Shiva Temple

Friday we took a trip down to kanyakumari, the very southern tip of India/Asia. Looking out across the vast Indian Ocean, which is the smallest of the worlds oceans. In route we stopped at the last noble families palace to take a tour of the place. We arrived at 1:10 pm, and the box office is closed from 1-2 for lunch. The man was actually sitting in the box office eating his lunch, but would not have sold us a ticket to save our lives, because it was lunch time. This is how India works - they don't think about having someone else do the job for an hour, we just close the box office.... Welcome to India. We decided it was not worth the wait and so we left. What we think of palace and what they think of palace here are different. Yes, the place was very large, but there was nothing that would have been worth seeing with and hour wait.
The journey there was down back roads, not the main national highways; the only difference, no strip down the center of the road! We did pass however very large banana plantations, that went on for miles which were fun to see. In between the banana trees would be small rice fields and between properties would be coconut trees. Very low land with lots of small rivers and bridges that we would cross which are only wide enough for one vehicle at a time. Some of the scenes were so incredible. As we crossed over one bridge the river forked and you could only see the water in the middle for all the coconut trees. Very thick like the forests of the Pacific Northwest. the waters are very calm, and moving up the river was a small boat. It should have been a picture on the cover of some magazine. Alas, I didn't have my camera ready, and we could stop on the bridge.
Once we got to Kannvakumari, the taxi driver took us right up to the place where we were to get our tickets for the boat ride out to Shiva's temple. They treat westerners very different sometimes than Indians. If you were an Indian the taxi would have parked well before the ticket area and we would have needed to walk, but not us. There will be other points I will tell about being a westerner.
While waiting in line to get on the boat the building we were in was very nice and built specifically to hold the passengers, waiting for the boat, cool during the hot summer months. The way it was built and the way the que ran reminded me completely of Disney. It would be something they would do. The boat however was not very Disney! It was a little scary, and Daren told me that last year one of the boats capsized! Thanks! The waters on the ocean were a little rough and the boat ride was interesting to say the least.
Once you get to the island the first thing you do is buy a ticket to be on the island. Now, in the states, if you bought a ticket at the box office usually you could get a multi pass ticket that would get you on the boat and the island because that is the only place the boat takes you to. Nope! Not here - stand in another line and buy the ticket to get you onto the island you are already on! (Keep in mind, that saying get in "line" is also a figure of speech, they don't really know what lines are.)
The next thing you do after passing through the gates is take your shoes off. (I can't remember if I have mentioned this before or not, so just in case. Here in India, your shoes come off before entering anyplace expect restaurants. Shops, most hotels, ours is run by some British people so we don't take our shoes off until we get to the room, and the shoes stay outside the room.) So shoes off, we go up the steps to the visit the temple of Shiva first. This temple is very new, within the last 8 years. The reason for this temple is that on the rocks there is a foot print that the Indian's say is Shiva's. The foot print is not imprinted into the rock but sticks out like like a mold. And it really looks like a foot print, toes and all. When Daren first came to this island 9 years ago, you could sit next to the print or stand on it, or whatever, but now they have built a temple around it and encased the print itself in glass. The temple is small and made of a dark almost black marble. The picture is of Daren and I in front of the Temple. (Going forward, pictures are not allowed with in the temples and one we went into we had to check the camera in before we entered so no pictures of the insides!)
There was a group of men there all dressed in black that are Shiva Devotee's, and come to the temple almost to worship the footprint. We started talking to them, they wanted pictures of them with the "white men" so we all took turns taking pictures of groups of us. Many of them spoke broken English so we were able to communicate with them. We ended up on the boat ride back with them as well. They are very interested in westerners and always want to know where we are from. Its funny because sometimes the locals know where Chicago is, but so far everyone has smiled at the name Las Vegas!
The second temple on the island is of Vivakananda. This was actually not a temple to him as would the temple to Shiva, but it was a very large building, much bigger than the one for the Shiva footprint. Vivakananda was the man who has been credited for bringing yoga to the western world. He made a speech in Chicago in 1893 at the first international religion conference. (The next time that conference was held was in 1993.) Here is some info of him from Goggle:
Swami Vivakananda was a great saint of India . The unknown monk of India suddenly leapt into fame at the World Parliament of Religions held in Chicago in 1893, where he represented Hinduism. His vast knowledge of Eastern and Western culture, as well as his, deep spiritual insight, eloquence, brilliant conversation, colourful personality and handsome figure inserted an irresistible appeal to people. He was born in 1863. He was spiritually inclined right from his childhood. He was pained at seeing the suffering of the people. He met Ramakrishna Paramhamsa and became his disciple. In 1893, Vivakananada went to Chicago to attend the World Parliament of Religions. With his brilliant speech, he impressed a great number of Americans. He was welcomed wherever he went in America . Many people Ramkrishna Mission. He wrote many books including ‘Hatha-Yoga’, Bhakti Yoga’, karma-Yoga’ and ‘Raja-Yoga’. He attained Samadhi in 1902.
After the visit there, we took to boat to another island only about 50 feet way. (Building a bridge would require years of talking with the Indian government and questions as to why build a bridge they have always used boats!) On the second island is a statue of Thiruvalluvar, a famous poet, and the best way to describe that is think "Statue of Liberty" (The whole time I was there I was thinking about Ellis Island and Liberty Island, almost the same thing. Here is a description from a web page:
Thiruvalluvar is built exactly of that of the statue of Liberty in America. The statue is 133 feet tall which symbolizes the 133 chapters in his Thirukkural. This statue is built on a rock which is near the Vivekananda Memorial. This was constructed by 5000 craftsmen. This a typical example of the modern Dravidian sculptures.
Besides being a different statue, the only main difference between him and Liberty, is that he is made of solid marble, so you can't climb up to the crown, or in this case turban. (This is where you are supposed to laugh!) Otherwise it is so similar to Liberty Park its amazing.
After which we took the boat back to the mainland and headed for the Hindu Temple which is a story all to itself....