Plenty to See!

A.M.S…
The third day in India we spent at Delhi, a modern city, the capital of the Republic of India, and saw many things of interest…

1. the Parliament buildings and the President's home, which would do credit to any nation
2. the American Embasssy, an architectural masterpiece! Firstly because it's the most beautiful contemporary structure we have ever seen. Secondly, because it is an amazing blend of modern American yet with strong resemblances to the most beautiful Indian palaces. The reflection pool in front with its fountains and the courtyard around the structure, which contains 150 offices, also matches the splendour of India's architectural grandeur. A friend commented: “If the Taj Mahal we're to see tomorrow, is half as beautiful, I shall be satisfied”
3. we felt the American Embassy was a credit to American prestige and a diplomatic compliment to India. Indians seem to love it and remark that: “the gates are open to the grounds and you can go see it at any time”. By comparison, the Russian Embassy has an iron fence around it with a locked gate! We felt here was a minor diplomatic victory for our side. The Russian Embassy was large and impressive. You couldn't help but feel by the very extent of the building and grounds that they're here to stay and they mean business!
4. the Ashoka Hotel, recently built (I believe by the Indian Government) is, without question, one of the most modern and probably the finest hotel in all Asia
5. the Raj Ghat; one of the most consecrated places in India where Mahatma Ghandhi's body was placed on a funeral pyre and burned
6. the Juma Masjid, the Mohammedan Mosque; we'll carry with us a picture of a little boy not more than six, sitting all by himself, and prayerfully singing, presumably from passages in the Koran, quite unmindful of visitors…
7. the Imperial Hotel; very nice, where we had all three meals that day

Now to Old Delhi

A.M.S…
The former were parts of New Delhi. In Old Delhi we saw many structures of India's past, mostly of Muslim construction because they conquered and ruled here for several hundred years beginning about 1200 A.D. We felt the Tour over-emphasised the Muslim period, skipped a little too lightly on the Hindu period, and gave far too little attention to the Delhi of today.

This comment is coloured of course, by our deep interest in what is happening and what is going to happen in India, and frankly by a relative disinterest in India's past history especially before British rule. If India's future, as we see it, were not so urgently important, the Red Fort with the beautiful grounds around literally a small city built by Shah Jahan and the imposing victory column “Qutb Minar” might command more attention and interest.

We stayed there for about an hour but the wait did not produce any spectacular result, except that the dark mass, at first only silhouetted against the sky, gradually changed from grey to grey-white. However, just as we were about to leave (most others had gone for breakfast) we looked back and observed that now the sun no longer was penetrating the haze.

Instead it was falling gently on this amazing structure to give it life and roundness, as though a flat painting had suddenly been given a beautifully delicate relief and a third dimension. In the afternoon after visiting other sights around Agra, we returned again to see the Taj in a dazzlingly full and brilliant sunshine.

A Curious Comparison…

A.M.S…
So much has been written by the most gifted writers, and so many beautiful pictures painted or artistic photographs taken of the Taj that there seems no opportunity to add to the written or graphic description. Most of whom have seen it, I feel sure, will contend that it is more beautiful and more awe inspiring than expected.

With this we warmly concur. I can think of no structure that, to us, has inspired such a dramatic sense of majestic and exquisite beauty as the Taj. The nearest, to us, would be the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, but that is so much enhanced by the significance of the man and his contribution to our country.

One can't be quite sure whether it actually is the Memorial itself, or what it stands for, which presses on one's emotions the most. The Taj on the other hand, must make its impact alone, with no other meaning whatsoever! The Taj is more than a piece of white marble architectural beauty.

For example, a small leaf, maybe an inch in length, may have a dark green inlay illustrating its top, but in that small design another thin, darker green stone might be inlaid to show the veins of the leaf, and should it be turned to the under side, a lighter green stone used…. All this in one infinitesimally small portion of a single leaf!

Quotations from the Koran are inlaid in black marble lines on the white marble exterior. In the inside the tombs of Shah Jahan and his wife, Mumtaz, in whose memory the Taj was originally built are inlaid similarly, not alone with semi-precious stones but with precious stones as well.

The tombs are surrounded by marble screens almost as delicately cut out as though they were lace. It took 20,000 men about 18 years to build the Taj Mahal, which incidentally was not only completely designed, but even advanced to the point of a model having been made, one year before the woman in whose memory it was to be built, actually died.

That was the custom in those days. The gals on the ship are asking what their husbands have in mind for them?

I'm Left Cold!

A.M.S…
For sheer, awesome beauty, probably surpassing the imagination of most people, the Taj more than meets advance expectations. For being in any way meaningful, in the sense that it is supposed to glorify the great love a man had for his wife, it leaves me, for one, absolutely cold.

All I can think of is those 20,000 men who laboured for 18 years in this poverty-stricken land, which for them was probably no more of a paradise then than now and for which they received very likely scarcely the bread to feed them. So, the Taj becomes a monument rather to an age in human slavery and in no respect more meaningful than the Pyramids of Egypt.

The Taj was, after all, well worth seeing and I'm sure we'll always view it as the most beautiful physical structure we've ever seen.