Journal 12/22 - 24: train to Agra, home

12/22 - train to Agra

We caught a ride into Udaipur with some other wedding guests and one of them, Diane, let us leave our bags in her hotel room during the day. That was a big help. We went back to Shilpgram where there was a festival going on, so there were tons of vendors there. And we went back into the old city and visited the Bada Bazaar, then walked forever to the Deen Diyal park where we watched the sun set over Lake Pichola. After that, we caught a rickshaw back into town, ate dinner, then grabbed our bags and headed to the train station.

We were concerned that the station would be confusing and busy, but as it turned out we walked in, saw our train right away, found our car, and got settled in our berths in no time at all. We were traveling First Class 2A, which meant that the coach isn't divided into compartments but is open, with curtains that pull around each bay. A friend recommended that we travel that way because we'd meet more families. First class 1A has compartments, so you tend to only meet business men, and 3A has three bunks in each bay instead of two, which must be pretty crowded. While we waited for the train to start a steward passed out sheets, blankets, and pillows. Everything was very clean.

12/23 - Taj Mahal, drive to Delhi

I had a really hard time sleeping that night, even though I was comfortable. When I woke up in the morning, Larry had struck up a conversation with the family opposite, who had also been at the wedding at Devi Garh. The husband told us that the train was running three hours behind schedule, and offered to call our contact in Agra and fill them in. We really appreciated that, because we didn't have a cel phone.

The land here was much more desert-like, although as we got closer to Agra there were fields of yellow mustard. We saw camels pulling carts on the main roads, people making huge rows of bricks, farmers in the fields. We passed some pretty impoverished-looking villages where garbage littered the land between the town walls and the train tracks. As we got closer to Agra the villages seemed to be dirtier, with people bathing and kids playing in small, stagnant ponds.

We hadn't brought much in the way of food with us, as we expected to be in Agra by 10:30, and I was starting to feel pretty out of sorts and in need of food. When we stopped at a station Larry got off to look for some fruit but was shooed back on the train by our friend who was concerned that the train was about to leave. (Trains didn't give much warning when it was time to go, they just started moving slowly away.) The train started and suddenly our friend came back with a big bag of bananas and oranges. "Here," he said, "A present for you." What kindness!

As we got close to Agra our friend phoned for us again, then got off the train and made sure that we connected with our contact there. Throughout our journey, we were overwhealmed by how well we were taken care of by strangers. That is the India we experienced.

Danha, our friend from Media Mix, owns a restaurant in Agra specializing in South Indian food, and one of his business associates there, Hanumant, met us at the station and took us to the Taj Mahal. We thought he would just drop us off, but he came in with us and showed us around, which was really helpful.

The Taj Mahal complex was built in the early 1600s as the tomb for the emperor Shah Jahan for his favorite wife Mumtaz Mahal who died while giving birth to their fourteenth child. Here is what Shah Jahan said about the Taj:

Should guilty seek asylum here, Like one pardoned, he becomes free from sin. Should a sinner make his way to this mansion, All his past sins are to be washed away. The sight of this mansion creates sorrowing sighs; And the sun and the moon shed tears from their eyes. In this world this edifice has been made; To display thereby the creator's glory.

The tomb is made of white marble and is full of intricate stonework, including jasper inlaid calligraphy running up the sides of each entryway. The mosque and guesthouse, one on either side of the tomb, are made of red sandstone, and the contrast between the colors of all three are beautiful. Every bit of architecture is perfectly balanced and symmetrical.

It took 20, 000 workers in addition to the calligraphers, sculptors, and inlayers, and 1,000 elephants. It took 22 years to complete. Instead of building scaffolds out of rope and bamboo (which is what they currently use in construction projects) they built a brick scaffold that mirrored the design of the building. This would have taken years to dismantle, but there's a legend that Shah Jahan offered the bricks to anyone who would take them, so they were gone overnight. I believe it!

After the Taj, Hanumant took us back to the restaurant for an amazing lunch. We felt that we had come full circle, ending our visit to north India with south Indian food, since our first meal in India was north Indian cuisine in Chennai. We freshened up a bit and were bundled into the car en route to Delhi.

Our driver was so nice. He put on some Indian pop music and explained that he liked the "old music" best, which I guess meant from ten or twenty years ago. He sang along and often replayed the same songs several times in a row, so by the end we were singing along, too. It was funny to be sitting in the car with all of us singing together like old friends.

The drive to Delhi was long, but there was lots to look at. When we got into the city itself traffic was awful, it was very smoggy, and there was a bad smell in the air. It was cold outside and I saw a small boy in shorts and a t-shirt begging at an intersection.

In order to get into the airport one has to have a ticket receipt. We stepped inside, changed our money (you can't change it anywhere after going through security), and checked into our flight.

"What seats would you like," said the man at the desk, "I tell you what, I'll put you in a row of three and will block the middle seat for you."

That was nice!

We waited in the terminal for a long time, but finally boarded the plane. They came around with hot washcloths for us, we took off, and I slept. When I woke up we were landing in Amsterdam.