A journey to TAj Mahal

Ahsan javed
Caas
J.N.U
A journey to Taj.

I wanted to set out a journey to Agra where one of the seventh wonders locates beside the bank of Yamuna. So I got a chance to make a journey for this wonderful place, where I had been when I was merely ten years. Last Monday (21-03-11) I thought this is the time what I was looking for when I got an invitation from one of my relatives there.
According to my plan I left the compose in the evening and started our journey next day along with my cousins in the morning. We were getting away from the city towards our next destination.
I was so exited to watch Taj after a long time, because of recalling every scenes, I had come across that time. We reached there in the afternoon when visiting Taj was not possible. In case of sun shine it is not easy to go for seeing Taj. It is made of white stones that get hit due to sunshine. We have to wait for one day more. We passed night quite well. Next day in the morning we two persons left for Taj.

We arrived there by auto rickshaw in front of a big get. This is Taj Mahal Sir! Driver says. We paid fair and moved towards the get. It was west get where I found some vehicles from auto rickshaw to long four wheeler . They started to flatter us even though destination is very small, I think around fifty steps. But they ask for fifty to forty rupee. the cheapest fair is five rupee per head by rickshaw.

We purchased two tickets in order to visit Taj. I read an announcement there, the children below 15 may visit free of cost. Thus it was my second visit but I was paying for the first time 20 rupee. 750 rupee is for all foreigners. We had to stand up in the queue, we had a bag which we were carrying with us, because we did not find any luggage room and we were told to keep it first when we were just about to enter, my cousin had to get off queue and I entered after being checked very carefully. There are three lines. One for mail then for female and last one is for foreigners. I had to wait for him for ten minuets then he came and we entered from the west get. There is another get beside the right hand from west get and just in front of Taj entrance. This get is not very common and almost people are unaware of this get. That is why there was no huge crowd as much as was at the west get.

We entered the first get on which the chapter no 89 of the Holy Qur'an is written properly. On my first visit I could not recognize these verses but this time it was easy to make sense. There is no an iota of unbalancing in the size of verses from bottom to top. After that here the wonderful and amazing Taj welcomes you, saluting the blue sky, telling the glorious past, attracting people from all over the world, symbol of love instead of hatred, made of white stones built by fourth Mughal emperor Sha Jahan in the memory of his beloved wife Mumtaj Mahal, surrounded by two well built mosques with red stones from both sides west and east. He made his love alive by building this huge building that is one of the seventh wonders in the world for which Agra is famous now all over the world. Although it has some other monuments like Akbar's tomb beside the main road in Sikandra where we had left our bus, and Fateh Pur Sikri where I could not get time to go there. People were every where watching towards the Taj amazingly, this is taking picture, that is going to walk with his friend, they are laughing, she is making a pose in front of photographer, guides are wagging their tails and running after foreigners. They are all in all here. They have plenty of time to address the visitors, to make speeches in front of them, they are responsible for explaining all the history weather right or wrong. We as well took some pictures and I am mainly fond of pictures so that I can share them with my friends on the face book and make them exited to visit our country. And we can boost our tourism by means of this activity, unfortunately I did not find a good number of foreigners as I was expecting before that. Timing was not suitable for visiting. It was afternoon and sun was shining upon our heads, it was not easy to stand up before camera for a long time, our eyes were blinking rapidly while taking pictures. I found one changing there. On my first visit in child hood we were allowed to go inside the grave yard even we had a close watch to grave of this noble couple Shah Jahan and Mumtaj Mahal. But nowadays the original get is close and visitors are not allowed to go inside. They have to watch original copy. It is better to visit Taj Mahal in the evening or in moon light if one likes to watch it's true beauty. And there should be a group of friends especially students. I was missing much some good friends of mine not only inside the country but abroad as well.

This was my short visit to Taj for the second time. In brief I would like to show some facts which I found there. Streets were so dirty, Children were doing their jobs at hotels , canteens, dhabas.
Krishna was one of them a12 years old Krishna takes every day a bundle of shoes carries them upon his small, childlike shoulder and sells them on foot path. He was very happy and told us proudly I find two to three hundred rupee per day. When my cousin asked him how much do you accumulate for yourself he replayed: Only hundred rupee. Fortunately the auto rickshaw driver was his relative. Krishna was very delighted to know that he would safe seven rupee. One can get Vehicle from in front of Agra fort just like red fort made of red stones. The place is good for looking at and visiting small India. One can find each and everything and scarcity of cleanliness. Smoking and pan masalas are symbol of that place.
While looking up prepositions in the book this nice sentence passed from me: "India is a noble , gorgeous land, teeming with natural wealth". In fact our country is so. But the current plight is not suitable for this sentence. All of us know why..............