THE TAJ

Many of you may not be aware that I went to the Taj Mahal last year.

It wasn't planned. The day before I left, I was planning on going to Rome. But Bonnie the godmother of senior mama mafias contacted me and asked me if I wanted to trade my Rome for a Honolulu, Sao Paolo, or 5 day Delhi. I said, "5 Day Delhi". She said, 'Oh? Are you planning on going to the Taj.?" I said, "yes." She said, "I'll make sure your taken care of. . ."

So I sold my soul to the devil so that I could get paid to go to the Taj Mahal.

That's the supreme perk of my job.

I took many photos.

Good thing, because I do not plan on going back.

We begin: Below is one of the three cars we took. The whole crew decided to go.

The party car adopted me. They were all Bonnie's friends, told to take care of me.

You'll notice I'm the youngest one there. This is a senior senior trip.

Below is our driver. Everyone in my car was really fun and nice but. . .

on the drive back (6 hours to do 60 miles)

everyone got totally wasted and said some incredible racist things.

I felt so bad for the driver.

The ride there was "only" 4 hours. Start, stop.

start. stop.

start.

stop. below a palace on the way to "The Taj."

ha, ha. we thought it was the Taj.

start.

stop.

start.

stop.

start. stop.

start.

stop.

start.

stop. Finally. Below is our guide in the orange shirt.

our crew. to the right(bottom) is matt our International Service Manager

I'll tell you more about him later.

You see a lot of this in India. The only ones who are safe

are the cows.

Here we are on a little trolley to get to the line

to get in to the Taj Mahl.

One thing I didn't take photos of were all the children trying to sell us little trinkets

any time we were not in a vehicle.

In fact, many of them were tracing us when we were in the Trolley.

above: street food.

below: ticket counter to get in to the Taj Mahal

lines

lines

Indians know how to do beauracracy.

At least there were interesting things like these monkeys to look at.

And we're in. where do we go... is that the Taj Mahal?

oh, no, that is.

Above is my party van.

They were so drunk. You can't even imagine.

The whole crew. Everybody has to take these group photos.

And a million photographers take these photos of you too

And then try to sell them to you before you leave.

But the thing that happened to me most...

Was that OTHER people wanted me in THEIR photos.

They'd never seen anything like me.

I was super exotic. I'm probably in a thousand photos.

So why did I take so many of my own?

Because I was at the Taj Mahal, duh.

And I'm never going back.....that ride was ROUGH.

Here's Matts bull legged stance. We had to take off our shoes and put

on these little slippers before we walked in to the Tomb area inside the Taj itself.

This is a view near the entrance of the Taj, looking back at where we came in.

Still at the entrance on the outside. Still haven't gone in.

walking in

These colored stones below are translucent when you put light behind.

I'm sure it's stunning at night.

wooop. And here we are OUT again.

They told us not to take photos of the inside.

But you can see some if you follow the link at the beginning of this entry to wikipedia

The back of the Taj Mahal. Whish most people think is the front, since thats usually where its most photographed from.

A building to the side. I liked it even more than the Taj Mahal but that's

probably because it was less crowded. Well, deserted actually. no one really cared about it.

Stunning ceiling.

beautiful little window.

Okay, so every time I took a photo, Lisa (below) wanted the same one.

She was pretty toasted.

And, of course. when you come back out, you have to take group photos again.

(hmm. In all these group photos, Matt is always behind me...)

Below is a man making tiles in a little shop our tour guide took us to afterwards.

The little shop is owned by his buddy and of course he wanted to give his buddy business.

But we are all so cheap, we didn't buy anything.

We travel too much.

poor guy.

Something I saw on the wall of the bathroom at our half way stop.

My party car kept complaining about how dirty and disgusting the bathroom was

when really, they should''ve realized. We were lucky to even have a bathroom to use.

And the guide was quite proud of it.

It was only for tourists.

They were so rude. I was so embarrassed.

Thank you, India, for trying to take care of me

And, India, you are just too, too hard for me.

I can't emotionally handle all the poor people and all the beggars and harrassments everytime I go outside. People are so desperately poor and hungry that they wouldn't know how to leave an obviously foreign "rich" girl alone. And if I give to one, a whole mob attacks me.

So I cannot even give to one. And I feel useless and overwhelmed. And my heart breaks.

I never want to go back.

Now I understand this story: A journalist was interviewing Mother Teresa in India. He said, while sweeping his arms out over the city, "Look at all the billions of starving people here. What makes you think you are going to succeed in saving them?"

And she replied: "God does not require that I succeed.

Only that I do the best that I can."

PS I forgot to tell you about Matt, our International Service Manager.

Anyway, the ride home was 6 hours of start-stop with polution and poverty on the outside of the car and rude raging drunks on the inside of the car.

I was so totally exhausted when we got to our hotel. The whole day, Matt kept trying to follow me around. I could tell he was interested but he's way too old for me, etc. etc . He kept trying to get me to ride back with him in his car too. I was super glad I was with the drunks and not him for those 6 hours and they absolutely would not hear of me transferring cars.

The Godmother told them to take care of me.

Well, when we arrived at the hotel, he kept asking me if I wanted to come to his room for a drink. I said no. I'm too tired. I'm taking a shower and going to sleep. Can I come to your room for a drink then? No, I am too tired. Thank you.

So I took a shower and then got into my over sized t shirt and pajama bottoms.

The phone rang.

"Hi this is Matt. I know you must be hungry. I have an extra sweet potato, do you want it?"

"okay, bring it over" I was starving.

I opened my door. No make up, scraggly hair. funny looking pajamas.

"Here's your sweet potato."

His eyes never left my chest.

"Thank you, I was starving."

"you look pretty tired." (how would he know, he was only looking at one area)

"Are you sure you don't want me to come in and give you a little massage?"

"ummm. thanks, I'm okay. Good night."

I shut my door. Really, he never once looked at my face.

A few minutes later,the phone rang again.

"Hello?"

"oh, hi, it's Matt. Umm. I have some bell peppers here too.

Do you want me to bring them over?"

"Uhh. No. Thanks. going to sleep already. good night."

click.

Then I sat on my bad and laughed until my stomach hurt. For real? He just wouldn't give up.

I guess that guy figured out how to get through to me:

Vegetables. uh. huh.

I told all my flight attendant girlfriends and we always laugh our heads off about Mr. Vegetable.

Sorry guys, but we do tell those stories.

Thank you, India.