See the first part of this article – Madurai Meenakshi Temple – I
The surroundings of Sundareshwarar temple have a feel very different from that of Meenakshi temple. Open spaces and well lit veranda give way to long and dark passages with shafts of light peeping in from the corners. The main entrance leads me to a mantapa with a Nandi in its middle, facing the main deity. The pillars of the mantapa are covered with carvings of Shiva in his varied forms – Nataraja, Bhairava and Ardhanareeshwara. Continuing the temple’s love with garish metallic structures that disturb the harmony of its surroundings, in the middle of the mantapa is a gleaming yellow pillar that stands apart from its environment.
Devotees come and go in quick successions in the hall surrounding the mantapa, circumambulating the gods adorning the pillars of the edifice. A mural of Hanuman covered in kumkum and decorated with a hanging lamp sees visitors like no other. Wick lamps lit, flowers offered and a pradakshina made, they move on after applying kumkum on their foreheads, in a mood that is visibly contented. As I stand in a corner and watch people go by, their numbers in the hall keeps changing quickly between a few handful to many a dozen, but never disturbing the silence and calmness of the environs.
Along the corridors, the outer walls have been a subject of creativity of the artists. Unstructured, yet beautiful and colourful murals crowd the walls – there are warring people, priests, women churning butter, common people – representing life in the times of their creators. Inside, the sanctum is guarded by life-sized murals of elephants on each side of its door, with their trunks raised up. Flickering orange lamps burning along the door frame provide a brilliant, lively decor to the dark interior. The linga rests in the sanctum on a platform, under the shade of a serpent(adishesha?). The impressions of the modern days are visible here too, in the form of granite flooring that contradicts the beauty of dark stone structures surrounding it.
In front of the complex of Sundareshwarar shrine is a small market selling trinkets, arty materials, small statues and images of all kind of gods. The statues are painted in brightest possible yellow that can make the most willing buyer to reconsider. A door adjoining these shops leads to the gigantic thousand pillar hall, inside of which is crowded with thick stone pillars in every direction. The hall is now a museum that serves no purpose but of a store room for haphazardly installed statues that are in a desperate state, which only disturb the beauty of uniform array of pillars.
In the few days that I spent wandering the temple and its surroundings, the brightly lit Potramarai Kulam and its painted surroundings kept pulling me back to its environs. I cherished the morning hours sitting on the steps leading to the tank, spent watching the pigeons flying in and out of the water, admiring the view of the towers that aim for the sky, and sometimes lost, with the complex labyrinth of thoughts in mind melting away into nothingness in the calm moments.
As I moved on from Madurai and its temples, the scale of its structures and the intent of its creators remained as an enigma. Was it a wish to show-off their prosperity to their people and rest of the world? An icon of their moments of celebration? Or was it truly a show of their utmost belief and devotion of the supreme power? I am yet to understand.
“It will be nice in the mornings,” a friend had told me before I left for Madurai. I grudgingly wake up before sunrise, wishing for a few more hours of sleep. The streets are empty but for the watchman of my hotel and a couple of two wheelers that were drifting away slowly. Perfume draws me towards a small coffee-shop manned by a short man with an innocent smile. The coffee is good, and at three rupees, is the cheapest I have had in many years. I had to have another cup.
Life expanded as I walked towards the temple. There is more light and a few shops are already open, but still hardly any people on the roads. A sadhu with a long beard squatted on the approach to temple, wearing bright saffron, his forehead smeared with Vibhoothi. There is just enough light for me to catch the glitter of warmth exuding from his eyes.
West Gopura of Madurai Meenakshi Temple
Repeated chants of ‘Om Namah Shivaya’ effused by loudspeakers from the temple, indicating that they are already open. Otherwise peace of the morning is disturbed by the continuous chant that is probably on since 5am. It would haunt me inside the temple too, till as late as 8.
Madurai Temple is roughly divided into two major sections – one around Meenakshi shrine to the south and the other around the sanctuary of Sundareshwarar to the North. The eastern entrance has the temple market selling flowers, trinkets, photos and statues of all kind of gods and goddesses. A huge thousand pillar hall which seems to have served a purpose no more than showing off the might of the kings is housed in a corner at the south, which is now converted into a museum. A fort-like high wall encloses all these, with four tall Gopuras one for each direction.
Entering Madurai Meenakshi Temple
The Gopuras dominate Madurai’s skyline and their might is evident from far away. As I walk closer, I pain my neck trying to looking up at all the brightly coloured statues covering every inch of the tower. There are goddesses with uncountable number of hands, gods with multiple heads, demons with long canines, dancing nataraja, calm Subrahmanya with blessing hands and men and women of all kind – earthly and celestial. Leaving their bodies which are painted fair or dark, rest of the Gopura are smeared in every conceivable color by the creative brush of the artist. There are clothes red, yellow and white. Crowns are orange and green. Only the armoury and jewellery of gods are allowed to stay sober in color. The space between statues are painted with a shade of gentle purple that is fading, and there is so little of free space that it fails to become the dominant color of the towers.
I think of the engineering capability of those times used for building these complex structure looming several hundred feet high, at a time when the word skycraper would not have been invented yet. The amount of labour used must be phenomenal enough that current day governments and temple authorities might squirm just to imagine the time and effort they have to spend maintaining the structures.
Potramarai Kulam, Madurai Meenakshi Temple
Entering through the West Gopura, I walk along the temple corridor to the east and reach Potramarai Kulam – The Golden Lotus Pond. Southern Gopura, the tallest of the lot dominates the environs of the pond. Sun is just out and the tip of Gopura is bathed in bright light, rest of it still in shade. A large metal lotus in the pond, colored in yellow would have given the pond its name. Water level is no more than a few inches and the floor appears cemented. A small square in the center isolated from rest of the pond is crowded with lilies and houses a metal pillar in the center – another one painted in yellow. A few pigeons fly in and out every now and then, probably enjoying the feel of shallow water on their feet. The otherwise quiet environs of the pond is unsettled only by continuous chants of ‘Om Namah Shivaya’.
I sit on the steps leading to the pond watching sun rays slowly light up more and more of the southern tower. A sign posted on a pillar next to me, and directly opposing the Gopura and the lake, proudly proclaims its location as ‘Photo Spot’. The corridor around the pond is colored to life with bright Rangoli. I sit quietly on the steps and observe life in the temple, and watch people walk back and forth with tiny pooja baskets. Time moves uneventful and I am lost in non-thought till a man comes and decides to disturb my moments of solitude. He tells me that I should go around the temple and visit the shrine before sitting here, and offers himself as my escort. I politely try to shrug him off with a lie, telling him that it is all done already, but he is not ready to move. I then resort to ignoring him which works fine, and I am back to non-thought mode.
Sun seems to move up really fast, and it was strong and bright all over before 8am. The recorded chants of ‘Om Namah Shivaya’ are replaced by someone singing carnatic music accompanied by Mridanga and Nadaswara. I am keen to linger here, but the rising sun eventually forces me to move. I hear sound of anklets behind me which grow stronger on approach, and become unusually intense as it gets closer. Turning around, I see walking behind me is not a damsel in dancing costume but the charming temple elephant striding with her Mahout. Finding an excuse to leave my seat of comfort,I walk behind the elephant like excited little children in a village who would run behind a motor car.
A woman lights a lamp for Nandi
I stroll further, exploring corners of the temple and put myself in the shoes of observer of life in the temple. A small statue of Nandi is lit with dozens of tiny wick lamps releasing gentle orange flames. Women keet walking in, prostrate in front of Nandi to light a lamp, smear their forehead with a tiny dot of kumkum from the Nandi and move on. A statue of Ganesha keeps watch of people going in and out of the sanctuary of goddess Meenakshi.
Premises of Meenakshi Shrine
The inner prangana(courtyard) is heavily criss-crossed with steel barricades meant to enforce a queue. Garish metals stand out amidst the stone walls and structures of the ancient days. Bright railings of stainless steel, tastelessly installed gold plated coverings for stone pillars and a Nataraja in silver stand out among the dark walls and dimly lit interior. The sanctum is lit only with gentle orange hues of flickering wick lamps that surround the deity. Devotees, only a few in number stand in line to receive prasada and take their time gazing at the deity. There is no rush or hurry. The evening pooja draws a decent crowd that just about fills the inner courtyard and justifies the barricades to some extent.
Coming out from the Meenakshi shrine, I walk forward to the enclave of Sundareshwarar.
Continued in Part II
When I was visiting Madurai a few months back, I knew there would be language problems. You can travel all over North India, talk Hindi and survive. Even in remote parts of Rajasthan where a few old men speak only Marwari, there is no dearth of Hindi speaking population. Pahadis in Himachal and Garhwal switch between Hindi and local tongue effortlessly. But things are much different once you drift southwards.
The deeper you head into any of the southern states, less easier it is to find people who speak a language known to wider audience. It better be Kannada, Telugu, Tamil or Malayalam in their respective territories. So Tamil it had to be when I was in Madurai – a language I did not speak.
I caught a rickshaw from the bus-stand to take me to Meenakshi Temple. That part of the communication was easy. “Meenakshi Temple,” I told him, and he responded with a short “fifty,” using the English word.
Further on, I would have been happy to sit silently in the backseat, waiting to be dropped at the temple. But the rickshaw driver had other ideas. He smelled more business, and had to act. He made a short talk as he drove towards the temple, most of which I did not understand. But what I could do was pickup words from his generous mix of English and give it a meaning. Besides, being neighbours, a Tamil fellow can grasp bits of Kannada and vice versa. And so began the conversation I did not wish to be a part of.
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Naturally it wasn’t hard to see what he was trying to say. But my challenge was to respond to him in a way he could understand. Realizing that my best bet was to use Kannada than any other language, I got down to speaking as though I am in Bangalore, or giving him short one-word answers.
Me: no
I tried to cut the conversation and keep it as brief as possible, but he would not give up.
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Me: kannada kannada kannada meenakshi temple kannada kannada
The conversation went on this way till we made it to the temple. He kept opening up every few minutes and had something or the other to say. And I had to stay alert to catch a few familiar words to help me interpret him. Even after we made it to the temple and I paid his bill, his last words were still the same – “tamil tamil tamil tamil rooms tamil tamil.”
Things was much easier when I was on the way out from Madurai and looking for a bus to Kanyakumari. The rickshaw guy I hired to reach the bus-stand was silent, but a travel agent caught me once I was there. To my delight, this man spoke Kannada to a decent degree, but it was to become a cause of my problem later. He insisted that I buy a ticket from him for a bus that was bound to depart an hour later. But I was least interested in it till I saw the bus – I did not want to look like a fool with a ticket in hand for 10am bus if buses kept departing at 9.30, 9.45,.. Or even worse, last thing I wanted is to make the 6-hour journey in a dilapidated rickety.
So I asked him to wait till the bus comes. It was 9am, and the bus was scheduled to leave at ten. But he wanted to finish my business in a hurry, so he get away in search of others.
“Bus has come,” he told me in excellent Kannada, “come to our office, I will give you the ticket.”
“Show me the bus,” I demanded.
“Bus has come baba,” he replied pretending a resigned look, “you take the ticket now.”
I never understand why he was hesitant to show me the bus, and that made me a little suspicious. I poked him further and insisted on seeing the bus – “no ticket till you show me the bus.”
“Bus has come,” he again said in a desperate push, “you see, the bus has come at 9.45”.
I then realized where the problem was – it was his Kannada. Talking to me at 9am, he was confusing the tenses, saying that the bus has arrived at 9.45am. I laughed, and eased his tension by finally buying the ticket from him a little later.