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A
first trip to India would be unthinkable without a visit to the Taj
Mahal. This much-photographed Mogul tomb is no less magnificent
because of its familiarity. The marble edifice was built by Shah
Jahan as a tomb for his beloved wife, Mumtaz, who had died in 1631
giving birth to their fourteenth child. The inlaid marble detail
inside the tomb is awesome. A very long pool of water in the center
of the garden leads up to the mausoleum. Pictures of the Taj
generally do not show the other lovely buildings and gardens in the
compound, which is enclosed by a large red sandstone wall. After the
Shah grieved for the loss of his wife he eventually returned to his
"goodtime" life but did not live happily ever after. His
sons got into the ultimate family quarrel and the survivor put him
under house arrest, albeit a palace, but imprisoned nonetheless. He
was buried beside Mumtaz, though their remains have been moved to a
lower level of the tomb out of harm's way from the hordes of
tourists. 
Elephants
in India are still used as beasts of burden, carrying both goods and
tourists. If tourists are the cargo the elephant will have a saddle
(called a Howdah) on top of its back. Our tour group walked up steps
and mounted the elephant from a platform. We rode up a steep hill to
visit a Hindu temple and palace at the summit. An elephant ride is
really a pretty tame excursion once you get used to the fact that an
elephant gait seems strange because its stride is so much longer
than the stride of a horse.
India
has made much progress in recent decades, but there are great
disparities. Though many people in India recognize that the caste
system is unjust, its practice has certainly not been eliminated.
The lack of the monsoon rains in the northern provinces for the last
five years has had a disastrous effect on the agricultural
productivity, to say nothing of the landscape in general. In recent
years India has been able to feed herself, even though there are
more than one billion people to feed in a country that claims
information technology is second only to the United States, arranged
marriages are still a common practice. One of our local tour guides
admitted she was able to divorce her first husband only because of
help from her parents, and the second marriage was not working out
and she was considering another divorce. Since independence from
Britian (1947) India overall has made fantastic improvement in
literacy especially in the South which is the center of their
information technology industry. In the northern province of Rajas
than, where most of the first time tourists visit, the literacy rate
is quite low, especially for women. The arrival by train of 20
American tourists in one small (by Indian standards) town was
recorded by a photographer of the local newspaper. Before our train
left the next morning we all had a copy of the newspaper. Our
picture caption on the back page noted nothing more remarkable about
us than that we had arrived. 
A
traditional intricately carved beautiful white marble elephant and a
white horse that was clearly the pride of Bateshwar Animal Fair are
definitely still part of everyday India. Today they exist among cell
phones, luxury cars, personal computers, extravagant weddings and
high rise apartment buildings. India is achieving its own personal
brand of a modern nation. 