Skip to main content

Featured Post

Temples of Kashi - The Kardameshwar temple

The absence of ancient Hindu structures in Kashi is something I have always lamented about. The shrines are certainly ancient, and that is something that has always attracted me to the city. However, I miss the beauty of the ancient structures that we see at other sites. This feeling is intensified when I see marble and concrete and tiles in temples that once would have been beautifully adorned with evocative sculptures, and worn by the passage of time, touched by the hands of seekers who came before. This time , this desire to see some remnants of an ancient Hindu structure in Kashi came true when I managed to visit the Kardameshwar Temple. The Kardameshwar temple is not one of the main temples in the city. It is part of the temples on the Pancha Kroshi yatra, a pilgrimage which takes one on a circumambulatory tour of the whole city. The temple is located on the outskirts of the city, on the western bank of a tank called the Kardama Kund. The Kardameshwar temple is one of the...
Post a Comment

Women at work

This looks like a scene from a village, doesn't it?







Well, looks are deceptive, for it isn't a village, but just a garden, right at the centre of the concrete jungle that is Mumbai! Surprised? You should be, for there aren't many open spaces left here. This is the garden in our colony, which is a joggers park, cricket/football ground, and also a recreation area, all rolled into one! 

For four months in the year, the whole place turns into a grassland. There seems to be a great demand for the grass, for people seem to keep coming for it, apart from those hired to cut it away....Soon, the ground will be clear again, for cricket and football enthusiasts who hold matches there..... Then there are all the marriages which are held there...... The ground will be busy once again, and the last vestiges of the rains will be gone!

Labels:

Comments

  1. Sankara Subramanian COctober 4, 2010 at 12:27 PM

    Hmmm...Well you should be lucky to find such open green spaces in your neighbourhood. Even though I stay in the garden city, I hardly see such open green spaces, unless I am inside Lalbagh :-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. MridulaOctober 4, 2010 at 1:06 PM

    I understand I am lucky to have a very small patch right in front of the house and some trees so I still get to see birds.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Bindhu UnnyOctober 4, 2010 at 2:25 PM

    Lucky you! to have such a ground nearby. I miss Chembur :(

    ReplyDelete
  4. Shrinidhi HandeOctober 4, 2010 at 2:31 PM

    you've not shown the complete area/locality, but focus on a small green area...

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anuradha ShankarOctober 4, 2010 at 5:55 PM

    @Sankara: Oh, we are certainly lucky to have so much of space around... unfortunately, as is frequently the case, the reason isnt all that good though! its simply because of a case going on for over 35 years that the land around our colony has been allowed to remain as it is.. so its sort of like living in the past, which isnt so bad sometimes :)

    @Mridula: you are lucky indeed... to see so many birds which i dont get to see.. ours is more of a marshland, so there are few trees and more of a mess, probably why so many birds dont approach!

    @bindhu: wish i had been able to meet you when u were here! let me know if u come this way sometime!

    @Shrinidhi: its actually quite large, but due to the grills on my window, i am not able to get a good shot... just to give u an idea, the local cricket clubs hold their competitions here, and there are sometimes two marriages held at the same time here... so u can get an idea about the size of the ground! and the entire area is filled with grass in the monsoon!

    ReplyDelete
  6. cyclopsevenOctober 4, 2010 at 8:04 PM

    Life is still blooming amidst the concrete jungle. There is still hope for survival.

    ReplyDelete
  7. IndraniOctober 5, 2010 at 3:47 PM

    Looks like right in the middle of a field. :)

    ReplyDelete
  8. ArtiOctober 5, 2010 at 8:15 PM

    Well I was deceived for sure... Thought it was some field on the Mumbai-Pune/Nashik highway!!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Thanks so much for stopping by. Please leave a comment for me so that I will know you have been here....

Popular posts from this blog

Gokarna Part II – The Five Lingams

We continued our Gokarna trip by visiting four other Shiva temples in the vicinity, all connected to the same story of Gokarna. The story of Gokarna mentions the Mahabaleshwara Lingam as the one brought from Kailas by Ravana, and kept at this place on the ground by Ganesha. (See my earlier post- Gokarna – Pilgrimage and Pleasure). However, the story does not end here. It is believed that, in his anger, Ravana flung aside the materials which covered the lingam- the casket, its lid, the string around the lingam, and the cloth covering it. All these items became lingams as soon as they touched the ground. These four lingams, along with the main Mahabaleshwara lingam are collectively called the ‘ Panchalingams’ . These are: Mahabaleshwara – the main lingam Sajjeshwar – the casket carrying the lingam. This temple is about 35 Kms from Karwar, and is a 2 hour drive from Gokarna. Dhareshwar – the string covering the lingam. This temple is on NH17, about 45 Kms south of Gokarna. Gunavanteshw...
10 comments
Read more

Newasa - Encountering an unique form of Vishnu, and Sant Jnaneshwar

The year was 1290 . A crowd had gathered around a clearing, where broken down pillars marked the presence of an ancient temple, now long gone. A young boy, just 14 years old, leaned against one of those pillars, deep in thought. Then, he began speaking, and the crowd fell silent, listening to his every word. He spoke without any notes, translating the Bhagavat Gita, from Sanskrit, which only the pundits knew, to the language everyone in the village knew and spoke – a variety of Prakrit which developed into the Marathi language. Even as he spoke, one of the men in the audience realized how momentous this event was, and how important this composition would be. He began writing down the words the young boy spoke, and this composition was named by its author and composer, the Bhavartha Deepika – the enlightening meaning (of the Bhagavat Gita). Now, the ancient, holy text, was no longer restricted to the pundits, but accessible to all, understood easily by them, composed as it was, in their...
2 comments
Read more

Review of Executive Lounges at New Delhi Railway Station (NDLS)

During my recent trip to Uttarakhand , I was faced with a problem I had never encountered before. We were passing through Delhi, but we had hardly any time in the city. On earlier visits when I have had to change trains/flights at Delhi, I have always arrived in the morning and left again at night, visiting relatives in between. This time, I was arriving in the city at night, and leaving again early in the morning. There was hardly any time to visit people. I would only have a couple of hours with them before I’d have to leave again. For the first time, we considered booking a hotel, but there again, we were hesitant about the actual hotels, the costs involved, and the logistics of getting from the airport to the railway station and then back again from the station to the airport.  That’s when we remembered reading something about a corporate-managed lounge at Delhi station. We soon figured out that we could book online and pay by the hour. Besides, we also learnt that there wasn’...
2 comments
Read more