A Winter in India

For four nights each month in the winter they open the Taj for limited viewing at night. It just happened to be one of those nights, and we were able to get tickets for the 9 PM viewing. They take up to 50 people at a time and you get to stay there for half an hour.

Security was really tight. We were frisked twice; once before we got on the little bus, and once at the entrance to the Taj. The only thing you could carry with you was your camera and they made you snap a picture in front of them to show that it was really a camera. They little bus had the two of us, 5 other women and one man, plus three male soldiers and one female soldier all with very large guns. When it was our turn to go in we were walked as a group, surrounded by six other soldiers, again with guns. Once you are in place on the steps, they turn out the lights and there is the Taj, a ghostly white in the almost dark. Even with the moon behind the clouds most of the time, you could see the Taj itself and its reflection in the water pool. The picture does not do it justice. But really, if you stare at the picture really hard without blinking, eventually it will float into view. Really.

Lee is here and that meant we needed to go to Agra. Dave stayed in Delhi but Lee and I headed off with a great driver, Mahendra Singh. There was very little traffic for most of the route, hardly looked like the same road we had seen in December. On Tuesday morning we went to the Taj pretty early and saw it as the sun was first filtered by the haze and then got above the haze.

All good parades eventually end. What a treat to have this one go down our street. I took some of my digital images to the local photo place and made pictures of some of the parade happenings. I gave a copy of the album to my buddy the dry cleaner dude, he was very pleased.
Have had some great interactions with the dental students before and after lectures. They keep a fast pace of activity treating patients and attending lectures. This is a government dental college and they treat hundreds of patients daily in all of the various departments. The students sure get some clinical experi

Dave was taking photos up and down the parade route. It turned out that the guy he knows from the BeeKay Cleaners in Bengali Market is a Lion. So somehow Dave became an honorary Lion, our very own Lion King! We thank Lee for these photos of the Lion pack and the Lion King.

You just never know what will happen in a day here. Lee Abrahamsen arrived Friday night; we delivered 30 pairs of fleece socks from Grandma Decker to the kids at Faith Foundation yesterday. Today we were about to go out sightseeing when the sights came to us right here. First there were horses parading up and down, then drums started, and buses arrived. Turned out to be a parade to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Lion's Club of India. The parade started just down the street from us, and we had grand views of all the chaos. Parade was supposed to start at 10 AM; finally got underway at 12:45.

Pam's sister Carolyn and her husband Milan were here in Delhi with us for a week, then went off on a tour of Agra, Corbett Tiger Reserve, Nainital and Hardiwar, then back with us for a few more days. Great to be able to compare notes on India, religion, history, medicine, the cosmos and the meaning of life. Haven't had that much time with my sister in years, and it was really wonderful.

The photo is in the Defence Colony market, near where we had stayed the first week we were in India back in October, but we had never found this place. Great restuarant of South Indian food, and then a ride to the airport to send them back to 10 degrees F in Minnesota.

Ray and Connie were here and it was so great to see them. We took them to Old Delhi the first day they were here, and that was probably not the best idea. The shock of coming up out of a beautiful modern metro into what could easily be the 17th century is a bit much. No pictures can really convey the density of people, shops, carts, cows, commotion and noise. And then there was the pedal rickshaw ride in which the rickshaw wallah crossed three lanes of traffic, including a hurtling bus, to make a U-turn off the highway and back into the narrow lanes of Old Delhi. Dave says Connie's finger marks are still in his arm. I just remember Ray chanting, "I'm not looking...I'm not looking." The magical thinking worked and we all survived!

Just so you aren't left with the impression that parakeets are the only birds in India, here are three more. The top one is a red-wattled lapwing. We saw a lot of those in Madhya Pradesh; this one was in the garden of the Sun Temple in Gwalior.

Middle one is a grey Hornbill, and that was in the tree right outside our apartment window this morning. Quite a sight since hornbills are 65 cm long (26 inches). They have this huge long bill with an extra horn on the top "lip" (what is the top part of a bird's beak called, anyways??). They also have a huge long tail, so when they fly they look like little straight wings on way too long a body. We had seen one at Parana Qila Fort here in Delhi when Carolyn and Milan were here, and were quite startled to be eyeball to eyeball with this one in our tree today.

Every archaeological site here is full of "parakeets" (parrot-sized birds). Here are two at Humayan's Tomb.

This temple was built in the reign of King Bhojdeva, who ruled from 1010 to 1055. It is a Hindu temple to Siva (Shiva). It is still in use today as you can see by the worshippers in the bottom photo.