Agra with Ana
2009
Hey folks,
it’s been really a long time since I wrote about my life over here despite so many interesting things happening around me. So I’m going to get things back on track over the coming days 🙂 Basically what kept me from writing was Ana, who arrived in Delhi  Tuesday two weeks ago. A friend of mine asked me whether I could take a little bit care of her during the first couple of days being here and thus I offered her to stay at my place until she would find a nice accommodation. So before she arrived, I asked her whether she would want to go to Agra together with me to see the Taj Mahal. I booked the tickets and guess what, Tuesday she arrived, Wednesday we went off to Agra 😉
The train was scheduled to start at 6:15 in the morning and thus we had to get up around 4. I didn’t sleep at all, as I normally don’t go to bed before 2 and thus couldn’t sleep despite lying in bed for quite some time… The train to Agra was really good, it had enough space, provided us with good food and arrived in time! 🙂 Arrived at the station we chose to take a driver for the entire day that (750Rs = 10€). He was really nice and carried us not only around, but gave us helpful hints for the Taj and taught us a little history lesson 😉
First we went to the Taj Mahal and what shall I say, it’s impressive. Not so much from the inside, but more from the outside, combined with the intense atmosphere in the morning – great. It’s hard to describe and thus I advice you to check out the pics we took.
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Next we went to see how the marbel is actually treated to look as it does at the Taj and afterwards we learned about handmade carpets (did you know that the color of a handmade carpet changes depending on from where you look at it?). After this little „commercial“ trip we went on to see the Red Fort. It’s pretty big and impressive and definitely worth visiting. Together, Ana and me shot 540 pics… 😀 I uploaded the best 50 to SmugMug, so you should check them out!
After a very nice lunch, we asked our driver what we could do next. It was 4pm and as the opening times of everything are „From Sunrise to Sunset“ and it gets dark at 5pm, there was nothing else to look at (at least not in Agra itself, as the town is not only really polluted, but as well pretty ugly…). Anyway, he drove us to a little temple which was nice to check out but didn’t help killing the 4 remaining hours we had until our train would leave.
So what to do? Well, let me put it like this: The next half hour ended up to be a verbal stress test for me… 😉 What had happened? The driver proposed to bring us to a jewelry store to check out some nice stones and as we had no other real option we agreed. Being in the shop, the first ten minutes were great, seeing the stones and stuff. But then he showed us his „art“ and Ana showed some interest for a really nice neckless. So at one point, the guy asked her: „So, how long have you been together.“ And without a second to think about she replied „5 years!“. Guess what, now all the attention was on me as being 5 years together, it was clear for the guys that I would have to buy it for her… To make a 20 minute argumentative fight short, I had a real hard time to maintain my politeness but get out of the store without buying anything… 😉 While I had to struggle with the two guys in the shop giving each their best to convince me, Ana had fun playing the „Pleeeaaaaaase, it’s really nice!“-card on me…
Finally we arrived back at the station more than an hour in advance just to sit down, have a coffee and relax. The train back to Delhi was on time but arrived with a delay of 45 minutes (which is good for Indian standards… 😉 ).
To conclude: Agra sucks, but the Taj Mahal and the Red Fort are really worth seeing. It’s been a long and intense day but overall great 🙂
Okay, that’s for now. More stories soon to come 🙂
Stay tuned, Strothi