DAY TWO

In Agra. Noise, noise, noise – but that’s not just Agra. That’s India. Hooting, honking, beeping cars, trucks, lorries and motorbikes, motorbikes, motorbikes. Neverending, day or night. Little purpose in all the racket other than that it seems to be in the genes! Driving is amazing. No lanes on the roads; if there’s no room on the road, the pavement will do – and if there’s no room on the pavement, well the other side of the road seems to be equally tempting, regardless of oncoming traffic. The idea is to inch a centimetre ahead (yep! Imperial or metric, take your pick!) and then you have right of way. Unless, of course, the other guy’s bigger! Amazingly, though, the entire system seems to work perfectly well. I never saw a single accident. Marvellous for the tourist driving home completely legless from a party – hazardous motoring skills would definitely go unnoticed.

I went to the Taj Mahal this morning. I never thought I’d be typing that – and neither was it disappointing. It’s every bit as magnificent as it looks on the postcards. I was a little confused at first (ok, ok, no surprise there …) as to why ‘polluted vehicles’ (tuc-tucs, cars, etc.) were not allowed near it. You have to disembark some way away and take battery-operated tuc-tucs up to the gates. To me, in terms of pollution avoidance, this was a bit like closing the window of your beach hotel to stop the sea air getting in! But it wasn’t about air pollution, rather noise. To preserve serenity around this wonderful tomb is a feat in itself and undoubtedly adds to the whole impression of the building and its surroundings. There is something magnetically beautiful about this building. It’s that type of special view that you could sit and look at all day and never tire of it. It transports to a dozen different places. Rather like they say the most beautiful women have a very particular symmetry to their facial features, the Taj Mahal (which means ‘Most Beautiful Woman’, in loose terms) is also perfectly symmetrical – and full of the most fantastic optical illusions. The 4 pinnacles around it, for example, are NOT straight, but angled outwards at 5 degrees, to ensure that in the event of an earthquake they would not collapse on the tomb. The decoratively ‘angled’ sides and corners of the doorways are not angled at all, but completely flat (but you actually have to put on your hand on them to believe it!). The script of the Koran adorning the front of the tomb is NOT all the same size, patterns are not painted but rather inset with precious stones, and if you think people might behave civilly while trying to enter the door of the mausoleum, that is also an illusion. The Indians, I’m afraid, do not understand queues and mutate into savages, elbows, teeth, the lot, when anything like a queue stands before them. Alas, it didn’t take me long to learn the ropes and yes, I DID get inside!!

Note, this ‘learning experience’ came in handy on many occasions throughout the trip. As I recall, I even barred the door one day from an Indian ‘lady’ (for want of a better word) who, true to form, was queue-jumping. Now, we all know that the English – let’s face it – are pretty anal about queueing, but this was too much. I braced myself, refused to let her in, had a two minute physical battle and – yay – my cycling colleague soon caught on and slipped in behind me – in her rightful place in the queue. Ha! A menial, pathetic and minor battle won. Felt GREAT!

Lunch was back at the hotel, then bike-fitting. The organisation of this was fabulous – mechanics galore and I had my bike with saddle done, gears checked and all ready in about ten minutes – which meant I had time for a swim in the pool and a head massage! The former was bloody freezing, the latter marvellous. Then I linked up with a small group of ladies and we went off to the Red Fort. This place was immense and, like any building, not easy to describe in words without making it sound boring. Its main features were pillars of Muslim architecture around the bottom and Hindu architecture around the top, which were quite symbolic – and of course the rooms where the Shah Jahan was imprisoned by his son and from where he spent the remainder of his life looking out over his wife’s tomb – the Taj Mahal. Other than that – it’s a fort. It’s red. It’s big. And there were other things on my mind, like the challenge ahead.

INDIAN HYGIENE - WITH A TWIST

Yep! Had to laugh at this – just not for the faint of heart! Lovely lad in the hotel toilets looking after your every need. Toilets were pretty spotless, by the way, in this particular hotel – on the surface, at least. In fact, if it hadn’t been for the queues it might have gone unnoticed that the lovely laddie was leaping in and out of the toilets wiping the seats clean with … wait for it … THE SAME CLOTH that he was then using to wipe the sinks, the taps, the mirrors, the counter ….

You gotta laugh. You just gotta laugh!

Hats off also to the group of 4 who stayed behind after dinner to ‘finish off the wine’ (gee – I wonder who could have been in that group, eh????)? And spotted the waiters pouring all the left over wine from glasses back into the bottles. Note to selves (?): Make sure wine is opened at the table from now on!

Further note to self: Indian rum = Hangover