The Drums of love

The burnished lamp glowed in its efflugence .
He looked from a corner lost in the crowd .

The line of fine elephants stood swaying , thier tiny eyes crinkled in amusement .
The drums beat in synched unison .
The cymbals clanged thier full stops ,the mathalam thier commas .
The elephant keepers stood shifting sand in their long hours watch .
The crowd was in a frenzy mesmerised with the rythm thier hands jerking up with the beat .
Exopthalmic eyes open they watched in a trance .
To them there was nothing else but the drum beat and those gentle giants .

But to him his search went beyond
He was looking out for something which made his heart beat faster.

He had watched so for decades now .

She would always come in resplendent white mundum neriyathum , her lithe slim countenance sailing like a floating angel .

The gentle smile on her face was still the same from the time she wore a golden blouse and skirt ,
 in those days he a humble temple worker still had some wild hope that he would win her hand ,the hand of the darling of the royal family itself .

He never dared to tell it out but just watched with mountains of love at his etheral beauty .

Her forehead head shone with brightness and the sandalwood paste on it glowed,
Her popping eyes shadowed her setting sun red full lips
He would particularly zoom into those lips and think about the time he would posess its softness.
Her nape of the neck with its gentle down disappeared in fine elegance to forbidden frontiers and his mind would almost feel his nose touching them .
But his love stayed as it was

Did she even know he existed when she got married in the same temple ?

The 6 foot bald man was disgusting to his eyes though he heard he hailed from kottakal kottaram and was a great match .

Later she came only for vritchikotsavam  every year more older tireder and sadder though her beauty never dimmed .

She would clutch her children close ,with time they would clutch her as she grew older and slower .
He lasted all along in the same job and  never married
He just didnt want and had none to take care of .
He looked forwards to watching the love of his life every year.
He had retired 10 years back
 they asked him to at 70 years

Now he stayed in a tiny room nearby mostly eating in temple .
old aqauintances  saw that Unniettan never starved
The ettan who loved laxmi thamburatti for 60 years .
He watched her once again leaning on a pillar
His body just slumped as he fell
They quickly carried him to hospital but he had left the world as quietly as he lived .

Laxmi thampratti asked her grand daughter
Endha kutti avide ?
Whats happening ?

Ammmamma one old man fell down maybe your admirer !
They all laughed

Laxmi too sighed
 true i had lots she said

The drums beat till dawn

Sree poornathresiya temple

I consider myself lucky to live just  200 meters from an ancient temple
Sree Poornathrayeesa .

Thura means a  port on the banks of river Poorna with a Thiru which is a respectful connotation so its Thiru..Poorni...Thura later becoming Thripunithura .

It also comes from poorna thrayee which is lord of 3 vedas .

The place was an ancient land of vedic learning called veda poorni where Arjuna comes with an idol in his poorni or bag of arrows which he places in this area and by pun it is pooni thura or open poorni as thura means open in malayalam .

Arjuna was given the idol of lord Vishnu as Santhana Gopala or giver of children for childless
A form of Vishnu not seen usually here hes sitting on the celestial serpent Adiseshah instead of lying down in ananthasayanam
He sits cross legged one leg folded one hanging down with four hands one with Chakra or swivelling diskette a weapon one with Sanghu or conch one with lotus and other resting on Seshan the serpent seat .

Once a brahmin kept losing his children one by one they kept dying as children and in those days people can blame thier king for thier fate unlike these days where the peoples fate is decided by the bloody politicians ..
So brahmin keeps cursing the king for every childs death
When his 8 th child dies Arjuna happened to be with the king, he promises the brahmin that he will protect the child born from death but that child too dies though Arjuna tries to save child he fails .

The brahmin ridicules Arjuna for his great words and dejected Arjuna tries to jump into a fire to end his life , but Krishna stops him as he loves Arjuna ,tells him to get all children if he can find out
Krishna plays a celestial game
Arjuna travels to several world paathaalam swarga naraga indra etc but in vain finally krishna helps him in doing so during this time krishna shows Arjuna the maha Vishnu form and Arjuna trembles with fear and piety
Krishna gives an idol of santhana gopala to Arjuna and tells him to consecrate it in a suitable spot
Arjuna asks Vinayaka to help him and he finds out Poorna river bank .
Vinayaka falls in love with the place and occupies it himself
Arjuna pushes him to west corner and keeps main idol in sanctum sanctorum
Initially the idol is in moolastaanam a temple in west of present one Poonithura Krishna temple
Later its moved into puthan palace temple by Cochin royal family and still later to present location .
Poirnathrayeesan is elder brother of Chotanikara amma whose temple is 10 km away .
One of most important festivals is Vritscikotsavam and falls in nov dec its for 8 days and on 4th day a very important ritual happens its Thriketta ir offering by devotees into a golden pot
Huge lines stand to do that ..same day elephant is caprisoned in gold
In 2016 the Cochin Dewaswom which manages the temple wanted to melt old caprison and make new one
Dewaswoms are an anamoly for hindu temples
Filled with politicians who loot it they do anything which benifits them
The royal family pleads to dewaswo

m not to melt gold as new one cannot be made before vritscikotsavam but its done
That year there was no gold caprison and it hurt so many tks to the dewaswom .
Such is the history of this great temple

Chinese Tibet

Chinese Tibet ...

In 1951 China signed an acession agreement with Tibet and in 1959 Dalai lama escaped into India
My post of his escape
http://hariwrite.blogspot.com/2015/04/the-escape-of-dalai-lama.html?m=1

After a decade of supression cruelty and  destruction of Tibet the Chinese gave more freedom built good infrastructure and attracted the younger generation who found life more easier with greater pleasures than thier old forgotten country .
Today with train from Beijing to Lhasa Tibet is very much part of China .
The Tibet which we went round mount Kailas was still in the process of modernisation .
It was never easy as geographically Tibet is a rugged plateau with high altitudes and building roads and  bridges and towns was an uphill task but rely on the Chinese to take hard tasks easily .
Overland route from kathmandu the capital of Nepal to mount Kailas was around 948 km
It went over Himalayan mountains
The border between Nepal and China and the customs building was in a place called
Keyrong .
It was reached after 2 hardy days of travel in bumpy narrow roads on high mountains and sheer falls .
Nepali villages were dusty unkempt in plains
In hills they were cute with flowers but the way up was filled with danger of imminent landslides .
We managed to avoid some but once needed to walk through a narrow edge where a landslide had destroyed road and reached other side to take a bus on other side arranged for us
Finally we reached Keyrung .
The Nepali custom was in a ramshackle building and we could see a big bridge on other side was China and its building was new big and neat .
We had to wait on bridge for some hours as one German couple with our troupe had to come the next day due to some visa issue .
Later we went to other side and sailed through very efficient customs .
We got into spank new buses and good roads but later roads became bad as they were being built and we needed to go off road though there were large empty spaces to go off road but they were bit muddy with rains and several times one of our troupes 2 buses kept sinking in mud and we had to wait for a JCB to pull it out .
By the time we reached Manasarovar after staying in a city called Saga for acclimitastion for 2 days it was like a very long journey .
Saga itself was a fine city with broad roads traffic lights hotels shops etc
Manasarovar gave us first glimpse of Kailas which was an emotional moment .
No one is allowed to swim or take bath these days in the freezing waters of the lake .
There was a bathing area where water was let in
Some of us just washed our faces including me .
We stayed in Manasarovar for a night next day morning we did some pujas offerrings for ancestors who had left us and then went to Drachen our final city with civilised hotels etc by late afternoon
Evening we walked up as an exercise to acclimatise to thin air
Tibetians sold oxygen bottles along with souvenuirs .
The next day morning we were dropped by our buses to yama dwar about 14 km nearer to south face of kailas
It was a big opening in 2 mountains and was named after the God of Death Yama
In the opening we could see the magnificient kailas
We got into our horses for a days trek to north face a place called Dirapukh but thats for another day .

Maradu kottaram bhagavathy temple

 Maradu kottarathil Bhagavathy temple is a well known temple ,very popular for its annual fireworks during its festival .

Today morning we walked to the temple though the maddening traffic made us walk warily .

Once we reached the temple it was very peaceful and quiet under the banyan tree

They say temples are built by aghamic traditions as battery rechargers filling devotees with positivity .

The idols can be seen as God or as symbols of God or as merely stone to focus our thoughts on the one and all supreme energy of the universe .

That is the beauty of Hinduism
Its never dogmatic .
It never regulates or dictates
You are free to form your beliefs
Even non belief is valid in Hinduism .

It has rituals orthodoxity superstitions but it also has a broader sweeping spirituality which transcends everything .

Neither is the idol worshipper,
 nor the believer that nature or quiet solitude in a conducive atmosphere allows him or her to connect to the power ,
either considered superior or inferior
They are all the same

Fragments of the one dissipating energy .

And funnily this ancient great religion is accused of narrowness by shallower ones .