India Blog!

Honey and Ishita accompanied me to the Taj today, which made the trip so much more fun than it would have been alone. They added comic relief, like this, to the ordeal of walking around in 100 degree weather on hot marble stone in direct sunlight! Despite the aggressive temperatures, Agra was not nearly as bad in terms of crowds and pickpockets as I had anticipated. In fact, while I at times wished that we were alone here to get those great, clean shots of the mausoleum without people in the way, I thought the crowds in their beautiful saris enhanced the whole mood of the place against the glowing white stone. There were also lots of tourists, of course, and Ishita and Honey commented when we entered that we could easily be in America! While, as I'm a foreigner, my entry fee was a good 50 times more expensive than my companions, we laughed that I got to ride the battery-operated short bus for free from the parking lot, while the girls owed 4 rupees apiece.