A day at the Taj Mahal

AGRA, India — Monuments, no matter how famous, aren't what excite me most about travel.

It took me a half-dozen trips to Italy before I made it to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

With just three days to explore Delhi, I wasn't sure I wanted to devote one to coming here to see the Taj Mahal.

"Maybe next time," I said to myself. It takes four hours along a rough road to go by car, and most people spend the night. Then I heard about the Shatabdi Express, India's best and fastest train.

If you're willing to get up at 4:30 a.m. in time to get to the station for the 6 a.m. train, you can be in Agra by 8:30 a.m. and have all day to see the Taj and other sites before catching the return train at 8 p.m.

It makes for a long day, but for us, it meant not waiting until next time, because unlike our travels to Italy, there may not be a next time for us in India, and the Taj is a must-see.

If you have to go anywhere at 6 a.m., the Shatabdi is a pleasant way to get there. Lots of Indian families visit the Taj, and the Shatabdi is usually their first choice for transportation.

Our second-class tickets included a free newspaper, a "tea kit" with two tea bags and biscuits; an airline-style foil packet with two curried potato patties and French fries; and a carton of apple juice.

Meeting Milik

Agra itself has a bad reputation as Indian cities go, mainly due to aggressive touts and taxi drivers who swarm anyone who gets off the train looking the least bit confused which is just about everyone who hasn't signed up for an organized tour or a prearranged guide.

I'm not sure how we found Malik Anis, or rather, how he found us, but out of dozens of drivers jostling for business outside the station, we chose him.

Malik drives a motorized auto-rickshaw, a three-wheeled vehicle with an open-air canopy that scoots in and out of traffic easier than a taxi and runs on natural gas.

After some quick negotiating, we hired him as our guide and driver for the day for about $6. Twenty-minutes later, without stops at carpet shops, gemstone dealers or marble carvers that pay drivers' commissions for detouring to their shops, he got us to the Taj.

Ticket-selling is low-tech in India. Two men sitting behind a wooden table set up in a doorway ripped off paper tickets as if they were selling admissions to a school play rather than to one of the world's most famous sites.

Indians get in for about 40 cents. Everyone else pays the foreigner's price — about $7.50, which includes a bottle of mineral water (the only food or drink allowed inside) and a pair of shoe covers for walking on the marble floors.

A place to relax

Built by Muslim Mughal emperor Shah Jahan as a tomb for his favorite wife, Mumtaz Mahal, it took 20,000 workers 22 years to complete the Taj Mahal in 1653.

It's hard to believe that the British East India Company once considered selling it for its marble.

Beautifully restored and cared for now, it's delightfully accessible, and, in the morning at least, surprisingly uncrowded.

If this were St. Mark's Square in Venice, the crowds would be so thick you wouldn't be able to walk. The Taj feels more like a park. Indian families love coming here just to sit and talk and relax on the cool marble terraces and benches.

A man named Sidartha from Calcutta introduced himself while we rested on a ledge. He had traveled two days on a bus with no air conditioning to get here.

When I heard that, I felt guilty for even considering not coming from Delhi.

Sidhartha asked us where we were from and when we told him, he recited the names of the 35 U.S. states he has memorized so far, then asked a friend to take a picture of us together.

We didn't see the Taj at the ideal viewing times of sunrise or sunset. But we've loved how friendly Indian people are, and meeting Milik and Sidhartha and several Indian families who asked us to pose for pictures with them was an unexpected bonus.

As for the traditional photograph of the Taj reflected in the lotus pool, we didn't get that either.

The pool was being drained for cleaning and hadn't yet be refilled.

Maybe next time.