Happy Diwali to
all. We had a lovely trip to Kanyakumari
and back; Zarryl Lobo and myself. As per
my calculation, we did 1429 Kms on my odometer and I got 44 Km /litre for mileage.
Some Pics are at:
On 10 November
2012, we left around 5.30 AM and were in Madurai by 1 PM. Spent the evening walking around and visited
the famous Madurai Meenakshi Temple. It
was absolutely fantastic. Some history
below if you need. Then next day we proceeded to Kanya Kumari, at the Southern
tip of India. We stayed at the
Tamilnadu Guest house and visited the Vivekananda rock, the Kanyakumari temple.
Ah, we missed the sunrise and the sunset, cloudy weather.
Next we went to
see an old classmate from the dental school, at Kulasegaram. It was pleasant and caught up on old memories
with him. Returned via Madurai on Tuesday 13 Nov. by 4 pm.
It was a nice
trip and NH highway route 7 is good. But, real boring to hit a straight patch
for some 25 hours + !
Some History:
Meenakshi
Sundareswarar Temple or Meenakshi Amman Temple a historic Hindu temple located
in the southern banks of river Vaigai in the temple city of Madurai, Tamil
Nadu, India. It is dedicated to Parvati who is known as Meenakshi and her
consort, Shiva, named here as Sundareswarar. The temple forms the heart and
lifeline of the 2500 year old city of Madurai. The complex houses 14 gateway
towers called gopurams, ranging from 45-50m in height, the tallest being the
southern tower, 51.9 metres (170 ft) high, and two golden sculptured vimana,
the shrine over sanctum of the main deities. The temple is a significant symbol
for the Tamil people, and has been mentioned since antiquity in Tamil
literature, though the present structure is built during 1623 to 1655 CE. The
temple attracts 15,000 visitors a day, around 25,000 during Fridays and gets annual
revenue of sixty million. There is an estimated 33,000 sculptures in the temple
and it was in the list of top 30 nominees of the "New Seven Wonders of the
World". The annual 10 day Meenakshi Tirukalyanam festival celebrated
during April–May attracts 1 million visitors.
Meenakshi is an
avatar of the Hindu goddess Parvati - the consort of Shiva. She is also one of
the few Hindu female deities to have a major temple devoted to her.
At Kanyakumari:
The small ride to
the Vivekananda rock was serene, quite and calm. The adjacent rock had the statue of Thiruvalluvar,
the famous Tamil poet.
At the Vivekananda rock, I liked the expression on ‘AUM’!
AUM - Symbol of
Absolute; The essence of the Vedas,
described by the Upanishads as the total human and divine consciousness;
Recommended by Swami Vivekananda as the
great unifier of all Indian people; Praised by Sri Ramakrishna as a bridge
between God with form and God without form.
