Aurangabad – Day two of our incredible visit to this historic city in Maharashtra State
Monday 1 May – oh oh, it had to happen……I woke early this morning with the dreaded Delhi belly!!!!! I think the Indian buffet was the finish of me.
We had a tour of the Ellora Caves booked today so after organising tea, bread and bananas for me, Geoff did the tour solo*. When he returned at 2.30pm he was armed with some tablets from the pharmacy (after having taken one we googled them and found that apparently this antibiotic for diarrohea has been banned for sale by the Indian Government with side effects such as, vomiting, nausea, headaches loss of memory, dizziness, heart and neurological problems – yikes!!!) and some electrolytes.
Apparently part of our tour also included a visit to the Paithani Silk House. Geoff asked the driver if we could push it back until 6pm in the hope that I might be OK to join the visit. Determined not to miss out, with a dubious antibiotic inside me, a bit of padding in an appropriate place, a touch of blusher and a swipe of lipstick, off we went. The Paithani is a variety of sari named after the Paithan town in the Aurangabad district where the sari was first made by hand. This is an art form dating back to the 2nd Century BC. All the saris are handwoven on their own looms, some 150 of them - mostly located in the villages. They are made from pure silk from Rangoon and silver threads. The loom has 8,000 silk threads and the weaving is done by counting the threads. It takes one day to weave 1 cm on a complicated pattern with a traditional design. This pattern will normally include peacocks which are associated with the God of Love Kama, and these are found in numerous bridal saris. This sari would take around 6 months to weave and costs about 150,000 Rupees (NZ$ 3,000), A plain sari with no pattern takes around one month and costs around 20,000 Rupees (NZ$ 400).
The shop owner also showed us the old style loom used for making a Himroo – a shawl made of silk and cotton grown locally in Aurangabad, this is now a dying art and there are only two weavers in the city able to do this, with each Himroo taking 3 weeks to weave. They are now made using punch cards and the machine can make two of these a day.
Of course the visit ended with the owner hoping to make a sale or two, not hard with me around – I bought a beautiful purple and silver shawl which I am actually going to use as a runner on my dining table. Unfortunately they did not have one with mandalas on it in purple as that would have been my first choice. Geoff succumbed as well!
Back to the hotel for dinner, a bowl of steamed white rice for me with my tummy and a lovely Chinese dinner for Geoff. There was so much noise in the restaurant, and given we were the only diners in there we enquired what was going on. Turns out there was an Indian wedding about to take place and the groom was being led to the marriage venue (our hotel) in a procession known as the Baraat. Off we went to see if we could get a peek of the action and we were rewarded with a view of the groom making his way in on a white horse. He looked magnificent! In Sikh tradition, the Groom arrives wearing a Sehra while carrying a Kirpan and is accompanied by family members, groomsmen and friends known as Baraatis all dancing, singing and clapping to the music. The Sehra is a headdress worn by the groom intended to ward off the evil eye. A wedding kirpan is a sword and is an essential part of Sikhism and marriage. The wedding kirpan is known as the Talwar and is worn by the groom as part of his attire. The head of Housekeeping saw us peeking through the fence and told us to follow him. Would you believe he waltzed us right into the wedding venue, decorated with the most beautifully scented roses, jasmine and tuberoses, with all the guests – all 500 of them - enjoying their pre wedding dinner. He then showed us into the actual wedding venue where they were expecting the bride to arrive 30 minutes later, to be honest, we felt a little reluctant about this as we were very underdressed compared to all the elegantly attired ladies is their gold and silver saris so we decided to make a hasty retreat although we were very thrilled at having been given the opportunity to witness some of the spectacle.
Tuesday 2 May – another early start – but one we were thrilled with. Our flight back to Mumbai was at 8.45am and the driver was picking us up at 7.00am. However, on the drive back from the Silk House he had asked if we wanted a very quick tour of the replica Taj Mahal, the Bibi-Ka-Maqbara – of course we did! Geoff has already seen the original Taj Mahal in Agra, but this is my first trip to India and I was very keen not to miss out on the experience. This meant a departure at 6.00am but boy was it worth it. Sunrise as we were driving up – we were the only visitors there!!
It is made mostly of sandstone and has plastered walls and a marble dome. It was built circa 1651 – 1661 AD by the Mughal Emperor Aurangazeb’s son, Prince Azam Shah, as a tribute to his mother, Begum Rabia Durani, whose mortal remains are placed below the ground level, surrounded by an octagonal jali, a pierced marble screen with exquisite designs. It is popularly known as the mini Taj Mahal of the Deccan. The main entrance is on the southern side of the outer wall, and at the centre of the three remaining walls are open pavilions which were used as Mosque, Diwan-e-Am and Diwan-e-Khas. These buildings contain beautiful paintings of Mughal and Nizam periods. The mausoleum is built in the centre of a high platform with four minarets at its corners. The lower body and dome of the building are made of pure marble and decorated with beautiful carvings and the brass doors are finely etched.
What a wonderful finale to our visit to Aurangabad – it was awesome being able to visit and be the only people there, it was so peaceful and all we could hear was birdsong as we made our way back down the pathway to the car and back to the airport for our return flight to Mumbai.
*Watch out for Geoff’s blog and photos on Ellora – coming soon!