Kadambai 2 London

Friday, October 19, 2018

Dussehra @ Kulasekharapatnam Arulmigu Sri Mutharamman ThiruKovil

When people generally speak of Dussehra, we get reminded of Mysore. Mysore palace is well lit and it attracts a lot of Indian as well as foreign tourists for the event. But there is one more place close to my hometown which has also awesome celebrations for Dussehra. This year I planned to check it out.

So this is what happens as for as I know about the festival. At day 1 of Dussehra, people take a set of vows like celibacy etc, and they dress up as different avatars something similar to Halloween in the west and ask for alms from different people. At the end of the tenth day, they visit the Arulmigu Mutharaman temple and offer their prayers to the residing Godess.

I drove to the temple from my hometown. I took the State Highway 176 from Koodankulam to Kulasekharapatnam. The roads were two-laned and they are part of the planned Chennai Kanyakumari Industrial Corridor (CKIC)

The trip was marked with cloudy sky and greenery all around. The geography here was a bit different from other roads I have driven. Since the road is along the east coast its filled with sand dunes and palm trees. The government had arranged for parking outside the village. We were made to park the vehicle outside the village and walk to the temple. One would also spot vehicles with people flooding to the temple on the way to the temple. Most of the vehicles where load auto rickshaws and lorries with devotees at the back of the vehicle.

After parking my car, I started walking along with the crowd hoping that following them will lead me to the temple eventually. At around 3 in the afternoon, the sun was high in the sky and it was really hot. The Devotees were walking in this hot sand without any footwear. I was able to overhear them talking how hot the climate is and literally, it felt like burning but they still continued on their path without any kind of footwear. A little faith can take you a long distance.

Devotees resting under the shade of palm trees

I am following this crowd hoping they will lead me to the temple

These are the type of vehicles which brought them here

One would all kind of devotees in the group. There were families with kids who had dressed up and families where the dad has dressed as Kali wearing a saree. Those kinds of things are not what you see daily in rural Tamil Nadu where a guy is dressed like a girl and walk in the streets.

On the way to the temple, I came across many small shrines which were also getting geared up for the festival.

A village temple

Three devotees. One dressed as God, another as a madman and another as Kali with red paint all over him.

Seemed like Oasis in the desert when water was offered for free

The landscape was so dry and not many trees to provide shade to the devotees. They had made temporary shelters with flex banners and most of them were resting under whatever shade they would find including lorries and palm trees. These devotees would have come here early and were waiting for the end of the day pooja. They were killing time lying around and some were seeing playing cards. This pilgrimage is like a yearly family trip for most of them. They had come with utensils and cooked there own food here.

As one gets closer to the temple the whole place looked like a sea of red and yellow. These were the colors worn by the devotees. The temple was surrounded by cops helping the crowd and making them take long routes to the temple. Most of the routes were blocked to maintain crowd.

One would also hear sounds from a nearby mosque and churches all around. And also from Kulasekharapatnam beach, one would see the Manapad beach and the church there. This is one of the spots in India visited by Saint Xavier on his trip to China.

I also witnessed an old guy with all grey hair beating himself with a whip and asking for alms. I was able to notice blood in his body. I quietly moved away from this disturbing scene

Typical temple side shops selling spiritual audio cassettes

The temple was crowded and had huge lines. So I turned towards the beach. I started following the crowd again. The beach was so filled with life. Devotees come to the beach and take a dip before they go to the temple. The path to the beach is filled with shops selling sweets and toys. In the crowd, one was not able to differentiate a guy from a girl or a sane person from an insane person. Guys had dressed up like girls and beggars.

The path to the beach was like any typical temple festival street selling audio casettes, elephants and beggars asking for alms, tattoo shops.

Some of them were happy to pose for a pic. For a moment I thought that is an excuse for God himself to come and roam the streets without being identified. When people roam the streets dressed as Gods, how are you supposed to identify the Original from the imposters?

One of a young devotee who was ready for the pic

A temple festival without an elephant is never complete

I should mention the bureaucrats had a good job for crowd control and safety of the devotees visiting the event. I would see a lot of cops with and without there uniforms doing jobs like traffic control, crowd control etc. There was one funny announcement made in the loudspeakers mentioning how if you steal in this crowd that God will never forgive you. Nice idea though. I would not believe that thieves these days would not fall for this trick. I was also able to see fire and rescue truck, ambulance and even the hospital ready in case of an emergency along with the temporary watchtowers in the beach.

The crowd is more energetic on the beach. One would literally do anything crazy and no one bats their eye. I was able to see devotees in police dress, guys in skirt and topless all kind of things which would sound so weird if it happens somewhere else.

Sunday, September 30, 2018

GoKarna

Along with a few of my friends, I decided to visit Gokarna over this weekend. Other than that we knew it was a tourist place, we didn't know what to expect there. As usual turned to Google to find some awesome blogs on what to expect from Gokarna.

Then we started our road trip from Bangalore. We headed towards Pune in the Bangalore Pune National highway. The roads were good but highways are so monotonous, you get to see almost the same scenery everywhere. The narrow smaller roads almost always have some good views.

We were welcomed by heavy rains on the way making it really difficult to drive. But once the rain was done, we were on the edge of the night and the sun was about to rise. We deviated from the highway to a narrow village road with some awesome scenery. Dogs waking up and people starting to leave from home for their daily work. The place was all filled with fog and the road was free. I couldn't resist myself from taking a pic of my car.

We found Sannavalli Dam on the way and stopped there for a break. We witnessed the sunrise from the forests and the lake behind the scenes. After a small stop, we started on our way to Gokarna. We witnessed school kids waiting for buses and some African ethnicity people. Weirdly out of nowhere how did this people get into Karnataka? Looks like they were brought here as slaves by Portuguese merchants. They are known as Siddis and are from south-east Africa. There was also a Tibetan Buddhist settlement on the way. Mother India has welcome everyone into her beautiful home.

The fog around us

Sannavalli Dam

Sunrise at the Dam

At the Ghats

We reached Gokarna and wanted to book a room as soon as possible to get some rest. We were a bit worried about getting a room since its a long weekend and we hadn't booked a room yet. We found a cheap room and got some rest and we were ready to hit the beaches.

We hit the Om beach next and chilled out there in Om Shree Ganesh with an awesome lassi. Then settled down in the sunset point to witness one of the best sunsets of my life.

Om Shree Ganesh Cafe

After some rest in the room, woke up early in the morning and took a walk in the Gokarna beach. The scene was like any small town scenes in the western coast of India. The small concrete roads leading to the beaches had bamboo bending over the roads. The roads were mostly made into one-way roads as it was narrow and can allow one car.

The old people I was able to witness had worn their saree in a different style without a blouse. There was a small fish market too on the way to the beach. The houses here were in a bit different style. Even huge houses had to slant roofs probably to keep the rain away as this area receives more rainfall. Almost every house had a Tulasi plant and the walls were made with Laterite stones and are filled with green moss.

Most of these houses had been turned into guest houses and had coconut trees and banana plantations around them with a lot of space between the house and the compound wall.

The beach had started to wake up. The sun had risen a long back and the cleaning ladies were picking rags left in the beach. Since the town had a famous temple the beach was used as a pilgrimage spot too. The beach was a mixture of both the pilgrimages and the young youth. The scenes with lifeguards in one end and people performing religious dips in another end.

Felt the beach was a bit sexist. Most of the males were in one piece or even less taking a dip and all the females were fully dressed in there sixteen feet sarees. There was this one guy who went bit deep into the sea and changed his dress by showing his private parts to the sea god. Probably this is why the Sea God causes tsunami once in a while.

After the dip is made, people pose for their family pics with the sea as the background and couple of people without any hair on their head. White dhoti so transparent that all their colorful innerwear is visible when they take a dip. Its also so weird how they offer eatables to the sea and the sea throws it out in few minutes even before they pose for their pics.

And there is another parallel world happening on the same beach. People who visit the beach for recreation. Couples taking selfies. You can see rented cars which are driven by people from Bangalore or Pune. These people wanted to escape from their busy schedule in these forest jungles. This crowds had a couple of girls only gangs too.

There is one crowd with sixteen feet sarees covering from head to toe and another gang with shorts. Noticed few men will be men scenes too.

Almost all beach scenes in India has a couple of stray cows mooing around aimlessly. When I noticed these cows it hit me if even I was a cow in last birth. I was also walking in the beach aimlessly noticing all things happening around me.

If you walk a bit further from all the crowd you could witness seashells and some small patterns in the beach sand. There was a small stream of water joining the sea here. I wanted to taste the water to see if it is fresh water but didn't dare to do it since I noticed a dark gutter close by and was not sure if the water is good. Might be because of this freshwater joining in I noticed few schools of fishes in the sea. The fish were in grey color with black strips.

Another scene I witnessed here was a couple of guys and girls pulling a fishing boat out. For the first time, I am witnessing girls helping in fishing.

A bit away from the beach are the row of shops selling everything from tender coconuts to t-shirts and shorts.

Graffiti at the wall

At the Gokarna beach

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Sunday, June 17, 2018

Chennakesava Temple, Belur

Chennakesava temple is present in Belur and is a marvelous example for the Hoysala architecture. This temple complex holds multiple temples within it. When you enter the complex from the North gate inside, at your right is the tank or Kalyani. This Kalyani is present at the North East corner of the complex and is known as Vasudeva Sarovara or Vasudeva Tirtha. It was built by Hoysala Ballala-II in 1175 AD according to an inscription found close by. At the entrance to this pond are two Elephants at the sides and two pavilions to the north and south. It has receding steps from all the four sides. Periodical temple rituals are carried out in this tank.