Agra, continued...

Once Benny had been returned to us, it was time to move on to Agra’s other sights. Even though we had been told the security at Agra’s other World Heritage sites was nowhere near as draconian as at the Taj, Benny was relegated to the minibus, with Keir’s Nintendo DS and Thalia’s Ipod for company. Agra Fort is 2 kilometres and on the other side of the river to the Taj. From one of the Fort’s balconies you can see the Taj Mahal. This vista is very different to the one you get from inside the Taj, much grubbier and more real. Having seen it, it struck me that it would really be better to have not seen the Taj from Agra Fort at all.

It’s probably better to concentrate on what you can see inside the Fort rather than look around outside. It’s very much the best house on the street. Rajiv was able to tell us everything about everything. There was nothing relating to Agra and its Mughal empire he did not know, apart from how to impart this information in a manner that could keep his audience engaged!

Rajiv gets it right, this time...

Then it was time to climb into the minibus again and drive to Fatehpur Sikri. Fatehpur Sikri is a ghost town, 40 kilometres from Agra, and I think, much more interesting than Agra Fort. The Mughal emperor Akhbar oversaw building the city, 60 years before the first stones were laid on the Taj Mahal. Akhbar wanted to create a new capital because he was weary with the crowds at Agra. I know how he felt! Fatehpur Sikri was only in use for 16 years, and then it was abandoned. There are various reasons suggested for this. Maybe water had been in short supply, maybe it was more militarily useful to be back in Agra. Maybe Akhbar found the road journey between the two rather tiresome. I know we did! We could have spent more time wandering around Fatehpur Sikri, as it seemed to have been abandoned by tourists as well as Akhbar, but we had to get back in the minibus and back on the road to Agra to catch our train home.


The journey began well. However it was not long before we found ourselves at the end of a queue of motorbikes, cars, buses and trucks. This was a single lane road, with a dirt verge. This dirt verge became another lane of traffic. Vehicles began overtaking us on the other side of the road, so many vehicles that it became another lane of traffic heading into Agra. Vehicles began overtaking this lane of traffic on the dirt verge on the other side of the road. I don’t know what these vehicles thought they were ever going to achieve. It seemed obvious to me that at some point there would be to be four lanes of cars travelling north on a single lane road pointing directly at four lanes of cars travelling south on the other side of the same single lane road. And knowing India, both sides would feel they had right of way, regardless of which side of the road they were on. After 30 minutes of going absolutely nowhere, Rajiv turned around from his seat alongside the driver and told us we would be moving to Plan B. This was a good thing, because while we were not yet behind schedule for the train, we were beginning to think dinner would be out of the question. Rajiv said there was another road we could take, one that not many people knew about. He had taken the British Labour politician Barbara Castle down this road when she too needed to get to Agra Train station. So we turned the minibus around, a feat requiring quite a bit of skill from our driver as all four lanes of this single lane road already had stationary vehicles on them. Behind us the traffic was lighter, so after a while we were able to rejoin the tarmac and drive on the correct side of the road. You might think it would feel good to be travelling on the correct side of the road, actually moving past many, many stationary vehicles. Except some of the drivers of those vehicles had not yet worked out that there was no way anyone was going anywhere ahead. We saw headlights approaching. A bus was driving straight at us. He made no attempt to pull over. Where could he go? There were already two full lanes of traffic on the correct side of the single lane road. He should give way to us, for we were on the side of the road allocated to us by street designers. But he was bigger than we were, and in India, the accepted rule is the bigger vehicle takes precedence. Thankfully the other bus driver slowed down, and there we were, two vehicles pointing directly at each other on the same side of the road. Our driver drove back on to the dirt verge and we continued back towards Baroness Castle of Blackburn’s Plan B.

When we reached Barbara’s road it became apparent pretty quickly that calling it a road was probably not entirely accurate. I don’t know when Barbara Castle was in India, but she left public office in 1989. This dirt track probably hadn’t seen any maintenance since then. So we bounced along , being very grateful that Holly had her car seat, and that the bus actually had enough working seatbelts to strap her in. This track between fields led to a village, and after a while, back to the road between Agra and Fatehpur Sikri. The traffic on this side of the jam was no better than it had been before the dirt track, but it was all heading up towards Fatehpur Sikri, and as we weren’t going that way, we didn’t care! We finally reached Agra railway station, dinnerless but with 20 minutes to spare. As we'd rather go without dinner than spend another day in Agra ,it was a result!

Agra and back, in just one day...

One of the things you just have to do before you leave India, they say, is visit the Taj Mahal. Rod, Thalia and I visited this majestic monument back in 1998. Thalia doesn’t remember much of it, but as she was 11 months old at the time, we’ll forgive her for this. Keir, Stumpy and Nutty had never been, and bizarrely neither had Holly. As the temperature hadn’t started rising past the comfortable level yet, it seemed like a good time to go…

The Taj Mahal is in Agra, which is a hellish five plus hour drive from Delhi. It can also be reached by train in two hours. Guess which option we chose! The downside of the train is that it leaves New Delhi Railway Station at 0615, so it was a rather early start indeed. But the train deposited us at Agra station at 0815, and it took until 0815 and 15 seconds before the hassle started. Agra is a dump, with no reason to visit beyond the Taj Mahal and possibly Agra Fort. So everyone getting off the train is a tourist, and therefore, ripe for touting. We had booked a minibus with driver and guide. This proved to be a godsend, as Rajiv was waiting for us on the platform with a little sign saying “Roderick Fairweather and Friends”. Okay, it wasn’t really a little sign. It would have been very easy for Rajiv to spot us, as the platform, while teaming with people, didn’t have many parties consisting of six white people and a baby. But we needed the sign, because it told us which Indian didn’t want money to help us, but only because we’d already paid him.

Rajiv led the way outside to the minibus and we climbed in, into an oasis of calm amid the teeming throng of Agra. This minibus was perfect with a passenger compartment consisting of four individual seats and a bench seat across the back. It even had two fully functioning seatbelts, plus less usefully, one half of a seatbelt. We strapped Holly’s car seat into one of the seats with both sides of the seatbelt. Rajiv told us our first stop was to be the Taj Mahal. Actually, our first stop was the Taj Mahal ticket booth, half a kilometre from the gates. This is as close as petrol and diesel engined vehicles can get to the Taj now, in an effort to curb the effects of pollution on the building. There are lots of restrictions on what you can take into the Taj grounds, so we were advised to leave food, fiction books (guide books are okay), packs of cards, Ipods, electronic games and USB cables in the bus. Didn’t have any USB cables on me. We then were given the choice of which type of environmentally friendly transport we would like to get to the gates. There was the free option, walking, but it was uphill and the start of what would be a very long day. Also, walking would give lots of opportunities for young men to try to convince us we really needed to buy whatever tat they were selling. Or we could pay some locals to go in a carriage pulled by a flea ridden horse, or in an electric rickshaw. Guess which option we chose!

The rickshaw deposited us as close to the gate as was possible, leaving a short distance for the young men to try to convince us we really needed to buy whatever tat they were selling. They had nasty replicas of the Taj and Rajasthani shoes, even though Agra is in Uttar Pradesh. No one was selling T-shirts saying “My boyfriend went to the Taj Mahal and all he got me was this lousy T-shirt”. A missed opportunity, for marketing and amusing spelling mistakes, I think. We reached the security check point and split into gender groups. From my queue I heard Rod explaining that Keir was in the right queue, even though his hair might suggest otherwise. I had to open my bag so the security lady could check inside to make sure I had not brought in anything subversive like a magazine or chocolate bar. Unfortunately, my bag did contain something she considered subversive. For inside was the instigator of riots and top of the Interpol Watch list, Keir’s teddy, Benny. Having known Benny for nine years I vouched for his behaviour. I promised I wouldn’t let him out of my bag. But this was not good enough. The lady would not let Benny in. I asked her what damage could a child’s small stuffed toy do to a 378 year old marble building. I begged for him, like an American Idol contestant facing the chop. But like Simon Cowell, she would not be moved. So I did the only thing I thought right, and started shouting over to Rod that the lady wouldn’t let Benny in. Maybe that teddy was a bad influence… Rod had also not been completely above board. He’d been carrying a copy of the ultra subversive, “Sunday Times of India” newspaper. That too would not be allowed in.

Rajiv came to the rescue. He apologised for not telling us back in the minibus we were not allowed to bring stuffed toys into the Taj. He’d only done this tour one thousand times, and was unaware stuffed blue teddies could be so subversive. He gave Benny to one of his friends in a shop outside the Taj for safekeeping. So after we’d visited the monument to love, we were going to have to visit the monument to marble nick-nacks to negotiate a hostage release. Marvellous!

The Fairweather Family, minus Benny

Holly: Mum, why am I sitting on the Taj Mahal?

Nutty: It was your father's idea, darling. Humour him.

I believe I can fly, just like R Kelly

The reunion shot

The Lotus Temple

Here's a shot to prove we made it out of India Gate in one piece. This is the Baha'i Lotus Temple in Delhi.

The Baha'i faith is a very interesting one. They want to remove prejudices based on race, caste and language. They believe in the equality of men and women and in universal education, for women as well as men. They think true religion conforms to reason, with a harmony between religion and science. They don't believe in superstition, outdated ceremonies and sermons. And they want to abolish the extremes of wealth and poverty. All in all, not a lot to object to.

The Lotus Temple was completed in 1986. Like all Baha'i Houses of Worship, it has a nine sided, circular shape. Outside there are 27 marble clad petals, inside the building is devoid of religious icons, and has no altar or pulpit. It is a white, peaceful, calm oasis inside a bustling noisy city, even though it is one of the most visited buildings in the world, with 13,000 people walking through its doors every day. But not on Sundays...as we found out the first time we tried to visit.

They have an education centre on site, which Stumpy, Nutty and Rod found very interesting. I stayed outside with Holly, as children under 12 were not allowed inside. I'm not sure how that sits with their universal education stance, really. But Stumpy contributed to the cause, coming home with a plastic replica of the Lotus Temple, to give to one of his work colleagues who is a Baha'i. It plugs in and everything, with pretty blue lights. All for four quid!

I predict a riot!

Another month, another lot of visitors, another shot of India Gate!


This time it was Stumpy and Nutty, with their 11 month old baby, Holly. Many photos of Holly were taken on this ten day visit. This one is unusual, in that it was taken by Rod and not by some random Indian for his own personal collection. For Holly became a celebrity while in India. Everywhere we went, polite people would stop us and ask if they could take Holly's photo. Less polite ones just took the shots. And it didn't stop with photos - people in the street wanted to hold her. Some asked, others just lunged for her. We all got very good at anticipating these movements, and placing ourselves between Holly and her adoring public. We were just like a group of bouncers, except that no-one was muscle bound, and other than Rod, no-one was over 5 ft 6 and a half!


While we were out Holly got hungry, as babies do, so we found a quiet area under a tree. I would've called it a quiet grassy area, but grassy might be stretching the truth just a little. It wasn't exactly secluded, but this is India, so not much is. But we were away from the main India Gate strip, the two cricket matches and the busloads of school children, so it was as good a place as any. Or so we thought...


It transpires that in India, there's nothing quite as interesting as observing a white baby eat baby food. Some school children saw us, and came over to watch. Some of the cricketers saw the schoolchildren watching, and came over to see what was happening. Children from a different school joined in too. The first group of kids had kept back like we asked them to, but with each new wave of watchers the gaggle was getting closer and closer. A souvenir seller saw the crowd and decided this might be a good place to set up his pitch, and came over to join us. When Nutty noticed the change of tone in Rod's voice she glanced over her shoulder and decided while Holly might not think she'd finished her lunch, for safety's sake she had.

Feeding time at the zoo when we only had one school and half a cricket team. The boy in the black jumper really didn't want to move back...