The Taj Mahal by Zander

We went all the way to India to see the Taj Mahal. I have always wanted to see it, because it is one of the Wonders of the World. I think that it is really cool that people could build such amazing buildings.  India is a really cool place and there is so much to see. Seeing one of the wonders of the World, the Taj Mahal really makes me appreciate what the people did in the Ancient times.

An Emperor during the 11^th century built the Taj Mahal for his 3rd wife when she died baring there 14^th kid in 19 years. His wife died during child birth. So he built the Taj Mahal as her grave. The Taj Mahal is a really big building, with 4 great towers. His son arrested the Emperor because he had spent most of the family’s money on the Taj Mahal and was wasting his empire. He was locked in the Agra Fort and could see the Taj Mahal out of his window. He died a few years later in the Prison.
The reason that the Taj Mahal took so long was because they used white Marble from India that is really hard to cut. All the pictures that are on the Taj Mahal are all made with imbedded semiprecious stones. It took 22 years to carve all the Engravings into the marble and assemble it. In the end it looked magnificent.

To make the pictures in the marble, people had to cut out all the individual stones  and  carve  a hole in the marble.  I takes about 4 months to finish a piece the size of a dinner plate, so the Taj Mahal took a long time because of the Stone work. The craft was invented by the Persians, so the king hired 22,000 Persian carvers working for his building. When they were done they weren’t allowed to leave Agra. The Emperor didn’t want them to make another Taj Mahal. The workers were paid for the rest of their life. You can still get some of their working the shops descendants in Agra today. We went to one off the shops and it was really amazing that people could still do this amazing stone work by hand with simple tools.

The Taj Mahal is a great example of a well-planned building and with perfect symmetry with all the building in the complex.  It also shows that the Emperor really cared about the body of his 3rd wife. There are four towers around the Taj Mahal.  They are all slanted 2% away from the Taj Mahal.  So if they fall, they will fall away from the temple. There is also a mosque that is for praying, but there was only one of them, so he built a replica on the other side of the river to keep the symetry. The gate to get to the Taj Mahal is perfectly in line with the entrance into the chamber of the burial. All the towers look exactly the same. The Taj Mahal looks exactly like stepping out of the picture. On the other side of the river was the building site of the Emperor’s Taj Mahal.  It was exactly in line with the Taj Mahal. The Emperor made sure that everything was in line. I am amazed! On the opposite side of the Taj Mahal is a really good viewing place in the Moon Gardens.  They are even symmetrical with the Taj Mahal.  You can see the plan of the next Taj Mahal when you stand there.  I am amazed that he could make such an amazing building with such perfection.

Seeing the Taj Mahal in India really makes me appreciate all the hard work that went into building this great structure. The Taj Mahal has some really amazing stone works, and I think that the Emperor must have really loved his wife or just wanted to make the people like him. It is sad that he was arrested by his own son before he could build one for himself on the other side of the river from the Taj Mahal. We went to see the building sight of the king Shahjahan’s Taj Mahal that he had planned to make out of black marble. I thought that seeing what the kings would be tomb was really amazing, but if it was built then The Taj Mahal wouldn’t be as amazing.