Adventures in Agra- Riding the Rails

OK- I am finally there, well- at least *almost* there.... the day of the Taj Mahal is upon us. Unfortunately for you, there is QUITE the back story to our Taj Mahal adventures and despite the fact that I have already regaled most of my friends with this tale, I am going to tell you all again to preserve the memory for posterity as a part of this illustrious blog =)

We had planned to go to the Taj on Friday, but as I have alluded to, it didn't quite work out that way.....

When we were planning this trip, K., a Delihi native, had suggested that we take the train, which seemed like a fun thing to do and probably the lease nausea inducing given that the alternative was a car ride and I am not one who enjoys long car rides in 3rd world countries. And, he assured us that the train was very very nice. Tourist class, very fancy and even good food. So K. arranged for our tickets and I started fantasizing about all the picture taking that I would do at the Taj.

Fast forward to Thursday at lunch in Delhi, when K.'s very wise friends informed us that, despite no prior warning from the guidebooks (thanks for nothing "Top 10 Delhi"), the Taj Mahal is closed on Friday. As panic washes over my entire body I realize that I may have to leave India with out seeing the Taj Mahal- which is the real reason we came all this way in the first place. K., who sees said-panic (and by the way has never actually been to the Taj himself), promises to fix the situation and generously scrambles to arrange for train tickets for Saturday. We take off for some shopping- and K. takes off to set up the tickets. He calls with the details and warns us that he couldn't get the same kind of ticket on such short notice and the times were not as good. As in, our train was scheduled to depart from Delhi at 4:40am. But he swears it will be just fine.

4:40am. Ugh. I hate early mornings. Hate them a lot. And I really hate early mornings when we have arrived in Delhi on a red-eye flight which provided us with a paltry (and uncomfortable) 4.5 hours of "sleep" and we have been moving across Delhi at a brake-neck speed ever since setting foot in the country. But, "for the Taj," I tell myself "anything is worth it."

So, we haul our exhausted bodies out of our comfy hotel bed at 3:30am to drive to the train station and await our chariot to Agra. On K.'s suggestion- we had asked our driver to park and take us in to the train station and deliver us directly to the platform. This proved to be excellent advice as we arrived at Nizzamudin Station at 4:00am to be greeted by a bevy of unclear signs in Hindi that seemed to indicate our train was late and provided little other guidance. Well, our very kind and patient driver informed us that it was in fact late (so glad we got up at 3-in-the-freaking-morning) and deposited us in the train station cafe to wait out our delay. While in the cafe, which was full of Delhi-revelers awaiting their ride back home after a Friday night of partying, we met our soon-to-be-new-friend P., who happened to be the only other foreigner in the joint.

After an indeterminable about of wait time- we, under the careful supervision of our very protective driver, head back to the platform to wait for the train. He interprets our train tickets- and in the super hero act of the day- pushes us through an intense amount of human traffic- to the right train car- and even on to the train and to our designated births. P. was in our car too- and we picked up a few other travelers along the way who were grateful for some direction on finding their car- so we were quite the parade of lost and tired souls running along behind our driver at 6am through a crowded train station. But we all made it to the proper seats and we were off.... Little did we know that this bit of the adventure was only a small taste of what was to come.

How to describe the train situation...

Dave, sitting on our side berths. They were about as spacious as they looked. 

This is not exactly what one might call luxury travel....

Check out how narrow the "aisle" is. Now, if this was just for normal use to get to-and-from your berth it wouldn't be so bad. But no, this narrow little walk way was the bustling commercial thoroughfare of the train. About once every 2.5 minutes someone, with a large kettle of hot tea, would come tromping down the aisle, screaming "chai, chai, chai, chai, chai." Then someone else would follow him and join in the chorus by offering  some other snack or item for sale. 

Spacious. Comfortable. Not to mention very clean. 

"Anti-social elements"- nothing like a warm welcome to the train. 

Come on, you knew you were wondering...

This, my friends, is the bathroom. 

And, because I know you wanted to know, if you looked down the hole, you could see daylight, which leads us to believe there was no storage tank system in use here. 

Oh, and yes, the hole does look pretty small. And yes, the train was pretty rocky. 

Think about the logistics on that one, and then imagine someone like me, who really strongly prefers not to touch anything in any variety of bathroom, but even more so in this particular kind of bathroom, trying to sort out how one is going to balance on a moving train whilst aiming for a very small target. Let's just say I was really regretting having consumed a lot of water and tea earlier in the morning. 

More train adventures next time....

Delhi Day 2- "The Best of the Rest"

I know it would seem like 4 separate posts would be sufficient to cover one single day in India and the photographs taken in 12 short hours- but that is simply not enough space to cover every gorgeous detail of Delhi. And I like to think that what I lack in photographic genius I more than make up for in photographic proliferation. And on this, the 2nd day of our Indian adventure, I managed to snap 481 pictures on my new camera. So, while I am dying to move on to the tales of the Taj, there are a few more shots that are begging to be posted.

I think the look in his eyes says- man am I glad that I am not the unfortunate fellow who got stuck having to pedal those large Americans around- their driver is getting work out and there are somethings that are not worth a few hundred rupees" 

Also, if you look at the ground, you can kind of get a sense of how incredibly dirty and trash-strewn the streets were. Ick. 

School bus. 

Those healthy sized fish I was talking about earlier. We are not sure exactly why they were all lined up right here, but ostensibly this is where food comes from? Or they were surf riding the current from the water circulating in the pond. 

A whole mess of catfish. Gives me the creeps just thinking about it. 

Delhi Day 2- Gurudrawa Bangla Sahib

Our last stop for the day on our whistle stop tour of Delhi Day 2, was the famous Gurudwara Bangla Sahib, which (according to Wikipedia) is the most prominent Sikh gurdwara, or Sikh house of worship, in Delhi. The pond inside its complex, known as the "Sarovar", whose water is considered holy by Sikhs. It was built by Sikh General, Sardar Bhagel Singh in 1783, who supervised the construction of nine Sikh shrines in Delhi in the same year, during the reign of Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II. 

We arrived right about sunset, which made the white and gold exterior sparkle in the hazy pink light. We were shepherded (by a large man who had a very large knife in his pocket) to the "Foreign Tourist" office, which we had seen earlier and decided we were too cool to enter. But, turns out two big white people cannot go undetected in the Gurudwara grounds and we followed instructions (once again, big and toting a semi-concealed weapon- we were clearly in no position to argue), went to the tourist office, dropped off our shoes, got instructions on head covering and also a really nice brief introduction to the Sikh religion. I knew very little about the religion prior to our trip to the tourist office and found the Sikh 101 to be very interesting and also the people giving the introduction class were very warm, friendly and open. We also learned that the knife-toting is part of the religion and not directly mean to scare tourists in to polite submission. Good to know.

One must cover their head to enter the temple, and I was thankfully prepared with a pashmina. Dave however was given one of these little cheerfully covered head wraps.

If it hasn't become clear so far in my blog postings, I have an unhealthy fear of germs and the transmission thereof via barefeet. You can add using communal hair wraps to the list of things that make me uncomfortable, so I was thrilled that my pashmina-over-the-head job was considered sufficient and I was given a pass on the "using a head covering previously used by a perfect stranger who could potentially have dubious hygiene practices" experience. Just to be clear, I would be equally as unhappy about walking barefoot or sharing clothing with strangers in the U.S.- maybe more so. And yes, I know I am germ paranoid- Dave (who likes to touch the subway and them threaten to touch me) reminds me of this attribute all the time, just in case I forget. I blame my mother and a childhood full of wet wipes and lectures on the perils of touching dirty things.

Oh well, David was a champ about the headcovering, and looked quite fetching in orange.

The temple was exquisite. I loved all the detailed carving and how amazing it looked at dusk.

The best part was this enormous reflecting pool.

Which by the way, was stocked with some very healthy fish.

Enjoying a very peaceful stroll around the pool. Its amazing that in the midst of the utter chaos of Delhi, you  can find a place like this with its magical quietness and serenity.

Yup. I am barefoot. Again.

And as far as I know (knocking on wood) I did not contract any diseases during my prolonged periods of naked-foot-ness in India.

 

So we are not entirely sure what this is about, but our guess is that women who don't want to bathe (or are not allowed?) in the communal pool can use this little building instead? Should have taken them up on that offer of a tour guide back at the Foreign Tourist office and I would have better details for you.

This (again, we are guessing here) is the instructions for appropriate use of the pool. Again, that tour guide would have been useful as my Hindi (could be Hindi, or something else) is not so good these days so we were left to hope we were in fact following all posted rules. Given the size and quantity of fish in the pool, there was little shot of me feeling compelled to jump in (which I am fairly sure is prohibited) so I felt confident that there were not too many rules at risk of being broken.

Humour and my germ-issues aside, this was really one of the most lovely places of worship I have had the pleasure of visiting. I really appreciated that they were so welcoming to foriegn tourists, because I can imagine it would get tiresome to always have a bunch of foreigners tromping around your sacred places- taking pictures and asking questions- but they were very kind hosts. We loved the serenity of the beautiful temple- the delicate winter sunset and the cold marble beneath barefeet made for a near magical experience. It was also nice to experience and learn about a new religion. We were able to walk through the worship hall inside the temple while services were being held which was very interesting. All-in-all it was a great way to end a very busy and nearly exhausting Day 2 in Delhi. We decided to be daring (and by "we" I mainly mean David) and, armed only with our tour guide map, walk home to the hotel. Despite a large family of blisters that popped up all over my feet after a day of walking around Delhi in rather adorable ballet flats- we arrived at the Le Meridian in on piece and ready for some room service and an early bedtime.  

Delhi Day 2- Moti Mahal

If you are getting the idea that we had a busy trip to Delhi, you would be right. As soon as we had sufficiently taken in one place, we were hustling off to brave another form of transportation and see what else the town had in store for us. After now having taken a personal car, a taxi and a bike rickshaw, it was time to give the auto rickshaw a go. 

If this picture had sound it would say "Beeep, beeeeeeeeep, beeeeeepepepepepeppbeeeep, beeeep" 

This place was very highly recommended by, well, practically everyone. Its a favorite place of my buddy K. and his pals- who are big butter chicken aficionados- and by each and every one of our tour books. The menu tells us that President Kennedy even ate here and Gordon Ramsey visited on his gourmet tour of India. And it did not disappoint.  

Seriously, how good does this look? Clockwise from the top, you have butter chicken, channa masala (my very favorite Indian dish) and some mutton biyrani. Delish! 

We arrived at Moti Mahal well after the lunch rush, so we had the whole place to ourselves.

Dave, digging in to some garlic naan. I cannot even tell you how good this was. 

We of course ordered dramatically too much food- and stuffed ourselves silly, but it was SO good we just couldn't stop. 

After lunch we were off on auto rickshaw ride #2. 

Delhi Day 2- Jama Masqid

Moving right along...our thrilling bike rickshaw ride dropped us off at the foot of the Jama Masqid, which, for your information was commissioned by the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan, builder of the Taj Mahal, was completed in the year 1656 AD and is the largest and best-known mosque in India. 

The massive dome on the mosque watching over Old Delhi. 

We were lucky enough to come on a Friday, right after prayers and they were cleaning up these huge communal prayer rugs. Pretty cool to see. 

Since I was dressed imprudently (jeans and a long sleeve sweater and offered to wear a pashmina, if you were interested) I was requested to wear this really lovely pink flowered robe. This had the unfortunate side effect of just making me that much more of a freak show for the locals to gawk at. On the upside, I do love me some pink, so their choice of color was appreciated. And, after having to wear a few of these at mosques in Egypt a few years back I can say that while this one was far from "clean" they come worse, much worse. And they didn't charge me for it, which was also nice of them. 

The mosque had a great vibe- a lot of people were clearly just there to hang out, spend the afternoon with their family in this beautiful place. Its nice to think of a place of worship also as a safe place for families to come spend a sunny Friday afternoon together. 

So, after balking at the idea of being barefoot in a public place at the Lotus Temple (it was mainly the communal foot bath that freaked me out) I gave the sans-shoes approach a shot and it went ok. I did scrub my feet like the dickens when we got home and if you saw how dirty Delhi is, you would understand my apprehension. I guess I don't really get how a bunch of barefoot people is really cleaner than a bunch of people with shoes on. Its hard to get a disease from someone else's shoes when you have shoes on too. I have to imagine that people's feet are generally not that clean, and are better conduits for disease than rubber soles. I am all for respecting other people's religious practices, so I risked infectious disease to experience the mosque, but I also really appreciated being able to slip my New Balances back on when we excited. 

Beautiful reflecting pool in the middle of the square. Also of dubious hygienic standards (there was lots of washing as well as drinking happening at this watering hole), possibly more threatening than the barefoot-ness. But it was pretty, and a good place to sit down and take in the majestic mosque. 

Really impressively tall minaret.  You could hear the call to prayer from everywhere in Old Delhi.

More of my admiring fans. These people were sneaky though- they (and 10 of their closest friends) launched a sneak attack. I was just sitting here, sweating to death in my pink polyester robe, enjoying the view of the main mosque when I notice that the people on each side of me seem to be scooting closer and closer to me, and then, boom, someone else sneaks out with a cell phone and the photo scoot began. 

Oh yea, time for the unrequested hug from a stranger. I think she happily confirmed that blonde hair feels pretty much like normal hair, even though its funny colored. The first 8 people that wanted to pose with me were mildly entertaining, but the crowd started to gather (no really, I am not kidding, people were practically lining up) so my body guard husband had to whisk me away from the paparazzi. 

My body guard is is such a good guy. 

As demonstrated here, in addition to ensuring my safety and keeping my adoring fans and their cell phone cameras at bay, he also happily carried my scarf and purse.

Also, despite his short sleeves, was not asked to wear a beautiful bathroom through the mosque. 

People chilling out in the steps of the mosque. 

Upon leaving the mosque, we braved a bustling market, where one could have bought all manner of religious decorations or second-hand clothes and shoes. Unfortunately it was really crowded, really hot and also filled with some pretty aggressive beggars, so it wasn't a good time to be pushing my big ol' camera in people's faces so there is no photographic evidence of this particular adventure. 

No, thank you for visit! 

Delhi Day 2- Old Delhi

After leaving the Red Fort, we headed right to the heart of the Old Delhi neighborhood for a stroll down atmospheric Chandni Chowk. (By the way, when a tour book says something is "atmospheric", one should read in to it that they mean its "going to be nuts but great for photos and later stories of your survival")

Check out all the rickshaw traffic, auto and bike, side-by-side. 

I wonder if the bikes feel left out that they cannot contribute to the honking symphony? 

 Really beautiful old buildings- and a unique mis-match of Indian and Colonial styles and modern advertisements! 

Don't fear- even in the heart of "Old" Delhi, there is a McDonalds. America's finest export. Ugh. 

So we are uncertain what these things are (anybody know?), but the cart was very cool, and the people buying them seemed to really enjoy them. I think they are a relative of the ice-pop, but Dave disagrees. 

Regardless, he wouldn't let me have one so it may forever be a mystery. But this little girl seemed pretty excited to be getting hers on this steamy hot afternoon. 

Look at that deliciousness, I heart samosas! You can add this to the list of things that Dave did not let me eat. 

It seems that school children like to hang out on rickshaws after school. 

Seems like a cool enough place to me. 

This fine man was selling candy out of his little red jars. No mystery here why there were a plethora of kiddos hanging near his cart. 

You should have seen the look of glee on this guy's face as he buys his little pouch of sweets- and the jealousy of his little friends looking on. Too cute. 

Ladies shopping for ribbon and trimmings for their outfits. If I had the appropriate Hindi vocabulary for it I totally would have come back with some of the pretties ribbon you have ever seen in your life. 

So the main street is hectic enough, with two way traffic on the sidewalks, store fronts bursting with goods, hawkers pushing their wears on the street and a chorus of honking cars and auto rickshaws, but you are really in for crazy when you take a step off of the main street and down one of the side alley markets. And although there was often hardly room for people to pass each other, there were cars and motorcycles zipping right along, greeting you with the Delhi honk. I don't think Dave enjoyed the Old Delhi stroll as much as I did because while I was taking in the sights and smells, he was in full on body guard mode trying to make sure I was not groped, pick-pocketed or run over by a passing auto. Poor man had his work cut out for him but I appreciate all of his efforts and I am pleased to say that I while I was occasionally fending off the random unwelcome touch from a passing man, I got through all of the markets no worse for the wear. I also didn't come out laden with shopping bags of goodies like I'd hoped would happen, but that's another story. 

Because so many places have converted to under-ground electricity, it was fascinating to see the helterskelter circus of interlaces wires that were running down the streets. It must be a bird's paradise- look at all those places to sit! 

Yes please, I'd like one of everything. Some samplings of the much talked-about Rajisthani jewelry. Must have been great to be a Maharani and get decked out in this finery every day.  

Please note the previous comments about a bird's paradise. Yup- it must be true. Check out the thick flock of birds taking off from their roost. We are happy to report that we made it through 4 days in an extremely bird-happy place and never once got pooped on. It may be good luck to get a little air-mailed gift from your passing pigeon, but I  think I'd rather have a rabbits foot. 

More yummy looking street food. If I didn't have a stomach prone to being inhospitable to foreign street cuisine and a strong fear of Delhi-belly, I would have eaten myself silly on this trip. 

Apparently the streets are set up thematically. So there is a car parts market, a silver market, a cloth market, a spice market, etc. This store was from, you guessed it, the paper street- home to stores selling books and stationary goods. Notice all the wires hanging down! 

We next moved on to another of our to-do list items, by throwing caution to the wind, and hopping in to a bike rickshaw for an adventurous ride through Old Delhi to our next stop on this whistle-stop tour of Delhi, the Jamma Masjid. Our poor guy really worked up a sweat hauling our two American-sized butts down these crowded streets. Despite learning the hard way that one should keep their elbows with in the confines of the rickshaw at all times lest it be sacrificed to on-coming traffic (ouch!) I really liked the ride. And I had a way better vantage point for some picture taking and sight seeing.  

This guy, with the 2 tons of books on his bike, made me feel less bad about our guy having to pedal us around. He got his work out for the day. 

Three people on a scooter. They really should have been more environmentally friendly and invited at least one or two more to join, seriously. This kid has the look of a seasoned pro- meanwhile, if you could see my terrified face or my white-knuckle grip on both my camera and the frame of the rickshaw, you would be able to understand the madness that was happening on this street! 

Doesn't Mr. Rickshaw Man look thrilled to be having his picture taken by a tourist? Well, thanks anyways buddy, it was a thrilling ride to say the least. But we arrived at our final destination with all extremities still attached, and we were off for to see the Friday Mosque.