Life in the City of Pearls: Taj Mahal

This post will mostly be pictures because I do not feel I can adequately describe the beauty and wonder of the Taj Mahal. Any adjectives I would use would not do it justice. Just a little bit of background on the Taj. The Taj is a white marble mausoleum located in Agra, India (about 4 hours from Delhi).It was built by Mughal emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his third wife.Shah Jahan liked to live beautiful things and enjoyed the finer things in life. In 1631, Shah Jahan was distraught over the death of his 3rd wife, a Persian princess, who had passed away giving birth to their 14th (yes 14th!!) child. Construction of the mausoleum began in 1632 and the principal mausoleum was completed in 1648 and the surrounding buildings/garden were finished five years later in 1653. So from start to finish it took 20 years. According to the legends, it took 20,000 people, 1,000 elephants transporting the materials, and cost about 32 million Rupees at that time. Unfortunately, by the late 19th century, parts of the buildings had fallen badly into disrepair. During the time of the Indian rebellion of 1857, the Taj Mahal was defaced by British soldiers and government official. In 1908 a remodel project was began. Okay, that is enough from me. I will let the pictures say the rest.