Wah, Taj boliye!

Bill Clinton once said, "There are two kinds of people in the world. Those who have seen the Taj Mahal and love it and those who have not seen the Taj and love it.". I'm glad to be finally in the first half.

And how?

The absconding

A taxi that we hired was stopped in the MP-Rajasthan border for a border RTO check. When the driver went in to the police shack and took 10 minutes, we smelled a rat. In the mean time, we watched the policemen shamelessly collect a note or two from all the passing carriers. They were least bothered about our presence. As we were watching the passing vehicles, the driver came out. Everything looked ok since he wasn't hurt and all. With 5 of us were sitting inside the Toyota Qualis, he quietly passed the vehicle and suddenly stopped a moving vehicle. We were all absolutely clueless as to what he was doing. The door of that vehicle opened, our driver popped in, and off vanished the vehicle into thin air.

As simple as that. Five of us were stranded in the border of two of the least developed Indian states inside a Qualis without it's driver, without a clue of what went wrong and what our status was. Thankfully, the policemen were co-operative and stopped a bus for us. What came as a pleasant surprise was the inspector recognizing what an IIM is!

The visit

To cut everything short, Taj was magnificent. That first look of the entire monument as it softly glistens in the evening light is the killer. I was more impressed with the long view than the up-close look, more so since so many tourists were crawling all through.

Anyway, the best part of the trip was that Agra was neither too hot nor too cold. Our evening -visit plan also ensured us proper sunlight.

We took all sorts of intricate snaps. Here are some.

The beauty. The magnus opus.


















Right perspective view.


















One side of the Taj, as dusk sets in.


















View of the main entrance, from Taj.