Puthankulangara temple

Living in Thripunithura we never knew of this lovely temple.
Just 5 km from our house is the ancient Puthankulangara Sivan temple .
It has a very intresting history .
The Pandavas during thier banishment is given a house to stay but due to Duryodhanas deviousness its a house made of wax so that it could be burnt when they are inside .
The pandavas realised there was some stealth behind their stay they built a tunnel from house to use when needed.
As they feared the house was put on fire and they escaped through the tunnel but in the process all of them suffered painful burns by the fire .
Kunthi devi prayed to lord Krishna to relieve them of their ailment .
Vishnu asked them to pray in the Siva temple of one place and kunti devi doing so the lord removed thier problems .
Its this temple that was used by the pandavas .
It was renovated by the Mampattu bhatathiri family who managed the temple for many years till it was was given to a Tulu family 

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In 1492 it was renovated .

Later a Cochin thampuran added Bhagavathy depicting kodungaloor amma who came to be close to her devotee who was bedridden .

Shaktan thampuran ruled Cochin in 1800 and the temple was renovated then .
His skin disease vanished after his phyisical labour for the temple .
In 1790 when Tipu Sultan came to kerala with his hordes of savages destroying temples murdering raping pillaging converting a devotee of a temple in Malabar ran with a Saastha idol and this too was installed here .
The temple today is known for its beauty its neatness with levelled green lawns symetrical granite patgways trees flowering plants and medicinal plants .
It has trees corresponding to all astrological stars
Murals depicting its legends adorn its walls .
It has alovely pond.
Mahavishnu too has a small temple like bhagavathy and Saastha .
Its a treat to photograph this temple the air was pristine with a gentle breeze from the giant banyan tree ,devotees were circumbulating a silver chariot used in ceremonies was seen and lovely huge lamps temple flagstaff etc .
It was an unforgettable temple indeed .

Thiruvaarppu temple

Today we drove early in the morning through Vaikom and back water country nearing Kottayam to a temple called Thiruvaarpu Sri Krishna temple .
Its 1500 years old and has a lot of legends behind it .
Its deity Sri Krishna is an idol with four hands ,
he is said to have given this idol to the Pandavars for doing puja ,when the pandavars complete their forest penance the locals of the area plead for the idol ,this place is said to be somewhere near Chertallai .
After a few years due to some local mishap the idol is not given due pujas and it gets lost .
After many years when a great spiritual being some say its Vilvamangala swamy ,some say its Padmapadha disciple of Adhi sankaracharya going in a boat in the area feels peculiar vibrations in an area and their boat refuses to move further ,the water parts by itself and an idol is located
The great saint takes out and looks for a place to install it ,one version says he finds a Dharma Sastha temple without an idol and consecrates it there ,
Another version says due to inclement weather the saint could not go forwards and quickly places the idol in an uruli ( a brass vessel )and leaves ,when he returns he finds the idol is stuck to the uruli and the owner of the uruli a local landlord Kunnan kari menon builds a temple and with help of a saint called madapuratthu swami consecrates it in the temple ,even today special pujas are done for the swamis ashram .

Another version says that the Pandavars after their penance leaves the idol along with their Akshaya patra in the area as they go for their agnatha vasa or hidden penance of an year .
the idol is recovered by some fishermen and they keep it in a temple in a place called charamangalam but without the uruli ,after several unpleasant happenings the fishermen put the idol back into the back waters and the spiritual person finds it ,as his boat gets stuck in weeds the local shore people bring the idol and uruli to shore and they feed the lord with tender coconut water and mango pickles ,even today the deity is taken during Arraattu to this place and fed tender coconut water and tender mango pickles
The idol here is supposed to be always hungry as Krishna after killing kamsa is tired and hungry
so this temple opens at 2 am the earliest of all temples in Kerala ,even guruvayoor temple opens only at 3 am .
The lord is fed even during his bath after drying hair and later his body is dried .
Even during eclipses the temple is open and lord is fed as once upon a time when it was closed and later opened the lords waist band fell down they say because he lost weight !

The best offering is the usha payasam which is made early in the morning ,made of rice jaggery ghee kadali banana and dried coconut ,jaggery is poured into rice till it stops by itself

incidentally the assistant priest is given an axe in this temple to use to break open the sanctum sanctorum if the chief priest loses the key as the lord cannot be kept hungry of course that has never happened .
There are five pujas here and the Deeparadhana is after athazha puja at 7pm ,before the temple closes they ask if there is anyone from chertalai who is hungry as it was from here that the idol was recovered and its believed no one from chertala should go hungry .
another story is about a landlord from pullattu house who had no family he donated all his properties to the temple and on the day he gave all his documents and properties he prostrated before the lord never to wake up puja done in his honor is called pullattu puja
a multi tiered lamp adorns the temple front gifted by a christian devotee of the area
all these can be discarded as myths but Hinduism has myriad idols zillions of legends all leading to the one omnipresent Eswara which is beyond all isms ,the ramification are for the souls who believe according to their level of understanding .

The temple is small serene and belies so many stories lying behind it
The Meenachil river floats serenely on its side with a green pond . .

Last day in job

One year back on this day I left my last job in Brunei in The Brunei Cancer center .
I wrote this then

Adhu anginne aanu bai
Thats the way it is buddy

Last day in job

Though not for many years for the last 5 years today was my last day in The Brunei Cancer Center now under Pantai jerudong speciality center Brunei Darussalam .

Before this I had a last day in Lakeshore hospital  Cochin 12 yrs back and one in Tawam hospital Al Ain UAE 5 yrs back .

Last day last prescription and shutting down the desktop has  a sort of finality for the phase .

Its the full stop of one chapter .

I have no plans for the next , in fact thinking back I never had grand strategies in my career .

I wasnt ever pushy never the typical A type achiever .
The Alpha male no never ever .

I just did what I knew best as honestly as possible .
I always answered to one person , no  no not to  God or any celestial being but to  my inner mind .

Somehow cheating him wasnt easy though I did try on off .

But I have been lucky too to get into places and work with people who were like steps for me  to climb up  my career .

Maybe if I was more hard working less diverted more focussed on my chosen career instead of indulging in my passions I may have reached higher peaks .

Now I did just climb small hills but I enjoyed the climbs as I had time to gaze at the scenery I had pauses to smell the flowers and I could taste the raindrops .

And I have a blank slate for the future which I am sure has an etch which will reveal in time like hidden writing .

So iam looking into the future with the wide eyed innocence of a child

Maybe with the foolish vision of an idiot with no strategies but as i gaze into my past I find i hadnt been much different before too .

My career like my writing or my cooking has been spontaneous impulsive with no punctuations and i just let go so that invisible something shapes my destiny as i am too lazy to do it myself.

Not an inspiring example for youngsters but as they say in malayalam

Adu anginne aanu bai

Which means
its like that buddy .

world cancer day message

Modern medicine has most definitely brought a paradigm change in the outcome of Cancer patients .
The number of survivors with a cure has definitely gone up ,those who are not cured too live longer and have a better quality of life with better therapies and supportive care available to them .
Though one has to mention the financial toxicity of modern cancer treatments which cannot be avoided since it involves costly trials and evidence based rigorous firewalls to introduce a new medicine or therapy as needed scientifically for the protection of the cancer patient .
Immunotherapy, targeted therapy ,more sophisticated surgery and Radiotherapy ,all has made a difference ,albeit at a cost .

The need for a sensible insurance policy and health policy to aid the cancer patient is a dire necessity
.
While on this topic we also have factors which are inimical to good cancer treatment .
These are not new and have always been the anti thesis in the fight against the scourge cancer .

Prevention is better than cure is an adage which has lot of sense in oncology ,the Screening programmes accepted for a few cancers like colon ,Breast ,cervix and the use of vaccines against hepatitis B and c for susceptible population and HP virus vaccines need a large scale public information campaign to reach out to the millions ,but unfortunately neither the center nor the states have realized this and the amount of funds allotted to this vital oncology prevention is meager ,to a certain extent NGO s have contributed their mite but they are just drops in an ocean needed .

one cannot understand a country which has hundreds of TV channels ,millions of social media sites,thousands of newspapers and journals and FM radio networks that bore you with uninspiring serials and idiotic political debates dont spend even one percent of their time on this vital transformation of information
its pertinent that these messages as well as the do and donts and early signs of cancer reach out to the public both educated and uneducated as the right knowledge on cancer is abysmal .

The second biggest obstacle for ethical oncology practitioners in India is the huge grey market which spreads misinformation and myths on Cancer to gain by way on unscientific treatments and thousands of claims which prevent people taking treatment at the right time and allow their cancers to grow to a stage that cure is no more possible
The valuable window of treatment is lost by these claims which are allowed by ruling governments to continue and some even encouraged and supported .
Myths abound on diet about what causes and what prevents cancer written by charlatans , who know nothing to do with anything ,
The system of a country should be alert to such false claims but unfortunately all kinds of quacks feed cancer patients with false hopes and lure them from taking correct treatment while sucking their resources , the only goal being to make money by exploiting fears .

One thing we can be smug about is this is not only happening in India but in many other countries too but that is no satisfaction .

Its time such false claims are exposed and quacks are punished and money spent on supplements are stopped and social media posts which support unscientific claims are clamped by the police strictly ,in the fight against cancer we can ill afford to have such obstacles
Having worked in oncology for last three decades i had seen several such cases going hay wire as they indulged in indigenous treatments ,homeo medications and the like by quacks and wasted valuable time and have regretful disease later ,
Its sad to know that those who could have been cured are pushed into sure death by suffering because of these charlatans .

Even those who are undergoing treatment spend money on costly supplements unnecessary dietary restrictions believing such canards and suffer by costs and ill health due to these .

There has been lot of experiences where patients suffer from hematological discrepancies unrelated to their treatment only on investigating repeatably we come to know patient is on some supplement or medication of some other system and that was causing the whole problem ,patients are told to take it along with the chemotherapy to assure of a good cure as chemotherapy would not do that and patients trust them without telling it to their medical oncologists
Its time these kind of myths are broken and claimants are arrested by the health system in the country
This is my message on this world cancer day .