Today was another early one. We woke up around 5:15 am and the driver was waiting for us at 6:00 am. We booked our travel to Agra through a cheaper tour company so we didn’t have the same driver. Our driver looked a little suspicious, just to stereotype a little bit (more to come on that later…). We headed to Agra to see the Taj Mahal and the Agra Fort. The car ride was around 3 hours, I lost track of time. I never know the time in India though. We took a rest stop about mid-way through the trip. Ryan and I didn’t really want to stop but it was okay. We talked to the security guard who was carrying a 12 gauge shot-gun. He handed me the gun and we took a picture together, it was pretty funny that he just handed his gun over to me. When you cross between states you have to pay a fee or tax, so when we would crossed a state line we would pull over and our driver would go pay someone. People would come to our window and beg for money or try to sell us something. At one stop a boy had a monkey on a leash and he wanted us to take a picture of it and pay him. The monkey did tricks and started to climb on our car. At another rest stop a boy with one eye came to our car begging for money. It reminded me of the movie Slum Dog Millionaire, when the head of the Begging Ring would handicap that children to get more money. That was hard to see. When you donate to those kids they usually don’t keep that money, their ‘boss’ gets it. In one town I saw several kids with the same tin bucket with a handle, so it seemed like they were working together.
I honestly didn’t know if we were going to make it back to hotel safely. The driver was crazy. We went around 120kph. There were several close calls and I think he had a little road rage. The roads in India are crazy, there are no rules. On the return home from our long day there were six rows of traffic on 2 lanes of cement. There were 3 lanes off of the road and 3 lanes on the road. There was constant honking which didn’t make much sense to me because there was nothing the person in head of us could do because he/she was caught in the same traffic. We almost hit several mopeds, bikes, trailers, buses, etc.
When we finally arrived a women hopped in our car, she was our tour guide for the day. We drove to Taj Mahal info center and from there took a golf cart to the Taj. They are concerned about the pollution damaging the monument so they don’t allow cars anywhere close. The Taj Mahal was beautiful and perfectly symmetrical. There are twin mosques on either side of the Taj Mahal. They had shoe covers for us to wear into the building, but mine broke so I wore my socks. It was kind of dark inside but you could still see the artwork and it was amazing,. It took 22 years to complete, which surprised me with all the detail that was in there. We walked around the garden a little bit then headed out.
We then went to the Agra Fort. It looked very similar to the Red Fort we went to yesterday. It was very interesting. I was hot and hungry though. The architecture and art was incredible. Closer to the end of the tour I was getting sick of hearing about all the work and design that was put into the fort. About how the carving and design was different in every room and hallway. I had the same feeling when I watch those Yacht or expensive homes shows. It gets to a point where it get a little ridiculous and out of hand. Just because the emperor had the money/slaves to be able to do that kind design frustrated me. Nonetheless the craftsmanship was outstanding and mind blowing. We were at the Fort for around 1 hr and 30 minutes. I took a picture with a random Indian kid and it was funny.
After the Taj and Fort our tour guide took us to two stores. The first was a place that does the same marble/stone design that was in the Taj. He then took us to their show room to try and sell us a marble table or something. At one point he was explaining how one semi-precious stone glows in the dark and right when he said it all the lights went out in the room. We didn’t know some guy was standing in the back it was funny. It kind of sucked because we knew that we weren’t going to buy anything. The second place was a place where they made exotic rugs. It was very impressive.
The ride back to New Delhi seemed SO long. About half way back the wind started blowing extremely hard and it rained. It also hailed for 30 seconds. Once we got back to Delhi our driver (the suspicious one) stopped at this shopping market, got out of the car, and made a phone call. At this point it was dark and kind of rainy. I rolled down the window and asked him what he was doing and that we were ready to head back to the hotel. He said his boss wanted to come talk with us. So we waited like 5 minutes and he still didn’t show. At that point I was getting a little nervous. Ryan and I planned what we were going to do in a worst-case scenario. A little more time passed and he was buying time. The boss showed up so I grabbed the backpack and we hopped out of the car. We talked with him and he just wanted to talk with us and ask us how we enjoyed the day. After we talked for about 5 minutes we got back into the car and made it back to the hotel. Everything turned out okay.
We ate at Hard Rock Café that night. The day wore me out. You know when you get so tired you don’t even want to eat? That is how tired I was and I just wanted to go to bed. After dinner I barely made it back to my bed before I passed out.
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