Mahabalipuram / Mamallapuram Part III (Chennai - Tamil Nadu)

Where were we..??? Ok.. In Krishna Mandapam. Then we came out of it… Lolz… Ok, let’s come to the point...

The next place in the list was Krishna Butterball aka Bheema’s Mustard seed. This is a huuuuuge free rock standing at a dangerous slope. But it’s so well sturdy. In fact the government thought of the possibilities of massacre if it rolls down the slope. So trials we done to push and pull it with elephants and too, but in vain!!! Its toooooo sturdy to roll off the slope… 

Krishna is a very chweet God filled with mystical powers. He takes different forms and changes his sizes. So this huge rock is as small as a Butter ball to Him, if he blows up. Bheema is one of the Pancha Pandavas, the strongest and biggest in size of the five. And he eats a lot too!!! So this huge rock is only as small as Mustard seed for his huuuuuuuuge tummy!!! Thus these names… Lolz… So, here we took some freaky shots too. You may look at the size of the people standing right below the rock to visualize the rock's actual size.

From there we went to the Ganesha Ratha. It’s a Ratha like temple that houses Lord Ganesha / Vinayakar. Next was to the Varaha Mandapam. This has 4 panels. First is Varaha Panel. Varaha is the 3^rd re-incarnation of Lord Vishnu when is born as a Wild Boar. Here is the scene of Lord Vishnu in the form Wild Boar saves Mother Earth – Bhoodevi and puts her on his lap.

Second is the Gajalakshmi Panel. Well, Lakshmi was created during the churning of the ocean by angels and demons. Gaja is elephant. Since she is flanked by 2 elephants on either side she is called Gaja Lakshmi. She’s sitting on a lotus with her feet placed on the lotus leaves.

Next is the Durga Panel. She is seen standing here on a lotus. Her vahana Lion is on the top left with a stylized mane.

The last panel is the Trivikrama Panel. Trivikrama is the form taken by Lord Vishnu in his re-incarnation as Vamana. He is also called Ongi Ulagalandha Perumal.

Our next venture was to the place where Kokila Ben of Reliance Industries, dances in rain. 

Ha… Ok. What I meant is, in the movie ‘Guru’ starring Abhishek Bachan and Aishwarya Rai which is based in the real life history of Dhirubai Ambani. Aishwarya Rai plays the character of his wife. 

A song sequence ‘Barso re’, was shot here in which she dances. And the place is called Rayar Gopuram. Again an unfinished structure.

From here we kept on walking until we saw this rock smiling. Is it only us or do u see it too..??? No..??? 

Lemme zoom it. Now.?

Then after a bit of rest.. we were off to the Shore Temple. 

This is actually a complex that houses several monuments again. It is located a bit away from the main location, just near the sea. It houses a Siva Temple and a Vishnu Temple. On a whole the Mahabalipuram is a mystery with constant new discoveries that completely destructs the assumptions. Here too, quite a number of structures are believed to be engulfed by the sea now.

A recent excavation led to the discovery of some things. One is this small Varaha (wild boar) - Small in comparison to the otherwise large scale architecture and sculpture. Another is a small rather mini shrine that houses Veenadhara Siva (Lord Siva with the music instrument veena in hand). Here is my friend in front of em.

It was post noon by then and a friend was waiting at a hotel constantly messaging to arrive soon for our lunch get together and another group of friends were waiting at ones home for another evening get together!!! Should I also specify we were blasted by both for late arrival.??? Still, our memories lingered with our date with the Pallava Dynasty.

TO GET THERE:

Refer Mahabs Part I

Dedicated to Vaishu

Mahabalipuram / Mamallapuram Part II (Chennai - Tamil Nadu)

First let me come back to the light house from my last post. 

Actually this is the Olakkaneshwara Temple, which was used during the British era as the light house till they built the new one. Next we proceeded to the Dharmaraja Mandapam. This has 3 shrines in it and unfortunately it’s all empty. 

Our next venture was Mahishasura Mardhini Mandapam. The central shrine here is Somaskanda. Somaskanda is little Lord Muruga/Karthikeya with Lord shiva and Parwathi on either sides. 

On the left wall is the Mahishasura Mardhini Panel. Mahisha is Bull and Asura is demon, so this is about Goddess Ambal who kills the demon who comes like a Bull. The whole scene of Ambal on a lion killing Mahisha with Bow and Arrow is depicted here. 

On the right wall is Anantha Sayana Panel. Sayana is sleeping – Anantha Sayana is the Sleeping posture of Lord Vishnu. We got a bit freakily funny by this time and started our freaky photoshoot. Along with the several devotees of Lord Vishnu, I too bow at his feet, here. You think this is not freaky.??? Well go on reading, you’ll see more…

Our next place was THE Panel. U know, THE panel! The huge Finished panel of Great Penance. Now, you may remember the Unfinished panel that I referred to in my last post. Now this panel is the finished one. There are so many things to note in this. The Elephants – Remember in the unfinished one those were fierce and very dynamic. Here they seem to be just standing with the babies sitting beneath them. Here there are not 2 boulders, instead it has a single boulder with a deep cleft in between. There are these beautiful Nagas – Snake figures. I love their thought process in this. When it rains and the water pours down through this cleft these Nagas would seem to be coming down. There is a huge water storage system beneath – rain water harvesting!!! This water flow depicts Ganga coming down from heaven.

The legend is that Bhagiratha prays to Ganga to come down to earth to provide water to the people. She accepts but says that when she comes down, her fierceness and force would destroy so many things. So he prays to Lord Shiva to absorb her force and let down only the water. He too accepts. Now as Ganga comes down, Lord Shiva catches her with his matted locks and holds her in his head. And Ganga flows gently from there.

So where is Bhagiratha? He is the main character of this panel. So realistically depicted with even his ribcage jutting out of his frail body after days together meditating in the single-leg posture as a Tapasvin (meditator/yogist). Lord Shiva is beside him.

At that era itself, the sculptor had a funny bone!!! Near the elephants is this Cat’s Penance. This is the story that says about a cat that acts like performing penance to fool the rats which come near it thinking that the cat is a tapasvin, so the cat can eat ‘em. A moral story today has its evolution during or before this era. Would you belive that???!!!! Hard for me…

Several other Bhootha Ganas, Flying celestials, Chandra, Surya, A forest scene where Bhagiratha performs tapas animals comprise the whole scene.

Beside this panel is a free standing statue of 2 monkeys, with one picking lice on the other. And I became the 3rd monkey and picked lice on the first one!!! Again, freaky Photoshoot!!!

Next to it is the Krishna Mandapam. Krishna Mandapam as the name suggests, denotes the Krishna Leela or the plays of Krishna. The main scene is the Govardhana Giri scene, where Krishna lifts the mountain Govardhana when rain and thunder storm ravishes the village.

The legend goes that in Gokul people always prayed to Indhra for rains but Krishna says it’s the mountain Govardhana that blocks the clouds and showers rain. So instead of Indhra lets pray Govardhana Giri/Mountain. And people of Gokul accept his idea. So angered Indhra forces thunderstorm and rain in Gokul when Krishna lifts Govardhana with his little finger and the whole village comes under the mountain and gets protected.

Seen here is the whole village depicted under the mountain that Krishna lifts. Now, comes again our crazy shoot. There is a couple seen dancing in rejoice in the scene and we decided the separate the couple. How crooked minded we are, right? While my friend pulled his hand, I pulled her hand in the opposite direction. Freaky, no…???

The shot of this milk man milking the cow while the cow caresses her child by licking is the best part of the whole series. Even the tongue of the cow is shown so perfectly. Don’t you just feel the mother-child love in this shot?!!!

Ha, would you believe!!! Its not yet over… Ok, I give you an assurance now. Its gonna be over in part 3....

TO GET THERE:

Refer Mahabs Part I

Dedicated to Vaishu

Mahabalipuram / Mamallapuram Part I (Chennai - Tamil Nadu)

One fine day my friend got seriously freaked out and said, “I want to go to Mahabs – THIS WEEKEND”. When a friend gets so freaked out, I ought to listen to her and promised to accompany her. So we both set off to Mahabs that weekend. Well, Chennai-vasigal (People of Chennai) call Mahabalipuram / Mamallapuram as Mahabs. It’s a pet name kinda.

So we both set off to Mahabs by bus. It was a part by part travel. Home-VGP-Kovalam-Mahabs. I had breakfast and started from home while my friend didn’t. So we dropped in a small hotel and had idly-vada-sambar (the typical south Indian breakfast. U ought to taste it atleast once in life).

Mahabs was constructed during the Mahendra Varma - Narasimha Varma – Parameshwara Varma - Rajasimha Varma Pallava period in 7^th to 9^th Century, with a majority of contribution by Narasimha Varma. This is not a single piece of monument but a collection of several monuments placed in an assorted way and spread over an area of 8 sq. km. It was a very rocky terrain having several boulders and some hillocks as well. Narasimha Varma with all my passion for art and sculpture, transformed the entire region into a mass of sculptural marvel and it’s called Poetry In Stone. Artisans and sculptors from everywhere were brought here to carry out this process which seems to have lasted for 150 years. Till date, the sculptural spirit hasn’t faded a teeny weenie bit also. Just a simple stroll on the road will make you visit sculptors at every doorstep. 

The biggest specialty here is that all these are rock-cut temples. In the sense, each and every monument here is dug out of single pieces of rocks. None of the individual buildings here has 2 or more rocks, each one is a single piece of rock, which is dug out, carved, and decorated meticulously with great care as a single wrong stroke would result in completely destroying the rock – there is no place for correction.

We first went to the main rock-cut regions from the back entrance. First was the huge panel of reliefs. This relief has so many special sculptures. We actually went in through the back entrance so we first hit the Unfinished panel of Great Penance. It’s unfinished when compared to the more popular finished panel. With the backdrop of the light house, this panel has 2 huge boulders which are separated by a deep cavity. This has several unfinished sculptures including the great Bagiratha/Arjuna Penance. And the elephants are not very big here and they are in rather a violent movement. You may relate to this better when I refer to the Finished panel of Great Penance.

From there we directly went to the Pancha Ratha Complex without continuing in the main section. It has an entrance fee of Rs.10. This is the actual hillock region where 5 different temples were built, one in each hillock. The one at the Southern end which is Hut-like is the Draupathi Ratha. Just next to her is Arjuna Ratha coz he was the one who won her hand. 

Next is one is Bhima Ratha which is a vast and wide one. 

The last one is in the line is Dharmaraja Ratha. Dharmaraja/Dirudrashtrar is the eldest of the Pancha Pandava and so this ratha is a two storeyed one. The last ratha is separated from the other 4 which are in a line. It’s the Nakula-Sahadeva Ratha. Since they both are twins they share the same Ratha.

Apart from this is a huge Elephant, Lion and Nandi (Bull) stand-alone sculptures. All these Ratha’s and Stand-alone statues were sculpted from the top as that is logic. As I told earlier it is all individual single stone. So some of these Rathas are unfinished at the bottom.

Then from there we went back to the main section thru the back entrance and reached the Light House first. 

I’ll get back to you with the continuation. Hope to complete in 2 parts. Let’see!!! Its 8 sq. km to be covered!!!

TO GET THERE:

From Chennai

From Tambaram: 50 km via Vandalur, Kelambakkam, ECR

From Tambaram: 50 km via Medavakkam, Sozhinganallur, OMR, ECR

From Thiruvanmiyur: 43 km on ECR

From Pondicherry: 96 km on ECR via Marakkanam

Dedicated to Vaishu

A Present For Your Blog

I thank Bhavesh for this award. Ok. Rather, I’ll put it as my travelogue thanks Bhavesh for this award. Coz this is not for me but for my blog. Isn’t it Bhavesh?!!!

This person has this lovely blog called Information is Everything. It has his random thoughts, pictures he’d clicked, places he had been to, food he’d cherished, God’s he’d worshipped, some festivities, some interesting mail forwards too. It has everything he comes across, I guess.

And now I pass on this award to,

Mridula – A professor from India who keeps travelling in India and blogging and clicking with a bit of UK too. And would you believe if I say she’s blogging since June 2005.???!!!

Ekanthapadhikan – A biker man from Kerala who goes wherever the road take him. A brand new yet a promising blog. And I actually like his name very much.

Ramesh – A Madrasi from (ofcourse) Madras aka Chennai, India now living in Dubai has his whole skeleton made of funny bone. He has a series of thought provoking stories which will tickle you for sure.

Prasanth – A Malayali in Delhi with an exquisite skill and great passion in Photography. His blog is a mix of Malayalam & Hindi.

Julie – A vivid photographer from Arizona who has this blog dedicated completely to her passion that’s photography. She’s doing a Halloween Series of clicks now…

My hearty thanks to Bhavesh for this award and congrats to others to who I pass it on.. Good day..