Touristin'

First, a disclaimer for Courtney: Although I am smiling in these pictures, I am not having any fun while you are at home getting four hours of intermittent sleep taking care of our children. You are a wonderful mother and I love you!

I haven't posted in a while. The reason is because we've been touristing to a few places. Sometimes when we are feeling energetic we'll go somewhere in the evening after work and then on Saturday we made the big trek down South to see the Taj Mahal (warning: many pictures to follow).

On our way down (4 hours one way) we had to stop in between states to pay a tax or something. Our car was bombarded with people selling stuff or showcasing these monkeys. I stepped out to get a monkey on my back. Bad idea! Not only was I immediately surrounded by ten peddlers, but the monkey kept pinching me in the face. For their size, they pack a punch. Worth 10 rupees (about a quarter) though. I found out later they had just taken them from the buildings nearby. We passed an abandoned building driving and saw dozens and dozens popping out of every nook and cranny.

This is the gate that leads into the Taj Mahal. Everything is about perfect symmetry and optical illusions. Not a bad entrance to your wife's grave.

The writing on the side is from the Quran. As they painted/etched the writings going up they made it slightly bigger each step of the way so that no matter how close you stand it all looks like the same size font.

Then as you walk through the gate, the Taj Mahal "looms" into view. Optical illusion #2: If you go to the edge of this arch and walk backwards the Taj Mahal appears to get bigger. I tried to capture this on video but it couldn't trick my trusty ol' lense. Pretty cool though.

Courtney, I love you, but not as much as Emperor Shah Jahan loved his 3rd wife. I probably won't hire 20,000 people to work 12 years to build you a perfectly symmetrical grave site. But I still love you.

Every tour needs a good guide. This was ours. He looks Mexican in this picture, but he's not. He grew tired of us taking pictures the wrong way so he would take our cameras, positioned us and then take several pictures for us. He's been doing this for that past 20 years. He was great, and very passionate about the Taj Mahal.

We also had our 15 minutes of fame. For some reason, 20-25 people came up to us while we were touring the Taj and asked us to take a picture with them (and everyone else in their group, one by one). I thought it was because we were white as the marble, but there other white people around. My guess is that it is because we looked very American. Several of them shook my hand and congratulated me on Usama's death (you're welcome, played a huge role in that one). Anyway, I thought it was so funny, I took a picture of it. Also, parents wanted their infants and small children to shake our hand, so they would force the sometimes terrified children to extend their hand or look our way and say hi. Poor kids.

Moriah got a little too into her 15 minutes of fame, and while I was trying to snap a picture of this cute kid and her dad, she popped her head in. I was cracking up as she realized I wasn't trying to take a picture of her.

Speaking of cute kids, Indian kids are the cutest. I want to bring one home with me. I actually sat there for 10 minutes on the ride home and thought about how I could sneak one on to the plane. This is inside the Taj Mahal. This little girl started to run as I took a picture. Then her parents grabbed her and made her stand still while I took some pictures. I felt kinda bad. Pobre sita.

See, aren't they cute. I'm going to the market soon to try and buy Emma Jane a churidar like this one. Also, the little anklets that have the bells on them. The little girl who ran had some on her that were so cute when she stepped.

Another pic our guide took. He was always framing the Taj Mahal with something.

They made us wear protective covers on our shoes to preserve the stone and probably also for religious reasons. I thought the covers would be enough to walk into the mosque next to the Taj Mahal, but some guy laid into me when I tried to walk in. Dumb American!

A view of the garden looking from the Taj Mahal.

The top dome actually comes off and there are little cookies inside, Yum!

Afterward, we went and saw how the gem stones were laid perfectly flush into the marble. It was done by this artisan family, and the special method has been handed down from generation to generation. They still take a several months carving and fitting them by hand. At least they made it look like they did, and wanted to charge me an arm and leg to buy anything. It was pretty impressive watching them do it.

Then we went to the Agra Fort, where the emperor and his family lived. This is a view across the garden to his bedroom. He was eventually jailed by his power hungry son and locked up in the tower over on the left until he died. Rough life.

A throne fit for a king. This guy understood. This is the entrance into a very nice, private and comfortable bathroom.

This is a carving on the side of the walls, before Hitler flipped it around and made it a symbol of terrible things, the Swastika was (and is) a symbol for good luck in many of the Indian religions.

The emperor and his wife(s) took a bath in this big tea cup. Those are steps on the side.

It was a long, but really fun trip to Agra and back. We also saw a small boy charming a cobra, but we were driving and I didn't get a picture. This is an amazing place with so much history.

Another evening after work we took a quick trip to few places in Delhi. This is the Lotus temple. Built recently by the Ba'hai religious group who believe everyone has the truth (or parts of it). It was pretty peaceful inside. The lotus flower is the state flower of India.

Then we went to see the India gate. Very pretty, but not so safe at night. I was surrounded by a bunch of teenage boys who decided for some reason not to do anything.

Then we went to the Old Fort for their light and laser history show, but it was cancelled due to technical problems.

Then, last night we went to this Akshardam Hindu Temple. They wouldn't let us take our camera in, so this is a pic from the web. But that's what it looked like.