Again, we had to get up very early, 6:00 o’clock this time because our driver was expecting us at 6:30 to drive us to Agra, the town where the famous Taj Mahal is located. After a rather exhausting travel of about 4 1/2 hours, we eventually arrived at the South Gate of Taj Mahal, only to wait another hour in the waiting queue for the entry, even after we have paid incredible 750 Rs. for the entry fee. There are separate prices for foreigners (probably about ten times as expensive) and for locals. I can live with that, no problem, but then I think it’s legimate to ask for separate entries as well.
But to be honest, it was also to a certain extent our own fault that we spent so much time in the queue. While we waited there in the queue, we were approached by about a dozens of so-called tourist guides and a few other very suspicious individuals that tried to convince us in paying them about 200-400 Rs. for a shortcut. When we traded it down to 100 Rs., we gave in and followed one of them but as soon as he entered a very dark and ominous building, we decided to rather stay in the queue for some time than end up on the newspaper’s headlines the next day (it wasn’t dangerous at all and we weren’t afraid, even I was more massive in size than those tiny Indians, but you never knows what lurks behind the next corner *haha*). While we might be a bit naïve, we are not completely stupid, so we didn’t pay in advance and we only lost our place in the queue.
In the end, we gained. This is because when we waited the second time in the queue, yet another guide introduced himself but to our surprise, he claimed that he will not ask for money as he has been already paid by the government. Naturally, we were still very suspicious, especially since the tour was supposed to be completely free of cost. There must be a catch somewhere… However, after we repeatedly stated that we won’t pay anything for the tour and the guy was still there, we gave it a try.
We were not disappointed. After we ultimately entered the area of Taj Mahal, he started to tell us very funny, interesting and astonishing stories about Shah Jahan, the emperor at that time (around 1631), and how he gave orders to build Taj Mahal after the death of his beloved third wife Mumtaz Mahal. Thank you very much for the tour, Mohammed (the Name of our Guide, as written on his business card). The main building of the Taj Mahal, the mausoleum made of white marble is just amazing and I think it’s better to have a look at some of the pictures I made there so that you can imagine how impressive the building actually is.
In the late afternoon, we went to visit a town called Fatehpur Sikri where we headed to Jama Masjid, a mosque with a tomb inside (The Tomb of Salim Chisti) but after having seen Taj Mahal, we were (naturally) not so impressed anymore although the architecture was also very remarkable. Inside the tomb, there were also some kind of stone fences where you could knot a thread to have one of your wishes become fulfilled. So we did. Unfortunately, the place itself was a bit dirty and as usual they wanted money for everything, one of the guys actually followed Shenji from the mosque back to our car (he even entered the same rickshaw without asking) until Shenji conceded and bought a wooden chess for 50 Rs. (very good trade actually, as it started at around 300 RS.)
At 18:00 o’clock, later than intended, we left Agra and arrived in Jaipur after another exhausting journey of 5 hours. After having eaten something at 23:00 (the restaurant in our hotel was still open, but we were the last guests), we immediately went to bed because we were, quite obviously, pretty tired.
