Continued.........

A portion of the corner that was being restored (such little effort)

Baby and his father, in the room where Mughal emperor Shan Jahan and his wife Mumtaz Mahal made their babies... also know to the locals as their "baby making factory"

Walk around the area where the kings and queens used to stay

India Next Top Model.... hahaha

Look at this door, picture looks abit dreamy but its actually due to the cravings on the door frame!

Baby and his sister (;

The Oberoi Amarvilas

Hehe awesome hotel! but not the best we stayed at yet... here is the night view... abit china place kind of feeling ....

Me and my darling

Taj Mahal

This is legendary.... a tomb stone that is as big as the area of takashimaya i think....

A tomb stone made out of love for the wife. It was bulit by Mughal emperor Shan Jahan in memory of his third wife (which he only have kids with) Mumtaz Mahal. Fully marbled with intricate finishing, which was initially meant to rest the tomb of his wife.

More about this king and this very important queen...

in 18 years of their marriage ... they had 17 kids... of which 3 were miscarriaged, and only 6 grew to adulthood. She died while giving birth to a princess, which Shan Jahan blame it on this princess for the death of his beloved wife (fuck! bastard! you made your wife work like baby production house of course machine also break down and die what).

Later he did not allow the princess to stay in the castle with him, no one knows what happen to her after.

Before the wife pass on, he was with her, and ask her what he can do for her (her last wishes). And they were,

1. Built something in memory of me - of which the Taj Mahal was built

2. Take good care of all my children - of which he did not fulfill as he did not wan to take care of the princess she gave her life for! *angry max*

Anyway we all know that marble is very expensive, so this tomb stone is damm expensive in the eyes of the civilian, and it too about 30 years (i think) to make this happen. He later wanted to make one black marbled tomb stone for himself which angered many civilians and before he could do so, one of his son, killed two of his brothers and overthrow the king, keeping him in his own castle along with the company of his remaining two daughters. He was not allowed to step out of his own castle till death.....

The grand entrance of Taj... and because they love the idea of symmetrical structures, they built four of these entrance ....

notice the top of the building... it has 4 dome shaped thing .... yes that's also for symmetrical sake

even the smaller dome shape cones of 8

FYI their fav number are 4 and 8

The other gate for symmetrical sake to the one above... which does not serve any purpose at all...

My baby boy

walking into the Taj Mahal

Tada.....

Eternal beauty of the Taj is formed by the raised platform to give an illusion that it is floating on the clouds with the endless sky behind (which is the reason why there is no other structure behind the Taj)

Baby in the garden of paradise .....

isn't she majestic and beautify?

View from my hotel room .... can you guys see taj from afar? yes ... we are walking distance from the taj actually (:

Our hotel room.... look even the tables have cravings !

Cozy corner

we found this diamond studded vase on display in the hotel boutique! gee... must be freaking ex

We then visited the jewelry areas, and this is where we learnt how each marble engravings inside the Taj Mahal is being single handedly craft out and pieced together to form the elegant piece of art walls on the Taj Mahal

See he use this saw liked thing to slowly shape the precious stone through repeated pulling and pushing action creating friction on the stones and shaping it carefully....

tada...

a beautiful art work is then formed ...

the marble are of such clear quality that light can pass through!

Fatehpur Sikri

This is situated in Agra District in the state of Uttar Pradesh. We took a bus ride into a nearby area, and then a battery operated mini bus that comes every 20 mins interval!!!! (its damm hot and we have to squeeze in a small mini van + wait damm long for it to come) but the pictures are worth it.

This place was named as the city of Fatehabad and constructed by the Mughal emperor Akbar (Akbar means the great i think) beginning in the 1570. It was built in honour of Sufi saint Shaikh Salim Chisti who live somewhere near this city.

Fatehabad was built to honour this saint because this saint was able to predict that Akbar will have a son, and true enough he was born and survived; name Prince Salim after the saint. Akbar use to have a twin son who died before Prince Salim. Of course with the birth of prince salim he was very happy and he thinks that this saint is very powerful and wanted to be near to him hence he built a city near him. Fatehabad later acquired the name Fatehpur then to the present Fatehpur Sikri and served as the Mughal Capital from 1571 to 1581. This place took 15 years to bulit but was abandoned after use of 14 years as there was simply to little water supply to sustain the population and the unrest in the north-west. Later it has become a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1986. But of course you can't exactly trust them to up keep this place well enough. You will see why I say so in the pictures later.

This picture below is the bed of the king! damm big! bigger than king size bed.....

its wood and just carpet where they made love....hahahahahahahaha

area near the bed room door.... said to be filled with perfumed water to bring nice fragrance into the room!

As I mentioned before, even though this is a world heritage, the paintings around the castle has not been properly maintained... you can only see slight shadows of what seem to be a picture of a lady in olden day dressing (possibly english dress)