Word: emperor
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...trouble begins even before you enter the mausoleum that Emperor Shah Jahan built for his second wife, Queen Mumtaz Mahal. The crowds are huge (the site attracts 40% of the tourists who travel to India). And because authorities have banned fossil-fuel vehicles in the area, visitors must rent electric cars or carts drawn by horses or camels to get close to the mausoleum, even as flies swarm around the animals and the dung they scatter across the potholed roads...
...life serving with other eunuchs in the imperial household, guarding the harem and offering wisdom to the dynastic clan. Somehow the prince and the castrate became friends and when Zhu Di launched a coup d'Etat in 1402, Ma was at his side. The prince, who became the Yongle Emperor, awarded Ma an honorific surname Zheng and made him head eunuch. When the Emperor sketched out a plan for Chinese ships to sail to the Indian Ocean, he named his loyal charge to lead the fleet...
...Described as tall and handsome with long earlobes, fierce eyes and skin "rough like the surface of an orange," Zheng He proved to be a stunning success. In his initial expedition, which began in 1405, he set out to find the deposed Emperor, Yongle's nephew, who was thought to have taken refuge somewhere in Southeast Asia. The voyage was also a chance for the young dynasty to show the world the power and capability of the Ming ruler. This was a China on the rise, a nation striving to return to the glory of the high Tang dynasty, when...
...This was a China that sought to dominate the region. On one journey, as recounted in Louise Levathes' 1994 book When China Ruled the Seas, Zheng He put down an uprising in Sumatra and brought the rebel chief back to Nanjing for confinement; the Emperor had the man executed. On another, the fleet landed in Sri Lanka and captured the Sinhalese King - punishment, according to one version of events, for his refusal to hand over to the Chinese Emperor a sacred tooth of the Buddha. He and his family were taken to China and imprisoned. Impressed by such power, rulers...
...hunt for souvenirs. After 36 months away, she decides she will return from Africa with a giant Toblerone bar, a bag of Sugus fruit chews and a bottle of Lubriderm Daily UV Lotion. Xu's haul is hardly as exotic as the unicorn that Zheng He presented to the Emperor. But she must take gifts home for waiting relatives. That is Chinese tradition, just as for centuries its citizens have made the long, hopeful voyage to Africa...