The meat safe and the study desk

Prompted by prabhukrishs' report on the Thirukkacchur temples, I decided to visit these temples this morning. For starters, I must say that the directions that were given by Prabhu were spot on, to the kilometer mark. Thirukkacchur is close to Maraimalai Nagar(Ford factory). For the exact directions, see here.

As advised by Prabhu we called the temple prient on our way there and were greeted by him as we enetered the temple. The temple bore the party flags of three political parties, PMK, DMDk, and I could not identify the third one. The first temple, which is the Tyagaraja Swami temple has a kolam(water pond) on the outside. The breeze that blows across, the peace in the air, the old fashioned houses on the outside(with the comfortable thinnais)-all made it a perfect setting.

We were the only visitors to the temple, which probably gives some idea of its popularity and flourish. Don't mistake me, it was a beautiful temple, and the one I liked the most amongst the three that we visited. The utsava murthy(roughly translatable as 'function deity') is Tyagaraja Swamy, while Kachapeswarar is the main deity. The name Kachapeswarar, for Lord Siva, is a result of the belief that Lord Vishnu worshipped Lord Siva at this very place in the form of a turtle, Kachapa=turtle(in Sanskrit). The temple had no electricity supply today and later did we learn that there is no power supply from 9-5 every Saturday.

After a brief, but comprehensive history of the temple, which dates back to 1000 years or so, the priest performed the archanai for the only 4 people in the temple. As the priest was telling us the story, we learnt many informative details. Sundarar(One of the Nayanmars) had sung about this Lord in Thirukachur, the temple was built by Kulothunga Cholan, the practice of building RajaGopurams for temples, did not exist in his time and was later introduced by Rajaraja Cholan(Prabhu had mentioned this), this place is also referred to as Adi Kanchi, meaning its another form of Kanchipuram and the Siva temple there. And many more intricate details.

There are 3 temples, along a small hill here. The first one is the Tyagaraja Swamy temple, the second one is the Irunditteswarar temple and the third – Marundeeswarar temple. The second one, is not a temple per se, but there is a just the Siva Lingam here. You are bound to miss it if you go, look for the water tank on the right hand side as you go from Tyagaraja Swamy temple to the Marundeeswarar temple. The Siva Lingam is just below the water tank.

The Lord at Marundeeswarar temple, which is the topmost of the three, is believed to treat and cure any kind of disease. Marundu, meaning Medicine(in Tamil). The priest, Mr. Natraja Iyer came up from the first temple to this place to do the archanai for us. The lack of funds and manpower meant that only one round of pujai was performed at this temple(Oru Kaala pujai here and Rendu Kaala pujai at Tyagaraja Swamy temple).

This place is a must visit for temple visitors, especially if you like the age-old temples, which aren't overcrowded by numbers and overflooded by donations, as many others are. A friend of mine, an Iyengar, I should mention, set us thinking by asking this question, " If you were to name one supreme Siva temple in India, which one would it be?", or to rephrase it "What is the equivalent of say, Tirupathi(for Iyengars), for Iyers and Siva temples?"

I could not find a direct answer to this, though Chidambaram and Tanjavur came to my mind, and my mom even said Kailasam(Mt Kailash in the Himalayas). I began wondering about the reason for the absence of such a supreme temple equivalent for Lord Siva. Any answers?

For more information go here, and there are some pictures available here too.

Most of my time with her was spent in trying to understand her, her preferences, her dislikes, and more. From what I remember, here are some of the things she liked/practised, she still does, or may be not.

* Mail Vans and her superstitions about them

* Omlettes, especially when she is hungry and it is a part of breakfast(actually, she'd eat them anytime)

* My bike's backseat after a long day's work

* Dark Chocolate and hugs

* Flowers – Gerberas(hmm, I think I spelt that right)

* Phone calls in the middle of the day, enquiring about her day

* My family and friends

* Her work, workplace and work related people

* Her dogs, oh she loved them!

* A dinner with minimal talking and more understanding and a drive/ride back to her place after dinner

* She often used to say she liked the 'glow' around her, when somethings/someone makes her 'glow'. The glow sometimes lasted for hours and hours after it was initiated.
* When people made her feel good about the way she looks

* When people understood her, listened to her, thought she had a worthwhile point to make and had faith in her.

* Boo??

May be, May be not. I do not know and probably will never know.

Update(within minutes of the post): She loved writing, she felt she expressed herself better through her writing and she did it very well, as in her blog.

Update-2(21 May, 2006) – Her unique way of following movies. Every time I or someone mentioned anything about a movie, her first reaction would be "What's the movie about, whats the story?" Indian movies dont necessarily always have a new age storyline or a plot or anything like that. Invariably its the same melodrama of love, action, comedy and a bit of suspense. That wasn't enough for her, she'd want all the details, every bit of it. What happened to this character, what about that character and so on… God, she used to get INVOLVED with the movie. She probably still does. We once did a back-to-back movie session, 7 hours of movie watching at the theater!

Now, the cracks begin to appear. The seemingly united, motivated, youngseters' political party has taken a beating and this doesn't paint a pretty picture to the public eye. Three members from Lok Paritran, who contested in the recent elections, have split from the rest of the party, quoting paritiality, dictatorial tendencies and more as the reasons. Read more here,

Three quit Lok Paritrana; to float new outfit

Now, this is what they call politics! 

I don't know why, but I just felt this was a valid point. As the heading suggests, the testimonials section on orkut is bothering me a bit. I have no problems with the idea of having other people write each other testimonials, but my shout and cry is with the way its designed and the probable impact that it can have.

The testimonials appear on the Profile page by default, and appear on the professional and personal pages too. As I was browinsg through my friends list, and their friends, and their friends, and so on (which is the purpose of orkut), I kept seeing that so many of them had testimonisla written. Invariably, these testimonials are very positive in emotion and sentiment. Smart, brainy, wonderful, lovely, sweet, best friend, bestest friend, charm, comfort, comforting, love, lovable, loving, and many more. How does it feel after reading that sentence?

The book Blink by Malcolm Gladwell explains somewhere how the mind can be influenced by a series of english words one is exposed to. He explains that the mind gets tuned to negative emotions when exposed to some negative and destructive words. Not good, right? The case is just the opposite here, too much of something good can also be bad. Thats what I saw happening here. I did not come across one testimonial where there was something negative that anyone had to say. Of course I realise that that is the very purpose of a testimonial. You aren't gonna get a testimonial from someone who doesn't like you, or who has some revealing facts to say about you. Thus, my botheration with the design and the way it appears too often. 

Don't know if that made sense, but a point worth pondering about…..     

Is there really a difference between the two. More and more people, at least in India seem to be addressing themselves as Developers, in the broader sense. An interesting read.

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