The Taj Mahal and so much moreWelcome to Agra, a city of exemplary and globally recognisable Mughal-era buildings on banks of the Yamuna river, in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Push through that, however, and you will be rewarded with amazing discoveries. Practically every travel guide recommends that you don’t stay in Agra for too long. Heed their advice! It is a grubby, rundown city with potentially the worst air pollution in the whole of India. A stroll around the block can cover your clothes in a thin layer of dust and god-knows-what else. Agra Fort I never thought I’d say this... but thank you Uzbekistan. If you had not created the warrior chieftain who ravaged his way across the Indian subcontinent in the 1500s and founded the Mughal Dynasty, where else would we get cool things like Agra Fort? It is a mighty walled compound built from red sandstone over earlier forts by none other than Akbar the Great. “It’s a trap!” his enemies may or may not have said when Akbar’s forces ambushed them. Anyway, the fort was a pleasure to explore, both at a macro and micro level. Huge stonking walls. Intricate Indo-Persian floral designs. Significant parts of it are unfortunately inaccessible or in ruins. But you can’t blame just the British for its desolation (although they did their fair share). Other powers like the Marathas also had a good crack. And the Mughals themselves did some destructive renovation. Akbar’s grandson, Shah Jahan (of Taj Mahal fame), replaced many of his grandfather’s opulent buildings with his own marble creations. Other than his late wife, the emperor’s greatest love was marble. He probably would’ve paved the whole world with it if given the chance. Looking out across the bend of the Yamuna River from atop Agra Fort, you realise just how insanely huge the Taj Mahal is. It appears otherworldly in a way photos can’t quite capture. A spectral wonder looming over smoggy gardens and pastoral land. And I’m not kidding about the last part — you can see small herds of cows grazing away on the riverbank directly opposite the Taj. It’s certainly a contrast. P.S. All the punks who graffitied this city’s historical monuments deserve to be thrown off Agra Fort’s bastions into its (empty, waterless) moat below. Disgraceful! Taj Mahal It is genuinely spectacular. Of course I gasped! Of course I sighed! It is a world wonder that Indians have every right to be proud of. On the advice of a friend, I went at midday after the fog had lifted and found the crowds surprisingly manageable. The Taj is an architectural titan that dwarfs everything before it. Dear I say it, perhaps it’s too frighteningly huge to be a tasteful display of the Padishah’s eternal love for his deceased wife? “No one can compete with the magnificence of my feelings!” the Taj Mahal proclaims. I think it stumbles into the same problem as Michelangelo’s David — it turns vulnerable human experiences that should humble and unite us into Goliath-on-a-pedestal. And now quickly moving away from rank amateur art criticism to amateur tourist criticism... While in the inner mausoleum, I couldn’t help but notice that some visitors were placing money in front of the tombs of Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal. A bit weird due to the whole ‘no idolatry’ in Islam thing, as well as the fact that what tourists get to see is only their false tombs. Lastly, I’d like to share my favourite Taj-related story. As is to be expected, people project whatever they want onto the Taj Mahal. In 1994, Chanel landed in hot water with the Muslim community after one of their fashion designers created a low-cut dress with Arabic written on it. Turns out what he thought were lines from a love poem inspired by the Taj Mahal were, in fact, Koranic verses. Whoops. Apologies were made, the press dubbed the incident the “Satanic Breasts”, and the dresses were subsequently burnt. Itimad-ud-daulah And if Agra Fort is the appetiser and the Taj Mahal is the main course, might I suggest Itimad-ud-daulah as dessert? It’s a gorgeous and relatively small structure from the 1600s, housing the tomb of an important Persian official to the Mughal Empire. Walled with white marble and encrusted with semi-precious stones, it’s often considered a prototype for the Taj. To quote a better writer than me: “The Mughals began like titans and finished like jewellers.” Now, you may be wondering why the Mughals built so many nice tombs. Luckily, I have an answer for you: It’s all to do with economics! Alex Tabarrok, economist and co-author of the Marginal Revolution blog, wrote a wonderful piece on this topic: “...the Mughal Emperor didn’t give perpetual grants of land. On death, all land that had been granted to the noble reverted back to the Emperor, effectively a 100% estate tax... Since land could not be handed down to the next generation, there was very little incentive for the Mughal nobility to build palaces or the kind of ancestral homes that are common in Europe. The one exception to the rule, however, was for tombs. Tombs would not revert back to the Emperor. Hence the many Mughal tombs”. So there you go. Tax economics. Hope you’re satisfied. Some final observations PETHA: A kind of semi-translucent soft candy made from sugar, sugar, and even more sugar. Agra’s signature dessert. I’m sorry to report that I didn’t enjoy it. It’s the only Indian sweet I’ve had so far where this has been the case. Like eating the offspring of a moist sugar cube and a lump of gelatine. JAMA MASJID: Battled my way through a very crowded, very dirty, very impoverished market to reach one of the largest and most visually striking mosques in India (pictured). At the masjid, a random kid ran up to me and demanded twenty rupees for ‘looking after’ my shoes. But he did help me with my pronunciation of “as-salamu alaykum” so maybe it was a fair exchange...? SHEROES HANGOUT: Visited Sheroes Hangout, a famous cafe in Agra staffed by female survivors of acid attacks. Just don’t do what I did and get all flustered at the counter upon realising that it runs on a pay-what-you-want system. I’m still grappling with the anxiety that I might’ve paid below the shadow price. Please, if you’re ever in Agra, do visit them and be confident in your donation! DOG ATTACK: That’s right. I got chased by a fucking dog when I walked down the wrong alleyway towards a historical monument. I’m told this is a quintessential Indian experience. Can’t recommend it though. I swore like a lunatic and bolted into the middle of a busy road. If the dog had bitten me, that would have almost certainly ended my trip. Rabies injections over multiple days don't sound like my idea of fun. And this was on the same day I went to the Taj Mahal! This goddamn country, man. Extreme highs followed by extreme lows, hour by hour.
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The showpiece city of ChinaShanghai, what a metropolis! The largest city in the People's Republic of China and the second-most populous city proper on the planet. Arriving into the city from the smoggy industrial sprawls of the Jiangsu Province was a godsend. Crisp, clean air. Here, the air is dense with something other than the belching of coal-fired plants and light manufactories. It's redolent of international finance, fashion, retail, professional services and real estate: the perfume of global capital flows! When Anthony Bourdain called Shanghai the most materialistic place on earth, he wasn’t kidding. During my short stay, I had the opportunity to visit a private yacht club and peek into its decadent wine cellars. I strolled into a Louis Vuitton showcase at the Exhibition Centre just for kicks. I drank Hennessy XO Cognac (mixed with sweet tea!) at the VIP table of a booming nightclub with my father and his 40+-year-old investor colleagues (don’t ask). This city is a relentless, gilded cynosure. Unlike many other urban centres in the Yangtze River Delta region, where economic growth has supplanted aesthetics with hedgerows of copy-pasted Soviet-style buildings, Shanghai is very pleasing to the eye. Is it as visually attractive as global cities like New York, Paris, and Hong Kong? Not really. But after spending so much time in banal, industrially stamped Chinese cities to the north, seeing the old European banks, consulates, clubs and trading houses of the Shanghai Bund was deeply refreshing. It was a shame that when I visited the Bund, I couldn't see Shanghai's iconic skyline through the mist. Overall, I found Shanghai fairly walkable, which I like in my cities. Also, it's hard to become even remotely lost with so much English everywhere. Likewise, the French Concession is a lovely area to walk around. Hate to admit this, but a colonial history can, at the very least, make a city nicer to look at. Even so, the Chinese way of unleashing cycles of creative (and un-creative) destruction has left its mark. Consider the stunning, glittering Jing'an Temple on West Nanjing Road. On paper, sure, this Buddhist temple has existed since the 12th century. In reality, it was repeatedly destroyed and rebuilt over the centuries and was, at its nadir, converted into a plastics factory during the Cultural Revolution. The current temple, as grand as it is, is only 35 years old. Such is the case with many "historical" sites in Mainland China. The people are Big City Brusque, as you'd expect. But they're not pathologically rude, like the denizens of Beijing. Shanghaiers also don’t seem to spit on the streets that much (an infamous habit of many PRC pedestrian, I’m afraid to say). The subways (which are, as you'd expect, seamless networks of efficiency) have all the usual public transport PSAs: where to stand, how to let passengers off first, how to be a courteous commuter. Yet no one follows them. They do in Taipei. They do in Tokyo. They do in Singapore. They do in Hong Kong. But China is still China and does things China's way. Shanghai Museum was wonderful. Free too. Strolling around the building, I got a sense of just how different societies can appreciate art and culture in unique ways. Consider, for example, the Chinese calligraphy wing of the museum. While largely devoid of western tourists, there were throngs of Chinese visitors crowding around particular scrolls and taking photos of ancient Chinese poems. Could you transpose such admiration onto the western world? An analogy would be if the English romantic poets were also famed for their breathtaking penmanship and people travelled from far and wide to a museum in London just to gaze upon their original manuscripts.
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AuthorMing is an economist, traveller, and creative writer from Melbourne, Australia. He’s a nebulous collection of particles on the lookout for a good corner to sit with a book and a cup of coffee. Archives
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