Life is an illusion

On the way back we came back to Haridwar. We had missed Ropeway visit to Manasadevi temple. I found the ropeway journey lacklustre and the temple loud. Literally. The music accompanied to the puja was loud and fierce. More suitable for Bhairav temple than Manasadevi temple.  And a funny thing happened, I observed in temple-let, a mini temple on the side, a priest asking the name of one's wife and then blessing both man and wife by touching both with peacock feather multiple times. I wanted that experience. Our names were told - and the priest starting blessing - but he wanted to know how much money are giving the God. When we said none - he tried to chase us away. When my husband tried to take the tilak - sandalwood paste which is common here and all the priests apply it to the devotees. When my husband tried to take the tilak, the priest wouldn't let him touch it.  Just like kindness has a price, divine blessing too has a price. In this 'ghor kali yug'. Hardwar and Hra

We started our Kedarnath Badrinath journey( in fact it is called char Dham, the other two dhamm being Gangotri and Yamunotri)  without collecting a lot of information. What little information we collected was nowhere near sufficient.   I want to help you readers not face similar problems if at all you plan on such pilgrimage . First of all, these are two holy places are located in the himalayan mountains, so it is not for feeble hearted or feeble bodied. The temperature will reach around 2 to 3°C. You will need layers and layers of warm clothes and like any other tourist place, it is swamped with all kinds of hawkers  trying to fleece you. Kedarnath temple is at a distance of 16 km from the base - a place called Gaurikund where no vehicle goes. You should either hike the distance, if you’re strong  or you should ride a pony or you can go in a palki.  Of course there is a helicopter service too which is extremely difficult to get and not very unreliable too. You have to book the helicop

 Gangotri is the starting point of River Ganga in the state of Uttarakhand. The place is also known for its scenic beauty, situated at an elevation of 3100 meter, surrounded by Himalayan mountains. There is shrine of Ganga. Every day thousands of Hindus visit this place to take the blessings of Ganga and to wash away their sins in the river. Mythology: There was king called Sagara in Ikshvaku dynasty. Once he was performing Ashwamedha yaga. Indra captured this horse and sequestered it in Patala.  Sagara’s 60000 sons went to Patala to release this horse from captivity. Their mayhem disturbed king Kapila who was performing penance. He got angry and by his stare, the 60000 children of Sagar were burnt to ashes.  The responsibility of final rites of these children passed on from one king to next until this duty fell on Bhagiratha. He prayed to goddess Ganga to descend down to earth. But she replied that force of her flow will play havoc on earth and Bhagiratha should pray to lord Shiva for

 I am sure I will make a great bhakt- as I have a large amount of half-baked knowledge. I can speak with vehemence. I can be vengeful.  And on the inside, I am fearful, mean minded and suspicious person. And I always blame others. And I always speak with righteous indignation. More so when I am at fault.  Sadly I lean in the opposite direction - at least in my speech, not so much in my action.

 Uttarakhand still has libraries - not digital libraries, but brick and mortar ones. I rarely see one in our silicon city Bangalore. You can justify its absence by saying - we all have infinite, endless library on all topics imaginable, at our fingertips. In the form of our mobiles. You can also state the actual reason - nobody reads now - we all get our infinite wisdom from “shorts”. The state is picturesque- your eyes will have a feast. And the road from Haridwar to Barkot follows river Yamuna. A river flows from mountain peak to ocean - to join its destination. We in our all wisdom go from mountain foothills to its peak - thinking we are somehow defying gravity. Or we fool ourselves that we are  king Bhageeratha who prayed for thousands of years to bring Ganga to earth.  Through out the path, we see mountains on the opposite side and start believing we are going round and round around the same set of mountains. We may be foolish to do that, but not the river. What actually happens i

The rate at which our cities and towns are growing vertically, all around the country, the day is not far when we literally reach the moon. Before our scientists or Elon Musk make moon touring a reality, our Bangalores and Delhis will be already there. Am I wrong?

The reason I prefer google tourism to physical one - you can visit the places as close as you wish. You can see each part of the architecture, zooming to your eyes’ content   I don’t do well with people. People in a group- for more than a small encounter. So obviously I am in a kind of a soup. And as usual thinking about quitting.  Here comes yesterday’s events. We visited Indira Gandhi memorial preceded by Birla Mandir. Which is not so majestic as Hyderabad mandir. And marble idols - they look more like dolls to us than Gods. We want our God to be black - like our hearts. And another grouse is they did not allow our mobiles inside in this Mandir. Mobiles have now fused into our body and we feel physical pain without it. And know this ye temples - allowing mobiles inside will result in free publicity for you.  Looking at old photos of Indira Gandhi in Indira Memorial you realise how beautiful and regal she was. And how like you and me, attending school(in a saree? - it was 1930s though

 For our Yatra, we started our visit with not so sanatani place - Qutab Minar in Delhi. The minar was started by Qutub Uddin aibak in the year 1299, founder of slave dynasty. What an oxymoron- Slave dynasty! Or a great feat by him.  Anyways this five storied minar representative of Islam architecture has inscriptions from Quran in calligraphy. It has had a colorful history- having been damaged and rebuilt multiple times.  What interested my spouse’s interest is an iron tower in the complex - a Vishnu dhwaja from 375 AD. It was probably brought from Udayagiri caves in Madhya Pradesh. What makes it unique is its rust resistant composition. The tower has inscriptions of Sanskrit.  This massive pillar is 23’8” tall and weighs 6 tonnes.  There was also a gate with intricate inscriptions in I assume Arabic.  My vain attempt to capture sunset 

The tragedy of modern day when many of us have no worries of roti-kapada ya makaan is that we don't have role models. We don't have a father figure or a mother figure we can aspire to. Every one seems to have feet of clay.  Take the example of Elon Musk. Before twitter, I read some where that he is this crazy genius, who is inventing one revolutionary technology after another - space travel, electric cars come to mind. Now he has taken over Twitter and facing hate and ridicule every single day.  That could be one of the reasons I am still continuing listening to Experiments with Truth by Gandhiji. He is some one our generation can look up to and idolize.  The Hindi as well as English translation (by Mahadev Desai) are written so well. And the story never appears self-righteous nor dogmatic. The words so sound so honest.  It is down to earth story of a down to earth man who shook the entire nation and the world. And it is the story of a man who is revered and respected all over