almost immediately after Akbar’s death because the water supply was incapable of sustaining the entire court.
When we asked the man at the ticket counter when the next bus would arrive to take us to Fatehpur Sikri, pointing out that the book said a bus came every half hour, a young English man spoke up and said he’d been waiting since 9:30 and no bus had come in all that time. It was about 10:15 and no bus showed up until 10:45 or so. We ended up exploring the sites of the ghost town with Chris, who proved to be entertaining and engaging. His mother is an Anglo-Indian from Goa and his family owns a hotel there, but he’s lived all his life in London and thinks of himself as English. Mom and I both enjoyed his company and we spent the entire day together.
The first place we explored was the mosque and courtyard surrounding it. When Akbar, after years of marriage, had had no child, boy or girl, he consulted the Sufi Sheikh Salim Chishti. Chishti told him he would soon have a son and, when this prophesy came true, Akbar began constructing Fatehpur and the Jami Masjid mosque. When Chishti died, Akbar built his tomb in the mosque courtyard. The white marble tomb stands out from the red sandstone used in the other buildings.
At first we thought we had seen everything after seeing the mosque because it was so big, but we did, luckily, find the Royal Palace as well. It is incredible and I recommend it to anyone and everyone. Nobody who visits Agra should miss the opportunity to see this jewel of a city off the beaten track of tourism. The architecture is exquisite. Akbar had three wives - one Hindu, one Muslim, and one Christian - and each has their own unique palace. Chris made many amusing comments along the lines of, “I don’t know what these people were thinking to desert a place like this. If I was a goatherd living down in the village, I would definitely live here with my goats. The alpha goat could live there, and I would have my mates up for football matches and barbecues on Saturdays over here…” It was very entertaining. I also enjoyed the look on the face of an elderly man when he asked Chris what his job was and Chris replied, “Oh, I’m a beer specialist” with a rather wide grin on his face.
I’m afraid the photos will, once again, have to be used to aid my attempts at describing this extraordinary place. The intricately carved walls and ceilings, the perfectly proportioned buildings, the Parcheesi court surrounding a tank where Akbar played, using beautiful slave girls as the playing pieces, these are things which must be seen, not discussed. And I must warn you that the pictures cannot do justice to this place either.
We left the palace by the wrong exit and ended up on a small road parallel to the main road which was traversed by the much needed buses. However, this accident led to the discovery of one of the old gates leading to the city. Chris and I climbed the steep steps and were rewarded with a beautiful view of the countryside and the crumbling remains of the walls which once protected Akbar’s capital. We then followed a narrow dirt path to the main road, walked back the direction we had come, and caught the bus. The bus then dropped us off at the tourist center that stood about 100 yards from where we had originally encountered the road. I was rather miffed because my feet and knees were hurting by this point, but what can you do? From the tourist center we caught another, extremely crowded bus. We considered waiting for the next bus rather than face the possibility of standing for an hour but had no assurance that there was going to be a “next bus”. A couple of men kindly offered Mom and I their seats though, and I spent the journey in relative comfort chatting with two young women, one from Slovenia and the other from Croatia. Mom and I also had a conversation with two young Indian men who were considering attending college in the States and wanted some advise on where to go. They were worried about anti-Indian hate crimes, but neither Mom nor I thought this to be a problem. We did, however, say to take our thoughts with a grain of salt because we live in Bloomington, a peaceful, liberal, college town and not NYC or Chicago. We even exchanged emails and they may contact us with more specific questions when they are more sure of their intentions.
The day finished with an evening meal in a roof-top restaurant overlooking the Taj. Unfortunately, the sun had already set and the Taj was merely a dark outline against a dark sky. Even so, it was very impressive. Dinner was delicious, possibly because I’d had no lunch and was starving. (I use the term starving very loosely.) After dinner, the three of us went out for beer. This is a new experience for me and I enjoyed the novelty of the excursion.
At some point in the conversation, we began talking about Varnasi and Chris told a rather funny story. When he was in Varanasi, his father and sister back in England had his 15 year old dog put to sleep because she had such bad arthritis. (I know this is not a good start to a funny story, but it gets better.) He was feeling sad and wanted to be alone so, instead of joining a group of tourists he had met the day before he went and sat by himself on the ghats and just looked at the Ganges and remembered his dog. When a bunch of children came up trying to sell something he told them that his dog had just died and he wanted to be left alone. Instead of leaving, they formed a circle around him, expressed their sorrow for him, and tried to cheer him up with their chatter. After a while, he asked why there were dogs and goats walking around in sweaters and T-shirts. (I’d wondered the same thing myself.) “Well, they’re our pets!” cried the children. “We take good care of them. It is winter, they get cold! So we put them in sweaters. We take good care of our pets!” “Well, what about that one?” asked Chris, pointing at a stray. “Oh”, replied the children dismissively. “That just looks funny”, and they all began laughing. I guess children are the same everywhere. I certainly enjoyed forcing my poor dog into a sweater and taking pictures of her some years back.