Reached Palani after 6 hrs odds drive from home.... Via irinjalakuda, thrissur, wadakkumcherry, nenmara, kollenkode, pollachi, udumalpett... Tomorrow morning planning to give a head shave to unnikuttan and climb the Palanimala.
The name of the place, Palani, always bring to my mind... the film
mazhavilkavadi... The characters of jayaram, KrishnanKutty Nair, bobby
kottarakara (his dialogues like "nan than sir murugan.. Enge ponam
sir???") and the urvashi's song... Thangathoni.. Nin malayoram
kanden... Let me have the original feel of Palani and see how it is...
While typing this from the hotel room, I can hear the sound of
Murugan's kuthiravandi outside the window....
Since others, my mom, deeps and dhruv have already slept, just
watching sachin and jayasurya batting for mumbai indians in IPL...
Early Morning...
The day started with Dhruv's "motta adikkal"... Just believe me... He has
turned around the entire Palani mala... And I think even the "Palani Andavan"
would have escaped from Palani as he was at the top of his voice...
A so called guide/well wisher (!) took us to a shop selling Pooja materials.. Though we were planning to do only two palabhishekams, the shop keeper gave us a bag of additional accessories and finally given a small bill of Rs. 1,339/- apart from Rs. 302 towards the palabhishekams... He was toooo kind enough (!) to give a huge discount and refixed the amount to Rs. 550/-, after removing just few things
from the list, when I revolted... Finally I had to really make a strong and firm stand that I require only Palabhishekams and just nothing else. Thus, we collected 2 "Kudam" so called milk for Paalabhishekam. It really was some white colour water.. .. I realised the way people get cheated in the name of god, if people are unaware of these...
To climb Palani mala, we have 4 options...
1. Ropeway
2. Winch
3. Steps
4. Aana vazhi (elephant path)
So, we took the Ana vazhi option and managed to climb up the hill..
Salute to my mom for managing it at this age and to deeps also for
carrying dhruv up the hill.. On reaching the top, I was panting like a
dog while both of them were so active and looked as if they are ready
for climbing one more... I really had to struggle to hide my panting..
so disappeared off the screen as if to take entrance ticket...
They got three types of entrance.. Normal entrance which may take 4-5
hrs to reach sreekoil... Rs.10 entrance which may take 2-3 hrs and
Rs.100 by which allow you to 'meet God' directly... Height of commercialising GOD... I opted for Rs.10 entrance...
Ah! Another 2-3 hrs spent on the queue... To my surprise even Dhruv
was enjoying the entire day without any prob... I never seen him
staying so long without having anything other than just plain water...
Now the best part is.... the sreekoil and the area around is air
conditioned!!! Ah! At least the Palani andavan is not affected by the
"kathiri" heat of tamil nadu...
I was dead tired by this time and opted to climb down the hill by
winch, and created a scenario as if it was for mom and deeps... and
rushed back to hotel...Reached the room by 12 noon after taking food, I really wanted some sleep before driving back home. So planned to sleep till 14:00 hrs and
we lied on the hotel bed. Unfortunately Mr. Dhruv was on his best hyper mood and didn't allowed us to even wink our eyes... So finally by 13:00hrs we decided to
checkout. Again long drive.. The drive through Kollengodu, Vallangi, Nenmara was refreshing and gave some energy to drive till home... Felt that some natural beauty still exist in some part and wanted to enjoy breathing the best air there.
Reached back home by 1940 hrs.. It didn't took any time for me to hit the bed.. Almost unconscious...!
The name of the place, Palani, always bring to my mind... the film
mazhavilkavadi... The characters of jayaram, KrishnanKutty Nair, bobby
kottarakara (his dialogues like "nan than sir murugan.. Enge ponam
sir???") and the urvashi's song... Thangathoni.. Nin malayoram
kanden... Let me have the original feel of Palani and see how it is...
While typing this from the hotel room, I can hear the sound of
Murugan's kuthiravandi outside the window....
Since others, my mom, deeps and dhruv have already slept, just
watching sachin and jayasurya batting for mumbai indians in IPL...
Early Morning...
The day started with Dhruv's "motta adikkal"... Just believe me... He has
turned around the entire Palani mala... And I think even the "Palani Andavan"
would have escaped from Palani as he was at the top of his voice...
A so called guide/well wisher (!) took us to a shop selling Pooja materials.. Though we were planning to do only two palabhishekams, the shop keeper gave us a bag of additional accessories and finally given a small bill of Rs. 1,339/- apart from Rs. 302 towards the palabhishekams... He was toooo kind enough (!) to give a huge discount and refixed the amount to Rs. 550/-, after removing just few things
from the list, when I revolted... Finally I had to really make a strong and firm stand that I require only Palabhishekams and just nothing else. Thus, we collected 2 "Kudam" so called milk for Paalabhishekam. It really was some white colour water.. .. I realised the way people get cheated in the name of god, if people are unaware of these...
To climb Palani mala, we have 4 options...
1. Ropeway
2. Winch
3. Steps
4. Aana vazhi (elephant path)
So, we took the Ana vazhi option and managed to climb up the hill..
Salute to my mom for managing it at this age and to deeps also for
carrying dhruv up the hill.. On reaching the top, I was panting like a
dog while both of them were so active and looked as if they are ready
for climbing one more... I really had to struggle to hide my panting..
so disappeared off the screen as if to take entrance ticket...
They got three types of entrance.. Normal entrance which may take 4-5
hrs to reach sreekoil... Rs.10 entrance which may take 2-3 hrs and
Rs.100 by which allow you to 'meet God' directly... Height of commercialising GOD... I opted for Rs.10 entrance...
Ah! Another 2-3 hrs spent on the queue... To my surprise even Dhruv
was enjoying the entire day without any prob... I never seen him
staying so long without having anything other than just plain water...
Now the best part is.... the sreekoil and the area around is air
conditioned!!! Ah! At least the Palani andavan is not affected by the
"kathiri" heat of tamil nadu...
I was dead tired by this time and opted to climb down the hill by
winch, and created a scenario as if it was for mom and deeps... and
rushed back to hotel...Reached the room by 12 noon after taking food, I really wanted some sleep before driving back home. So planned to sleep till 14:00 hrs and
we lied on the hotel bed. Unfortunately Mr. Dhruv was on his best hyper mood and didn't allowed us to even wink our eyes... So finally by 13:00hrs we decided to
checkout. Again long drive.. The drive through Kollengodu, Vallangi, Nenmara was refreshing and gave some energy to drive till home... Felt that some natural beauty still exist in some part and wanted to enjoy breathing the best air there.
Reached back home by 1940 hrs.. It didn't took any time for me to hit the bed.. Almost unconscious...!
