The thing about these dusky Subcontinentals is they're very reluctant to tell us anything about themselves (They think we'll ridicule them)--and yet they're always, half-intentionally, inadvertently opening up and blurting out a flood of astounding information about themselves and the peculiarities of their existence that, despite ourselves, we can't help but find at least morbidly fascinating, if not utterly hilarious....

Case in point:  The minarets at the four corners of the marble plinth that the Taj Mahal sits on.  I quote from an online tourist guide, published by the Department of Tourism, Government of UP, Uttar Pradesh:

"Four minarets  each more than 130 feet tall, display the designer's penchant for symmetry is (sic) set at the corners of the platform of the mausoleum and complete the architectural composition.  They were designed as working minarets, a traditional element of mosques, used by the muezzin to call the Islamic faithful to prayer.  Each minaret is effectively divided into three equal parts by two working balconies that ring the tower.  At the top of the tower is a final balcony surmounted by a chattri that mirrors the design of those on the tomb.  The chattris all share the same decorative elements of a lotus design topped by a gilded finial.  The staircase opens through rectangular doors onto the balconies, and windows providing light and ventilation. Although these are covered with grilles, the interior is full of bats, which makes the ascent difficult because they react with hysteria to a person's entrance...."

Still, before we quite expire from politely suppressed giggles, we need to know:  Exactly how, in what manner, does the hysteria of bats make a person's (more particularly, we suppose, a muezzin's) ascent of the spiral stair within a minaret difficult?  God, yes, we need to know that.