Day 2:
Mr.Bee and I woke up at 4:30 a.m on the advice of the hotel admin. He informed us that we selected a particularly important day to visit the temple and warned us that the temple crowd would be akin to mini-size Kumbh Mela. He was not wrong! It was Shashti thithi, which is auspicious as Vel Murugan a.k.a Karthikeya was said to be born on that thithi.
I looked out of the windows, (our room 2** had a balcony facing the hill) and saw the most beautiful view.
Mr.Bee and I, discussed among ourselves and decided to wake GBee up first.
GBee was confused about why there was no sunlight outside and thanks to his EVS lesson in grade 2, he knows what an eclipse is! I told him, we just woke up early to visit the Murugan temple.
During bath, I heard peacocks making wailing calls! If you hear a peacock wailing or crowing near by, it is generally assumed as a sign of presence of snakes. That too if you hear them in the premises of a very popular Murugan temple, whose deity Himself is a snake, then what more to add to that? My heart was filled with devotion and fervour.
After both Mr.Bee and KBee were ready, we rushed to the winch queue. We can either climb the 700 odd steps to the temple or go in a winch to the temple which is situated on top of a hill.
The winch and the scenic beauty!
We spent 2 hours in the winch queue and hardly moved 20m from our initial spot. If you are going to popular temples, you should mentally prepare yourself that you will be pushed, shoved, verbally abused, on top of it, physically tired too!
By the time it was 6:30 a.m. , an announcement had been made that devotees need to take a break and return after 6 hours! (That’s was how heavy the flow of devotees had been to Palani)
I felt upset and low, as it seemed we may not return to the temple. We didn’t want to harass our kids by waiting in the hot weather and climbing 700 steps with 2 kids below the age of 8, seemed preposterous! We resigned to our fate and accepted defeat.
We shopped for Velaayudham and I got myself a photo frame of Dhandayudhapani (Murugan). I remembered we had not visited the Vinayagar and Meenakshi Amman temples in the premises. We visited both and returned to the hotel. KBee only ate a couple of biscuits and GBee didn’t even have those.
At the Hotel, the admin saw our disappointment and advised us to visit the other Murugan temple 5 minutes away from our hotel. He informed us that this one was the original Dhandayudhapani Murugan temple, which was later relocated to the top of the hill. We visited the temple by walk and I remember a middle aged gentleman who entered the temple with us, stayed with us, asked me to go to the front and let me pray to Murugan in peace. He was no where to be seen after talking to me. (It felt like divine intervention, an emotionally charged moment for me)
After our breakfast, which was below average, we packed the soveneirs, checked out from the hotel and started for our next stop, Kodaikanal. Woohoo!
In barely 2 hours, we reached Kodaikanal. The driver, N made a brief stop at the outskirts, for his breakfast. He had an omelette. Mr.Bee and I ordered tea, which was ‘one-sorry- excuse-of-a-tea’ and I poured it down the drain! (When travelling, one should adjust to eating mediocre food and drinks or not buy them at all!)
We checked into Pine Borough, Room ££, which was built such that it was half way into the hill and that made it extremely cold to live in! We had to rent a room heater from the hotel, to stay warm!
We ordered food by WhatsApping the reception desk, sat in the afternoon Sun, under the patio umbrellas. KBee and GBee were famished and so was I, it was 2 p.m.
Mr.Bee and GBee engaged in the cell, while KBee and I chatted away.
Even though KBee was hungry and it was well past his lunch time, he suggested that the bugs were hungry and not him!
We had our lunch in the room, rested a little while and then spent a good hour in the garden outside.
As the weather became colder and since we started hearing strange sounds ( like that of a rattle), we returned to our room. The kids played with their dozen Hot Wheel cars, whereas Mr.Bee and I watched Baahubali, dubbed in Hindi!
After having Dadu’s snacks and a late dinner, we called it a day!
P.S:
1. At the entrance to Kodaikanal, one lady officer, bent down inside our car and nabbed our plastic bottles. Plastic is banned in Kodaikanal, just like in Ooty and Tirumala!
2. I had a wild guess that the rattling sound must mean a rattle snake, since we were staying on a hill resort. God knows if I am correct or not.
3. GBee, still in the mood to count the windmills, began counting bikes (since there are no windmills in Kodai) and his total reached to 172!
4. Interestingly, one of the admins at the Kodai resort was named Palani!
5. The recent war atmosphere in India had an effect on me, so I could hardly write. That is the reason for my late post. #IndianArmy, #OperationSindoor.
Till the next post, cheerio!
