A Toast (high Velocity) to Agra
Oh my Gosh - what a journey - it was CRAZY Madam...if you had of written the script you could never have believed it - where to start????We got to Delhi and dragged our exhausted selves to the YWCA in Delhi - tumbled into bed and got up bright and early the next day (yesterday) for our journey to Agra and the Taj Mahal. Our driver Amar was a wonderful man who came to get us from Agra and we fought Delhi traffic for 2 hours then continued our journey - total time to Agra...5 hours......aaaaaaaaaahhhh. Halfway you can stop and we did at a hotel/roadhouse with a beautiful garden. We stopped for tea (as I had a terribly sore throat) and some chipati bread (tortilla) and a little abuse from the toilet attendant...a Rajistani woman - who was quite a pain!
Off we went and before you knew it we were in Agra - wan to know some of the things we saw on the way - crazy things - like lots of camels, pulling all sorts of things, crops, sugar cane, people - we pulled over and took the photo of a fellow and his camel - just before I clicked the shutter - he leaned over to Susie and said "not for free...rupies"... a little later there was a 10 camel, camel train on the other side. Amar stopped for us to take photos - I took photos and was aware of some men hovering - a quick smile and I was heading back to the car - Susie was ahead of me and started to giggle - from her vantage point she could see I had picked up a 15 man entourage of camel riders, workers etc and I was blissfully unaware that just feet behind my my fans were closing in...Amar had the door ready and off we went! Rickshaws that drive 2 or in a pinch 3 people are on this highway driving 6, 8 even 10 people - legs and arms hanging out - Crazy Madam we say as we look at each other. Much of the crop we pass is sugar cane - so always something to do with sugar cane, tending, threshing, loading, moving but camel or cart or buffalo. Imagine everyone intermingles on the 3 lane divided highway on each side...buffalo, camels, cows, horse carts, bikes, motor bikes, rickshaws, cars and buses!!!!!! Constant honking! As we passed the General Institute for the Reasearch into the Study of Goats Building - we had to smile...this is India Madam...Little patties built into little bee hive shaped structures dot the landscape...these are made of cow, buffalo and camel patties shaped into 12 inch diameter (ish) and 3 inches high circles and dried in the sun then stacked, used for fuel for cooking they remind us, nothing is wasted here in the rural communities. Halfway we took a breatk and had tea, this was the guard a the roadhouse/hotel
Our journey at an end, our Agra tour leader Sodhi met us by the side of the road and Amar had to leave us as cars not allowed in the city proper of Agra - so we transfer two big back packs, two little back packs on camera pack, big blue (the super gynormous back from MEC (familiar to Canadians) and the more modest killer whale black bad from Sonoma Outfitters) along with two very stinkly and exhausted madams to the rickshaw - Sodhi then excorted us to the Taj Khema hotel - the hotel from hell...more on that later...we head in, sign many many forms that Susie finally has a freak out about and they stop giving us forms - good job Susie...then Lalita arrives and Sodhi exits stage left... Sodhi is a good Sikh who of course set us up with a woman tour guide - she hurried us thru some tea and rice and off we went by the hawkers to the Taj Mahal - wow words cannot describe the Taj - it is magical, mystical, beautiful, crazy - incredible...We were there rather late so had only a couple of hours of light and photographed the heck out of the situation - went inside the tomb and wandered all around with Lalita insisting on taking our photos - we had to teach her how to do this though - as the first photo was just of our heads, the next of only the Taj - but she warmed up under our instruction sand soon both Taj and us were appearing in the same photo! Quick trip by a fabric store - where they had to fire up the generators to turn on the lights - enough allready take us home....we freshened up and ordered tea, 50 minutes later no tea ...then Susie being fresh of mind...decided to put our 2 day long joke about toast flying thru the air...not sure how we started joking about this...anyhow before I knew it, there was a projectile toast heading my way...one slightly fat lip later... we wandered down to the guest reception and gave up on tea - it was however ready about the time we had to leave for the Taj moonligh viewing...so a quick gulp and off we go - getting a flavor for the unintentionaly India diet? The full moon viewing was surreal - Sodhi had purchased tickets for us the day before and Lalita escorted us to the entrace - we entered annother world...there were easilty 200 military men, in body armor sporting automatic riffles - we were x-rayed, grabed, squeezed and probed by 3 women - Lalita had warned us, camera, money, water - NOTHING else - some not so lucky travellers were loosing the contents of their make-up kits etc...move, stop, push, pull - we were surrounded by the military - what had we gotten ourselves in to? Exiting the check point the crowd of 50 grew quite - what a privilege to view the Taj for 30 minutes in the moonliight with an unubstructed view - Alas Susies camera had died so I was on tap to photograph the situation. All too soon we had to leave and head back to the hotel -on the way we wanted to get, yes a drink...I admit it we needed it...but of course all of Agra is dry, almost impossible to find and buy some alcohol and we did not want to wander - so we went to the shop accross the street from the hotel, in the back room they sell sarees, have you ever seen this done, a huge platformed surface 2 feet up is covered in white sheets and the owners take our sarees after saree and flings the 6 metres of fabric out at you for viewing...a Russian couple and their child were there viewing sarees, Susie taught them how to dress in a Saree as the owners were hopeless and she bought 3 - she is an actress in Moscow and her husband a director, they are moving to New York shortly - what a kick - he thought Susie was the best as she helped him negotiate from $125 per saree, to $150 for all 3...finally we left to go back to the hotel..., the hotel itself has a viewing point so we headed up there...and took some more photos - now completely exhausted and freezing (no more bathing suites like Goa) we headed down to our room - queue spooky music from Scooby doo...don't go in there Shaggy...OK picture this - dirty dirty blankets - sheets with strange looking black specs on them, mosquitos everywhere because of bathroom window that would not shut - providing the additional added bonus of waiters and hotel staff getting a good view of our potty habits...being concerned about lice, Susied donned a blue plastic bag on her head...nicely matching her Venice Beach Sleep Shirt...we were afraid to turn out the lights so I stuck my Costco flashlight inbetween the two twin beds, which were side by side and we amused each other by making shadow puppets on the ceiling - made crazed creatures forced to stay at the Taj Khema for more than one night - I took photos of this for our upcoming slide show vidoe production that we will subject our family to later this month...We finally drifted off - so cold we were so cold, I kept going to my back-pack and adding another layer - sarong, after sarong - what a sight I was - finally we got warm and fell asleep - bang, bang bang...the ratty bellboy who had propositions Susie last night (sorry forgot to mention that one...) is at the door wanting to be paid for who knows what - I saw steam rise from Susie blue plastic head bag...oh my God what else...well - I definately had a throat infection so had started on meds about 24 hours earlier - that or some Hotel Khema bug was at work - I now had Delhi belly and was making regular trips to the potty - the viewing potty you remember that the busboys pass by...however Susie had some meds to snap me back in shape...oh boy - Lalita came and we were going to the Red Fort with her - and Amar - we just could not handle driving her there, then back to Agra so we begged off and headed out just with our driver - Susie waited outside having gone there a few years ago and I did the highlight, self-guided tour. Six Indian boys (are you getting that boys from the North, the the excepting of the wonderful sikh men we met up here in the north) were sassing me and I was at my India limit - I looked at them and yelled in English...while pointing my index finger at them "you need to go get some manners now!"...I am sure that had an undeniable influence on their lives...ha ...but a Britsh couple were passing and I said to the woman, I am sorry I was having a rough moment...she said you are not having a frustrating moment Love, you are having an India moment....it has to happen some time! Sprint tour done, back to the car, Amar and Susie and our trip back to Delhi, which thankfully took only 4 vs 5 hours and was rather uneventful - I did however see this veggie vendor - note the red carrots!
- well until we landed close to our hotel, all the streets were closed for a visiting Shiek, we had to cross 6 lanes of traffic with all of our luggage and transfer it to a rickshaw to finish the way to the hotel because Amar could not get his car to the hotel...but now our bellies are full, we have posted and a luke warm shower awaits...tomorrow is another day! Love KB from Delhi - remember to check Susies blog
for her take on the Hitchcock day from hell.....
Off we went and before you knew it we were in Agra - wan to know some of the things we saw on the way - crazy things - like lots of camels, pulling all sorts of things, crops, sugar cane, people - we pulled over and took the photo of a fellow and his camel - just before I clicked the shutter - he leaned over to Susie and said "not for free...rupies"... a little later there was a 10 camel, camel train on the other side. Amar stopped for us to take photos - I took photos and was aware of some men hovering - a quick smile and I was heading back to the car - Susie was ahead of me and started to giggle - from her vantage point she could see I had picked up a 15 man entourage of camel riders, workers etc and I was blissfully unaware that just feet behind my my fans were closing in...Amar had the door ready and off we went! Rickshaws that drive 2 or in a pinch 3 people are on this highway driving 6, 8 even 10 people - legs and arms hanging out - Crazy Madam we say as we look at each other. Much of the crop we pass is sugar cane - so always something to do with sugar cane, tending, threshing, loading, moving but camel or cart or buffalo. Imagine everyone intermingles on the 3 lane divided highway on each side...buffalo, camels, cows, horse carts, bikes, motor bikes, rickshaws, cars and buses!!!!!! Constant honking! As we passed the General Institute for the Reasearch into the Study of Goats Building - we had to smile...this is India Madam...Little patties built into little bee hive shaped structures dot the landscape...these are made of cow, buffalo and camel patties shaped into 12 inch diameter (ish) and 3 inches high circles and dried in the sun then stacked, used for fuel for cooking they remind us, nothing is wasted here in the rural communities. Halfway we took a breatk and had tea, this was the guard a the roadhouse/hotel
Our journey at an end, our Agra tour leader Sodhi met us by the side of the road and Amar had to leave us as cars not allowed in the city proper of Agra - so we transfer two big back packs, two little back packs on camera pack, big blue (the super gynormous back from MEC (familiar to Canadians) and the more modest killer whale black bad from Sonoma Outfitters) along with two very stinkly and exhausted madams to the rickshaw - Sodhi then excorted us to the Taj Khema hotel - the hotel from hell...more on that later...we head in, sign many many forms that Susie finally has a freak out about and they stop giving us forms - good job Susie...then Lalita arrives and Sodhi exits stage left... Sodhi is a good Sikh who of course set us up with a woman tour guide - she hurried us thru some tea and rice and off we went by the hawkers to the Taj Mahal - wow words cannot describe the Taj - it is magical, mystical, beautiful, crazy - incredible...We were there rather late so had only a couple of hours of light and photographed the heck out of the situation - went inside the tomb and wandered all around with Lalita insisting on taking our photos - we had to teach her how to do this though - as the first photo was just of our heads, the next of only the Taj - but she warmed up under our instruction sand soon both Taj and us were appearing in the same photo! Quick trip by a fabric store - where they had to fire up the generators to turn on the lights - enough allready take us home....we freshened up and ordered tea, 50 minutes later no tea ...then Susie being fresh of mind...decided to put our 2 day long joke about toast flying thru the air...not sure how we started joking about this...anyhow before I knew it, there was a projectile toast heading my way...one slightly fat lip later... we wandered down to the guest reception and gave up on tea - it was however ready about the time we had to leave for the Taj moonligh viewing...so a quick gulp and off we go - getting a flavor for the unintentionaly India diet? The full moon viewing was surreal - Sodhi had purchased tickets for us the day before and Lalita escorted us to the entrace - we entered annother world...there were easilty 200 military men, in body armor sporting automatic riffles - we were x-rayed, grabed, squeezed and probed by 3 women - Lalita had warned us, camera, money, water - NOTHING else - some not so lucky travellers were loosing the contents of their make-up kits etc...move, stop, push, pull - we were surrounded by the military - what had we gotten ourselves in to? Exiting the check point the crowd of 50 grew quite - what a privilege to view the Taj for 30 minutes in the moonliight with an unubstructed view - Alas Susies camera had died so I was on tap to photograph the situation. All too soon we had to leave and head back to the hotel -on the way we wanted to get, yes a drink...I admit it we needed it...but of course all of Agra is dry, almost impossible to find and buy some alcohol and we did not want to wander - so we went to the shop accross the street from the hotel, in the back room they sell sarees, have you ever seen this done, a huge platformed surface 2 feet up is covered in white sheets and the owners take our sarees after saree and flings the 6 metres of fabric out at you for viewing...a Russian couple and their child were there viewing sarees, Susie taught them how to dress in a Saree as the owners were hopeless and she bought 3 - she is an actress in Moscow and her husband a director, they are moving to New York shortly - what a kick - he thought Susie was the best as she helped him negotiate from $125 per saree, to $150 for all 3...finally we left to go back to the hotel..., the hotel itself has a viewing point so we headed up there...and took some more photos - now completely exhausted and freezing (no more bathing suites like Goa) we headed down to our room - queue spooky music from Scooby doo...don't go in there Shaggy...OK picture this - dirty dirty blankets - sheets with strange looking black specs on them, mosquitos everywhere because of bathroom window that would not shut - providing the additional added bonus of waiters and hotel staff getting a good view of our potty habits...being concerned about lice, Susied donned a blue plastic bag on her head...nicely matching her Venice Beach Sleep Shirt...we were afraid to turn out the lights so I stuck my Costco flashlight inbetween the two twin beds, which were side by side and we amused each other by making shadow puppets on the ceiling - made crazed creatures forced to stay at the Taj Khema for more than one night - I took photos of this for our upcoming slide show vidoe production that we will subject our family to later this month...We finally drifted off - so cold we were so cold, I kept going to my back-pack and adding another layer - sarong, after sarong - what a sight I was - finally we got warm and fell asleep - bang, bang bang...the ratty bellboy who had propositions Susie last night (sorry forgot to mention that one...) is at the door wanting to be paid for who knows what - I saw steam rise from Susie blue plastic head bag...oh my God what else...well - I definately had a throat infection so had started on meds about 24 hours earlier - that or some Hotel Khema bug was at work - I now had Delhi belly and was making regular trips to the potty - the viewing potty you remember that the busboys pass by...however Susie had some meds to snap me back in shape...oh boy - Lalita came and we were going to the Red Fort with her - and Amar - we just could not handle driving her there, then back to Agra so we begged off and headed out just with our driver - Susie waited outside having gone there a few years ago and I did the highlight, self-guided tour. Six Indian boys (are you getting that boys from the North, the the excepting of the wonderful sikh men we met up here in the north) were sassing me and I was at my India limit - I looked at them and yelled in English...while pointing my index finger at them "you need to go get some manners now!"...I am sure that had an undeniable influence on their lives...ha ...but a Britsh couple were passing and I said to the woman, I am sorry I was having a rough moment...she said you are not having a frustrating moment Love, you are having an India moment....it has to happen some time! Sprint tour done, back to the car, Amar and Susie and our trip back to Delhi, which thankfully took only 4 vs 5 hours and was rather uneventful - I did however see this veggie vendor - note the red carrots!
- well until we landed close to our hotel, all the streets were closed for a visiting Shiek, we had to cross 6 lanes of traffic with all of our luggage and transfer it to a rickshaw to finish the way to the hotel because Amar could not get his car to the hotel...but now our bellies are full, we have posted and a luke warm shower awaits...tomorrow is another day! Love KB from Delhi - remember to check Susies blog for her take on the Hitchcock day from hell.....
posted by Photocat | 4:29 AM
3 Comments:
Oh man I forgot to put in my blog that the waiter wanted to sleep on me! How could i have forgotten such an offer?
EWWW!
Oh my stars, quite the experience of a lifetime there, gals.
Keep it up, you are on the home stretch and really, it can only get better, right? Right??
What a journey to Agra, and how exact you describe India as I remember it from our journey back in 1998. We was invited to a Sikh wedding in Punjab. Landet at 1:30 am at Dehli International. Spent 45 minutes to agree upon the price for "The Best chaufeur in India". We ended up paying USD 100 for a 10 hour drive (Started at USD 700!!!).
After 4 minutes drive, the tire went flat, and the chaufeur asked us for money to buy a new one. That was only the beginning. The drive through the foggy night was a real nightmare. I've never been so scared. Loaded Elephants, broken down overloaded trucks marked with bunch of stones on the "Super highway", people and people and whatever you can image all through the night. And the chauffeur all the time asking for more money - money - money.
Talking about drinks: In Amritsar, rain pouring down, just about freezing point: My wife and I needed something Warm. asked in the hotel receipcion: No, we don't sell alcool, but try over the street. Knock on the gate. No sound. Then besides, the tobacco shop was about to close and I asked the owner if he could help us. Of yes sir, just jump on back on my scooter. I off we went in the rain and near frost in the black night. 15 minutes, and he stopped: Knocked on a gate:
- Yes what do you want, sir?
- What can you offer, sir?
- The strongest beer in the world sir, Only 90 rupees. Or Half a whisky, Doctors special for 100 rupees
- I'll take the whiskey, sir.
Then I was droven back on the scooter. All from free. But we bought a lot in the tobacco shop the day after.
India is marvellous, if you only get used to it.
PS. Soory for this very long comment, but your post gave me so many memories from India.
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