India Part 4 - Agra

Sweet, unobstructed pavement.

My second experience of Indian Railways doesn't go quite so well, the train seems to spend quite a long time stopped, and is ninety minutes late when we finally get to Agra, not ideal given this means it is now past 11pm.  Well, still plenty of tuktuks about, in fact I splash out on a taxi, does mean my plan of finding a bar is out though.  In fact this was a doomed plan, Agra does not really have any bars... lots of sweet shops mind you, I think that being the location of the country's number one historic Islamic site means the muslim influence is strong on whatever passes for the licensing authority around here.  Well, my hotel is willing to sell me cans to drink in my room, a little galling to pay two hundred rupees - two pounds fifty or so - for what is basically a can of special brew but what can you do.  On the plus side, Agra has quite a few streets that aren't in fact that bad to walk along, there are actual pavements, it is bliss.  I do get a little blasé and step in some of the ever present poo, maybe from a monkey, ah well.  Wonder if there is anything to see here then?  Oh yes, the aforementioned Islamic heritage site... well first of all I take a detour into the 'nature walk', well worth a hundred rupees, I stroll through the trees, birds sing, there are peacocks wandering about and here and there a view of that... heritage site... rising above the forest.  I feel the stress of the last week or so, the slow ratcheting of tension with every blaring horn, every motorbike wooshing past me as it rides on the wrong side of the road, every guy trying to sell me stuff... slowly slipping away, for a time at least.

OK, not the most original photo I have ever taken.

So, the Taj Mahal then.  Yes, it is pretty awesome... as a foreigner, I do have to pay some twenty times as much as the locals to get in, it does at least let me jump the queues, and there is much to see.  As well as the mausoleum you see in pictures on the wall of Indian restaurants worldwide, there are huge walls, gardens, a mosque, and a couple of buildings which a sign assures me are not 'Naubat Khanas', that is 'drum houses', but full scale replicas built as part of the complex.  Just getting up close to the mausoleum itself is worth the entry fee, it is an amazing thing, a vast jewel of white marble, totally out of scale with mere human beings.  We do get to go inside, it isn't very exciting to be honest, a dark, vaulted space, and despite signs telling us to be quiet and not to photograph anything, the place is full of a cacophony of whistles and shouts, and most of the illumination comes from mobile phones, all running camera apps as far as I can see.  I reserve my photography for outside, just a pity one of the minarets is covered in scaffolding... it occurs to me that if I could get the other side of the river I'd have a very nice view of it, that minaret would be hidden, and there'd be no crowds either, so off I walk.  Turns out you can walk across the railway bridge from Agra Fort station which helps, then I get down to the riverside, dodging the community there who seem to have a thriving business washing clothes in the river, I guess they probably come out a bit cleaner at least.  I walk past some groups of men playing cards, through banks of sand with sparkling grains of quartz in them, would be pretty were it not for the ever present rubbish strewn around, and am just getting opposite the Taj when a middle aged lady with a stick says to me 'go back, please'.  Hmm, is she planning to bathe?  I slowly get the feeling she's in fact saying, 'go back, police', and sure enough a chap in... brown clothes turns up.  Doesn't look much like a police uniform but I'm not going to argue, he leads me straight away from the river and sure enough there is extensive barbed wire and even a couple of watch towers, go on then.  They probably need to work on the way this can all be completely bypassed by walking along the river...

I think these posts mark the boundary of the bit I wasn't meant to go into.

My train away from Agra departs at a less than ideal 6am, so I check out of my hotel near the Taj, and head off to one near the station... the only one I could find on the internet anywhere near, it had, um, mixed reviews.  Sure enough I get into my room, and note that somebody has dumped a condom and its wrapper in the toilet, and the sheets don't seem to have been cleaned, ew.  Well, after some nagging they change them, and on the plus side here in the low rent district I can get a can of Kingfisher Strong - 'the king of good times' - for a mere one hundred and twenty rupees, bargain.  After checking in (so much filling in of forms), I have time to head to the other main attraction of Agra, yes it's another fort, just like the one in Delhi known as the Red Fort, and indeed it is of similar design, unsurprising as I gather both were built at around the same time under orders from the same Mughal Emperor.  It is very splendid anyway, with great views along the river to the Taj... I notice that here, the buildings built by the British have been removed, the only evidence I spot is a sign explaining how once there was a lot more construction here from Mughal times, but much of it was demolished by the East India company to make room for barracks, oops.  Well then, time to get back to the hotel, I drink some of that beer and grab some paneer masala with interesting layered bread from a nearby street eatery - they have the cricket on I see, Indian TV is odd, takes me a while to figure out it is in fact Indian since much of it is in English, and also the people on the screen with their pale skin and anglo features look nothing like the faces I see around me, weird.  And then, an early night, hopefully I can succeed in catching that train tomorrow...

Inside the fort.

Photos to go with this post can be found here.