India! I cannot wait to explore the country, the people, the scents, everything! 
As I start re-gaining my self-confidence, I get back to being my whole self again. I start smiling and waving at people, asking if I can take pictures of them (that is very me). 
They seem to be amused by a woman photographer, who could be Indian by her looks, but _apparently from what they said_ very different. Probably more outgoing? (Anyone from India Reading? Would it be true?) We are taken sightseeing, shopping. Our guide is from the Himalayas and although we are suspicious of him taking us to expensive shopping places, we are also taken to the interesting places along the way (Shopping, in that sense deserves another chapter). The buildings, handcrafting, traditions, landscape, everything is breathtaking… 
The detail put into their work of the temples. The majesty of their palaces is a thing you rarely see in other parts of the world. I am specially overtaken by the extreme accuracy in their work of art, which I admire. I tend not be surprised by the enormousness of things but rather by the details of it, which make the difference (as you can sometimes tell by my photography), but these places are both: breathtaking because of their size plus their beauty in detail. 
The day we visited the Taj Mahal day was special. I am overwhelmed with joy and overtaken by the beauty and delicacy of this magnificent mausoleum. It’s the history of Taj Mahal that adds a soul to this magnificence: a soul that is filled with love, loss, remorse, and love again. So, some little history… Our guide tells us that this is an example of how deeply a man loved his wife, that even after she died, she remained a memory and he made sure that this memory would never fade away. Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan, who was head-over-heels in love with Mumtaz Mahal, his dear wife (Arjumand Banu Begum, a Muslim Persian princess before marriage) who died in 1631 while giving birth to their 14th child is to be paid tribute with this wonder. Masons, stonecutters, carvers, painters, calligraphers, dome-builders and other artisans were requisitioned from the whole of the empire and Central Asia and Iran. It took approximately 22 years to build what we see today. An epitome of love, it made use of the services of 22,000 laborers and 1,000 elephants. The monument was built entirely out of white marble, with incrusted additions of black onyx, green jade, coral, lapis lazuli, malachite, cornelian, turquoise, garnet, ruby and topaz which were brought in from all over India and Central Asia (Yeah, those words you see written on the walls are not painted, they are in fact stone incrustations). After an expenditure of approximately 32 million rupees, Taj Mahal was finally completed in the year 1653. 
As I entered the Taj Mahal, I needed to have a moment of my own. I isolated myself and stood in awe, in contemplation, admiring, feeling, touching, sensing that I was there, closing my eyes so that I trap this overwhelming beauty within my heart, my soul embracing every single inch of it. They say there is a phrase in South India that speaks of this experience: “when the body becomes all eyes”, I would say my body became all senses… something I can still feel as I write. 
Later that day, this is what I wrote in my travel anti-diary: …Today, today, today has been a VERY special day. Touching, different day. One of those days that you feel only once in a LONG while. Taj Mahal, moves something within you, you know? And you know you will never be the same again. Your appreciation of beauty has a new diamond to defy. So much perfect beauty… Such grandeur of human work when doing something in the name of love, connects you with the infinity of the universe… P.S. CLick on the images for a better view.
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