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2023 - The Year That Was

Places impact you for a variety of reasons. And the same place impacts different people in different ways. This is especially true when it comes to spiritual experiences, where every single person’s experience is unique. And personally, every spiritual experience is unique, the same person can have different deeply spiritual experiences at different places, at different times. This thought has emerged because of my own experiences over the years, but especially so this year, with different and unique experiences at various places I have visited recently. I began this year with a visit to Baroda (Vadodara) with friends. It was meant to be a relaxed trip, a touristy trip, with our sons. We enjoyed ourselves to the hilt, but the highlight of that trip was a visit to the Lakulisha temple at Pavagadh. It was the iconography of the temple that I connected with, and I spent a few hours simply lost in the details of the figures carved around the temple. There was an indefinable connect with
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Train Journeys- Fun and Photographs

Train journeys can be fun- as I keep telling Samhith. He usually gets bored on trains, and either wants me to read to him all the time, or climb up and down, troubling everyone else, and getting hurt. This time, however, the trip to Kumbhalgarh was different. We had great company in our coach - 4 young boys, about 20-25 years old, with their family, on their way to their hometown near Falna. They were only too glad to play with Samhith, and he kept them occupied! It was certainly the best train journey I have had since Samhith was born. I don’t know their names, but when we got off the train at Falna, I asked them to pose with Samhith for a photograph, and they happily obliged. Samhith remembers their nick-names, with which he called them, and I have the photograph for him to remember them by. It was certainly a memorable journey!








I am an avid photographer- not a very good one, but I just enjoy taking photos of just anything and everything. This time, while we were approaching Virar station, I was able to get a good shot of the Jivdani temple. This temple, situated on a hilltop is a very popular one, but unfortunately one I have not yet visited. I hope I get to visit the temple soon – meanwhile, I have photos of the temple.





The Jivdani Temple

Shankar refuses to touch the camera, but Samhith is taking after me, and keeps asking me to let him use the camera. While we were on our return journey, the coach we were in was empty, and we had the whole place to ourselves. While the train was held up at a small station, we saw this temple near the tracks. As the train was stationary, I helped Samhith take a photo, and the result is in front of you. It was a Tuesday, and women were praying to Shitala Devi, a form of Durga, for good health and a long life of their husbands.



I also took some snaps of the sunset, as seen from the train.







This was, really a wonderful trip, as we had a good time on the train too, and Samhith wasn’t bored at all!
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  1. D.K. SharmaJanuary 21, 2017 at 3:10 PM

    Good write up for the people interested in sight seeing and exploring the countryside.
    I wish to visit Kumbhalgarh next month

    ReplyDelete

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