Editor Pick
One of India's most Famous Hotels
- September 24, 2009
- Rated 4 of 5 by
koshkha from Northampton, United Kingdom
I hope that members will forgive me for being slightly morbid, but I had no idea that when I wrote about this hotel for another travel site, it would one day be the centre of one of the worst terrorist outrages in recent years. When the world's media were reporting on last year's attrocities at the Oberoi and Taj hotels in Mumbai, I had clear pictures in my minds of every part of the Taj Mahal Palace and Towers because I stayed there twice almost five years ago.
When an eyewitness talked about being in the restaurant, I knew where he meant. When another told of taking a lift to the lobby and finding armed men shooting, I knew the layout and could imagine the scene. In terms of being able to guide people considering a stay at the hotel, this might not be the most useful of reviews since much of the hotel remains closed for repairs nearly a year later and the resulting hotel may be different from the one I describe. But maybe this review will help others to imagine the setting of the events in a more vivid way.
** A Mumbai Landmark**
Rumour has it that the Taj Mahal hotel was built backwards - that someone had the architect's plans the wrong way round and that's why all the rooms look out over the gardens and not the sea. Further fables tell that when the architect returned to view his masterpiece, he was so distressed that he killed himself. Apparently it's not true but it's a good story. The Taj, it's fair to say, makes a big impression!
The first time I went to Mumbai, I stayed out near the airport in the Leela (very nice) and a Dutch colleague dragged me along to the Taj Mahal for afternoon tea as a 'must do' experience. We sat in the old-fashioned restaurant, sipping tea in china cups and looked out at the India Gate and the sea whilst liveried waiters brought us dainty sandwiches. It was like being in a time warp to old England. To tell the truth it was less a matter of opulence and great service and more a reminder of childhood afternoons being dragged to Lymington-on-Sea yacht club. However, I came away with the sense drummed into me that this was probably the most famous hotel in India.
So when I discovered that I'd be staying there on a business trip a few years ago, I got quite excited because the company I was working for at the time wasn't prone to putting us in fancy places. Their justification for the choice was that we had a train to catch and the Taj was handy for the train station - Mumbai's famous Victoria Terminus which ironically was another key location in the terrorist attacks. I was thrilled and excited but sadly the reality of the Taj was a bit of a disappointment.
Perhaps the disappointment was my own fault because I'd been so excited and had built up too great an expectation of this almost legendary hotel. Please don't misunderstand me - there are aspects of the Taj which are outstanding but also others that disappointed me deeply. The public areas are for the most part fabulous and we were there just before Christmas when a giant Christmas tree had been erected in the lobby and local school children came in to sing carols so sweetly you could almost cry. The lobby is a stunner and the restaurants are very nice - but the room I had in the tower (the cheaper end of the hotel) was like any other slightly dated and tired 4 or 5 star hotel anywhere in the world. There was absolutely no atmosphere or sense of being somewhere special. I have stayed in several better hotels in Mumbai and many better hotels elsewhere in India.
There was nothing actually 'wrong' with the room and it had all the facilities you'd expect from a large business hotel but nothing exceptional that would actually stand out in your mind. The rooms were easy to forget. We stayed there twice - at both the beginning and end of that business trip and each time the rooms were just a bit too dowdy. Had we paid a bit more for rooms in the 'Heritage' wing, I'm absolutely sure that I would have loved the Taj because those rooms have high ceilings and lots of period features, but up in the tower, things were very ordinary.
The hotel has a bizarre night club that we were told was 'very exclusive' and a magnet for the wealthiest people in the city but it left me cold. We spent a couple of evenings in the bar off the main lobby which was nice, expensive but again, nothing extraordinary. The usual set of expensive top-brand concession stores in the Taj don't set it apart from other hotels either and it's useful to be aware that the in-hotel shops have some odd opening hours and can catch you out. I failed totally to get any shopping done whilst I was there.
My colleagues thought the food was great but I can't comment as I left very early on my first stay and when I came back at the end of the week I got very sick and couldn't eat anything (I'm blaming a pickled onion at a very pricey Mumbai restaurant). It's possible of course that my opinion of the hotel is partly coloured by spending 24 hours groaning in bed, throwing up and running to the toilet every few minutes. Perhaps if I'd been healthy enough to go and sit in the gardens by the pool I would have been more favourably disposed to the hotel. Under the circumstances, the tip I left for the housekeepers was one of the most generous I've ever made.
On the plus side, the Taj Mahal is in a fantastic location if you want to be in downtown Mumbai and is so close to the famous Gate of India and many of the museums that you can walk to many important sites and if I'd been well I would have been out doing my Christmas shopping in a flash. Compared to staying by the airport it will save you 90 minutes in a taxi if you want to get to the downtown area. However, standing as a very blatant symbol of affluence in a city like Mumbai means that the area around the hotel attracts an enormous number of beggars and hawkers which many people find very distressing. I've been to India many times and I'm as used to the poverty as it's possible to be, but even I found the level of attention from the poor and crippled around the hotel was really uncomfortable. My boss who I was travelling with at that time was a massive 300lb ex-rugby player who got pursued down the street by so many small dirty children that he had to enlist the help of a passing policeman to get him back to the hotel and then swore he'd not go out again.
So if you have the chance to give the Taj a try - and if in future it remains an option - my advice would be to pay the extra for a room in the Heritage wings and avoid the Tower. Otherwise, save your pennies and book elsewhere. You pay the premium for staying in a landmark building and it's not justified if you are stuck in what looks like a rather ugly 1970s tower block stuck on the side of the beautiful wedding-cake of a building that is the original Taj Mahal hotel.
**Finally**
I'm sure everyone who followed the events in Mumbai in November 2008 couldn't fail to be moved by the plight of the victims of these attacks. I'd however urge people not to let this - or other attacks - put them off visiting one of the most fantastic countries in the world. It's a hard fact of modern life that nowhere is really safe these days but the only way to beat this evil is not to let it change the way we live and the places we visit.
From journal A Handful of Memorable Indian Hotels