Thursday, September 07, 2006

the real taj mahal...


been a while since I posted any new pics...been quite busy lately...
oh well, c'est la vie, no?

just got back from New Delhi - the capital of India. I went there to attend my GFE control, which I passed by the way...
me and two other guys stayed an extra day there for we were planning to visit some clients. due to the Ganesh festival, they were not open for business that thay. and since we had 8 hours to kill before our flight, we asked our driver to took us to tourist spots. he took us to the parliament house, Indira Ghandi memorial (yup, the place where Indira was shot), Mahatma Ghandi tomb, and last but not least...the great emperor Humayun tomb...

it is a magnificent building...
build several hundred years ago by Humayun's widow - the tomb shows what great architect the mughals were. Humayun was the second mughal emperor, son of Babur, who ruled northern part of india sometimes in the 16th century. don't ask me to give you more details...I Are Engineer, remember!!! go to wikipedia or better yet, watch the nat-geo channel if you wanna know more...

hundreds or even thousands of persian craftsmen were brought in to build the tomb, using local materials and their great artistic sense, they brought this monument to life. The main building is located in the center of a garden, several hundred meters from the main gate. It wasn't a long walk, but boy it was a hot day...I was sweating like a pig!!!
inside the main building, located right in the center, there lies the great emperor in his final resting place. surrounding him are his two wives and other relatives...

his tomb - a model of the so called "paradise garden" - is one of the greatest monument of india - and was the "draft" of the ever so popular Taj Mahal (have to go there someday...)

this trip was unplanned, so I didn't pack my SLR. one being it's too heavy. second, thanks to the tighter security check in the airport, I didn't want to carry too many electronics.
so - forgive me if the pic quality is not that great. I took it using my Nokia N70 camera. not bad for a cell phone cam...but can't say it's great either...

next time...definitely I'll come more prepared...especially now that Canon just launched their 70-200 f/4L IS lens...got to get me one of that!!!