Romance at the Taj

[sheherazade]

Concerns over tilting Taj Mahal dismissed

 

Fears that the Taj Mahal’s minarets are tilting dangerously and its base sinking on one side have been dismissed by the Archaeological Survey of India, which says it has not detected any structural damage at the base for the past six decades.

 

Indian authorities launched an investigation in October when historians reported that the Taj Mahal was leaning and in danger of sinking.

 

But the four Taj minarets were observed to be inclined at various angles by the Archaeological Survey of India’s (ASI’s) first scientific survey in 1941, which examined the position and verticality of the minarets as well as the foundations' stability.

 

That first report noted that three minarets tilted by 1.5 to 3.0 inches (3.8 to 7.6 centimetres), while the fourth southwest-facing minaret was tilted by 8.5 inches (21.6 cms).

 

It concluded that the tilts were either part of the original design - to prevent all the minarets from crashing in on the main dome in an earthquake - or the result of some sub-soil displacement and settlement centuries ago, Doraiswamy Dayalan, Superintendent (Archaeology) at ASI, Agra, told New Scientist.

 

The report found no cracks at the minarets’ base or their 300-metre-long plinth, but recommended regular four-yearly surveys to check on them.

 

Urgent attention

A survey by ASI and UNESCO in 1985 found the tilt in each minaret had increased by 0.1 inches (0.3 cms). But Dayalan says this was considered “statistically insignificant†and a possible error in measuring the 40-metre-high minarets.

 

No structural damage was detected during two other major surveys in 1991 and 1995. Apart from its regular surveys every four years, the ASI does not plan a separate survey of the 350-year-old marble monument in Agra, says ASI director general Babu Rajeev.

 

But the ASI is at odds with some Indian historians who fear the southwest minaret is tilting dangerously.

 

While Babu Rajeev asserts “the Taj is in excellent shapeâ€, Agam Mathur, a historian and former vice chancellor of Agra University and Ram Nath, former historian at Rajasthan University, insist the tilts need urgent attention.

 

Water worries

Mathur also fears that the drying up of the river Yamuna - on whose banks the Taj was built - has led to its sinking on its northern side, which is now 1.44 inches (3.7 cms) lower than the southern side.

 

The monument’s foundations lie on huge wooden slabs over deep wells, says Mathur. The structure was designed in accordance with the continual flow of water against its northern wall, he adds, and as the river dries the northern side is sinking.

 

Dayalan disagrees, saying none of the routine studies since 1941 - which include foundation checks for recent displacements and settlements, load misbalance due to stress compression, structural defects, and cracks in the base - indicate a shift in the plinth.

 

He adds that the wells lie only beneath the northern side of the plinth and were in fact designed to keep the water away from the foundations.

 

The most recent survey on the Taj was done by ASI and Survey of India in 2000-2001 and found no structural changes.

 

source

[Baluug]

Pardon me for getting off topic here, but I felt like ventig for a second about Indian people(yes, I know there's a "venting room", but that's all smoke and mirrors). Why is it that the Canadian gov't is letting these people in like locusts and they at least have a functional gov't back home, yet Somali people are getting turned away at the door, and in many cases, let in only to be deported for no reason later on!! I know I'm generalizing, but these people are the most part racist, cheap, and condescending towards others. I had to rip this Sikh guys a$$ one time cuz my wife's niqaabi friend just barely tapped this loser's taxi with my car door while she was getting out. This id*iot starts yelling at her like he's the king of f**king Canada until I got and told him who's the f**king king!! Even then, he still wouldn't apologize. Moro*n.

[Som@li]

I visited India this year, and left before Ramadan, I travelled from Bombay,Bangalore,Mysore,Nioda -Delhi,and Hydrebad.

 

It was really unique and crazy country,where most pple live life with no choice,somalis,poor,with no government have certain choices in life...But in India,Most pple are like robots.

 

Thre were many things i lked abt the country,and equally there many things i hated.

 

The first day i took a taxi,and had a map to hotel i was going, the damm driver took me a ride going in circles, In bombay, i knew the Hotel was not far from the airport, I stopped and left,and didn't pay him any, he didn't do anything,just stand there, cursing me in his mother tongue.

 

One of the strange things i remember were, all the pple u get to knw,always ask u "Did you had Lunch/dinner?", it is their way of showing, I care.

[sheherazade]

Liibaan, let an Indian into a country and there's a very good chance he'll contribute to that economy.

 

I got cheated a lot(they didn't know I could understand them hehe) and even when I accused them of being dodgy(when I was at my wits end) they would never ever apologise or admit guilt. Don't go to India if u're looking for a neat ending to stories.

 

Farxan, I got taken for a ride too(and this too on my first ride in India). The guy was from the Tourist Office at Delhi airport- official I thought but I didn't realise that his office was one of 3 at the airport and only one was official and it wasn't the one I'd picked. I got to see a lot of Delhi though. LoL. When I had enough he took me to their main office in Connaught Square and who should be sitting behind the desk but an Arab. I got nowhere with him; he was as evasive as the others. All he could say was,'This is India'. It took hours to get to my destination; if the humidity hadn't drained me I'd have knocked the driver out. At one point he said something like, 'If I told u I loved you, what would you say?' I told him he needed to stop talking and keep driving. LoooL. So damned Bollywood.

 

Nobody asked me if I'd eaten. Lots of other nosey sh*t but not that. So did u find romance anywhere?

[Som@li]

Sheh,Romance, I did, I visited the Tipu Sultan palace at Mysore, though they refused to take photos inside, it was a nice experience, he was one of the greatest hero in India,there was somthing abt his palace that attracted me. Locals are proud and love their late king so much, that they tell you he killed a tiger with his bare hands,

 

At Mysore,I also seen dancing fountain, with music,which was beautiful. Utti is not also far,a nice place to visit.

[Baluug]

Originally posted by sheherazade:

Liibaan, let an Indian into a country and there's a very good chance he'll contribute to that economy.

Yeah, he'll contibute to that economy, all right!! He'll open a business and have his whole bloody family who's over the age of 13 working there, except for the grandmother, who'll stay home to watch the under-13 kids

[Simply_I]

Talo, king of hearts and Ocean very sorry.

[sheherazade]

What's wrong with that? Hard work only kills Somalis.

 

Simply_I, kya, kya, kya?

[WILDCAT]

What an absolutely delightful topic sheherazade... this is one of the loveliest things I've read on this site... it is my dream to visit India one day... and you have drawn such a vivid pic of it for me, I could almost smell the curry... heh heh

 

Please do go on posting what else you experienced in your travels... please!

[sheherazade]

^Aren't u a blast from the past! Where have u been?

 

Thank you for the kind words. I've been writing a lot in the last week or so, almost happy with what I'm producing. A lot more effort is going into it than what I hurriedly posted here.

 

I couldn't wait to go to India either. I left disappointed, may be harrassed is a better word but I'd go again, probably with somebody big and scary to ward off men. I couldn't get to talk with women, in a country as heavily populated as India, where the hell do they hide the women?

 

I'll dig out my archives at some point and some pics, how's that? I'm writing about another country right now.

[WILDCAT]

^ I would love to see your archives about India. I want to see them right now in fact! Do you have a blog...

 

Did you go to any of the nightclubs and mingle with the young people and students in the evenings? I've heard they have kickass clubs playing things like Indian influenced speed-garage!

 

Oh, and which country are you doing now?

 

...You remember me? How kool is that! Did you post under a different handle back when I used to frequent this joint? I think you must have... *scratches head*

[sheherazade]

I don't have a blog. Or I did and I will again but neither is usfeul to you; one was for a few friends' eyes, the other irrelevant to India- if I ever get round to it.

 

Nightclubs, kick-*** or not are not my scene. Wasting time in nightclubs in a land as captivating and horrifying as India is unforgivable. I remember hearing some Aussie backpacker boasting how he'd been in another country 3 weeks during which he'd drunk the time away and hadn't seen a single thing. He couldn't give a Four X, the fool.

 

I used to lurk now and then long before I joined SOL. You stuck in the mind. Do stay.

[WILDCAT]

^ I shall lurk, like you used to do, but my posting average shall probably continue to remain very low (to the relief of many of the old garde posters I think *chuckle* )... I lead a far quieter existence than I used to, despite all this talk of nightclubs. I listen to Bobby and Nihal on Radio One midweek playing the latest desi tracks... and they are always going on about how absolutely advanced the upmarket clubs in Mumbai and Delhi are, so I simply had to ask about it. Gosh, I love them, never miss a single solitary programme of theirs. Have you stubled across any of their sessions...?

 

I spent a month in Kenya last year, and I swear I must have whiled away all my hours glued to the hundreds of Indian channels they have on sky, and admiring the sari shops the few times I went into central Nairobi... suffice to say, the Indian element was the only thing I enjoyed about Nairobi, that was really kewl. I would be far happier living in Southall really... :cool:

[sheherazade]

I've almost outgrown music so Nihal and whoever are not part of my routine.

 

Bollywood fell out of my favour when I saw how completely unspontaneous and closed the people are- it's everything the society is not, escapism I suppose. I barely got smiled at. I left India having dropped the habit myself. It reappeared when I flew out of the country, looked out the window and saw the perfect, perfect, now battered Sri Lanka. It was an exquisite sight, a green pearl-drop fringed with white.

 

The Taj like they won't show it on the brochures:

 

[sheherazade]

Some of my pics, shrunk for your viewing and band width pleasure(u're feri, feri welcome). For Wildy and the no-mince man.

 

The Taj's Mosque

 

 

The Taj's back

 

 

She moves like a puppet

 

 

Rajah, Tipu(as in Sultan), Saiba, Yasmin, Shah Rukh(as in Khan), Naaj, Saddam(as in Hussein) and Muna! Brothers, sisters and first cousins.

 

 

She's hot.

 

 

Delhi's Jama Masjid