Christmas at the Taj

This was written on the 26th, just as a heads up. Happy New Years, everyone! I feel really bad that it's hot here. Oh well, it'll make me appreciate this weather better. An updated post will arrive soon.

Well, Christmas was certainly different this year. The four hour trip to Agra from Delhi amounted to 7 hours. It took up the whole day. No Taj Mahal at sunset, no rooftop dinner. Only a small bump into another car (everyone is fine), an insane amount of traffic, a crazy intersection, trained monkeys, transvestites begging for money and a cow crossing the road. And to add to that, because we didn’t have any internet for the past few days, our reservations for our hotel was cancelled and we had to find another one in the dark. We found a nice place that claimed they had hot water, but wound up not.

At heart, I’m still a little kid when it comes to Christmas. In fact, it’s actually my favorite day of the year. So with no family and presents by the fire in the morning, it was disorienting but quite the adventure. It will be a story that I can never forget, and my mom has promised me a Christmas in July, when our family comes to visit.

We were going to visit the Taj this morning for sunrise, but just our luck, today is the first day of “the fog”. From our balcony, you’re supposed to see a great view of the Taj, but instead all we can see is gray. We are now waiting for the fog to settle.

Today we’re driving back down to Delhi to take the train to Varanasi. We will stay there for 3 days in a fancy shmancy hotel. Love to all, and a little advice for the future: If you ever want to come to India, don’t come during the holidays.

Thai