The Trichy-V.Koil-Guruvayoor Trip - 13.02.09

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Apaara Karuna Sindhum Gnanadham Shaanta Roopinam

Shri Chandrashekara Gurum Pranamaami Mudhaanvaham

 

There are three primary inspirations for writing the blog. In our trip to Badrinath and Kedarnath (May 2002), we recorded details of the temples visited and also made note of the rivers that poured into Bhaagirathi and Alaknanda. Though the idea of noting important stuff was always there, I somehow never did it after that. Then my brother Vijay visited Kumbakonam in Dec. 08 and sent a list of places visited and had also noted Sivan Sir’s reference to the places he visited. Then while I was searching the net for places near Trichy, I came across Raju’s Temple Bolgs. His blogs really inspired my to note and present to people, my thoughts while visiting temples. The next source of inspiration was actually “The Da Vinci Code” by Dan Brown, which kindled a hidden passion in me – that of finding the hidden truth behind ordinary things (especially those related to our culture). If you read the Da Vinci Code and my observations on the architechture of the Thaayumaanaswamy Temple below or the observation on St. Joseph’s college, you would probably understand the connection to the Da Vinci Code.

 

The Trichy-V.Koil-Guruvayoor trip

Prinitha, Anirudh, Sarvathmika and I started off on 13th February 2009 rather abruptly. We were actually supposed to leave for Guruvayoor only on the 18^th. However, dad wanted to do a four kala pooja on Sivarathiri (on which day, as per our original plan, we would have been at Vaitheeswaran Koil) and hence it was decided on 12^th of Feb that we would leave for Trichy on the 13^th and go to Guruvayoor from there.

We got tickets in “Thiruchendur Express” without knowing that it was the first day that the train was actually flagged off to Thiruchendur. Adding to the drama, we had only one confirmed ticket – fortunately the TT just asked if we would get down at Trichy and left it at that, implying that I can travel in the same coach without any issues. The coach, when viewed from outside, looked quite old. However, the newly made interiors looked good inside.

The wooden paneling was pleasing to the eyes, and for once, Railways’ deviated from its blue and the seats were great.