Thursday, December 15, 2005
Hampi - rocky beauty
If Dali existed in the 14th century and decided to build a city, perhaps this is what the result would be. Hampi - the capital of the Vijayanagar empire in South India. Founded in a Romanesque fashion by two legendary brothers, Harihar and Bukka in the 14th century based on some lucky omen, the city survived as a unique bastion of Hindu culture in the south before succumbing in the mid-16th century to Islamic invasions.
Hampi today is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and not just that. Due to recent bridges and road construction plus tourist influx, is labeled as a "threatened" World Heritage Site. Unfortunately, unlike the tourist spots in Kerala (Periyar Sanctuary, for example), I was less than pleased with the conservation efforts here on part of the local population.
Hampi is located over an area of about 27 sq km on the southern banks of the Tungabhadra river. The central portion consists of the towering Virupaksha temple, and the Hampi marketplace. The construction is all stone, and the central marketplace is actually now being reoccupied to create the modern little Hampi town. The temple is a live temple dedicated to Lord Shiva, with regular worship, and weddings happening all the time in there.What strikes the first-time visitor to Hampi are not the gorgeous intricately carved temples,
or the vast marketplaces, or the abandoned sprawling covered bazaars, or any man-made construct. It's the location. 
The rocks. Boulders. That's what you see all around. Boulders naturally piled upon each other for miles and miles around the the most exquisite, maddening, mesmerizing formations defying gravity for ages and ages. The mind revolts against the idea that something can just exist naturally like this, and has been not piled by 
some giant child with tons of pebbles at his disposal. These rock formations hide little stone houses, temples, watch-towers, and numerous places to just spend hours in peace, looking around at nature. I went to Hampi intending to spend a few hours, but the rocks trapped me for a couple of days there :)
Other than the main Virupaksha temple, there are several other beautiful architectural wonders there. The Vitala temple dedicated to an avatar of Krishna, with its famous Sun chariot made of stone, and 'Musical Pillars', which resonate with different musical notes when
tapped, the Royal Enclosure and the Queen's (Zenana) enclosure are impressive and imposing, though mostly in ruins. The rocky environs lend an air of impregnability and serene calmness which is simply impossible to describe in mere words.
On top of one of the hillocks which look like piles of giant pebbles, stands the Matanga temple. There are two stairways leading to the top, one broad and easy to negotiate, the other a mere formality carved into rocks. Naturally, I ended up finding he more adventurous one first and got some gorgeous pictures from up there. The local priest was leaving for the nearby village of Hospet as I arrived and I befriended the guy into taking me for a walk to his village through some local non-tourist trails. He turned out to be one spark of hope in a very touristy town where locals seemed a lot more focused on making money from tourists than preserving the unique world-famous cultural heritage they had inherited.
Friday, December 09, 2005
Periyar Tiger Reserve
The Periyar Tiger Reserve is an awesome place to visit for countless reasons. If these pictures and this post does not convince you that you just HAVE TO visit this place, feel free to count me among the worst writers of all time!
The sanctuary is located in the western ghat range, over an area of 700+ sq km. It has about 35-40 tigers, as well as herds of elephants, bison, deer, wild boar, 300+ varieties of birds, some of them rare, exotic and
endangered species.Kerala is India's most educated state, with a 100% literacy rate, and it shows. This is one place where I saw an extraordinary awareness among people about the environment and the need to preserve it. Also, this is one of the few places in India where eco-tourism is a well-organized endeavor and has taken off in a big way.
The Periyar sanctuary is located around the Lake Periyar, an artificial lake created by damming the Periyar river. The lake is surrounded by mountains covered with fairly dense forest. The weather in winter is pleasant, with daytime temperatures in the late 70s/early 80s. At this time of the year (late Nov/early Dec), it's the time for the
retreating monsoon in South India, so heavy rains usually occur. The time to see animals is usually late evening or early morning, since that's when they emerge from their jungle hideouts to drink water.Conservation issues
There are two huge problems the forests in South India face: animal poachers and Sandalwood
smugglers. Tigers have been poached and hunted mercilessly in India ever since the time of the Raj. The ubiquitous photos in history books of British sahibs in sola hats and Indian maharajas posing over dead tigers/skins serve as disgusting reminders that despicable colonial tradition: the tiger hunt. During the British rule, these regal creatures were mercilessly hunted for pleasure and trophies to within a sliver of extinction. Nowadays, tiger parts are valued for so-called medicinal and aphrodisiac powers, particularly in China. But conservation efforts like Project Tiger are slowly crawling back, although poaching still remains a problem and the tiger is a highly endangered species.Elephants, while not endangered, have been valued and poached for their ivory tusks. This problem too, has been contained to some extent now, and elephants are thriving in most forests.
Sandalwood (chandan) is a rare small tree whose bark and wood give off the famous, intoxicating sandalwood fragrance. Grown chiefly in India, and some in Hawaii, the Indian variety is under serious threat from illegal cutting and smuggling activity. The harvest and use of sandalwood is strictly controlled by the Government, and it is rare and expensive, and in great demand in India for religious rituals and herbal medicines.
Eco-tourism in Periyar - Two days on The Tiger Trail
The work being done to protect the forests and the environmental awareness of the locals was enough to persuade me to throw in my support to this amazing effort by indulging myself in several of their eco-tourism options.
The Jungle Patrol: This is a night trek held in three different time slots. 7-10pm, 10pm-1am and 1-4am. Each of these treks are with a group (at least two) forest guards armed with flashlights and ancient guns. The trek lets you accompany these guards on their regular nightly patrols as they try to protect the forest against sandalwood smugglers (who operate at night) and also provide an informative first-hand guide to the innards of the forest. Anunforgettable experience to hear a dense forest at midnight and know what the sounds are. An unforgettable experience to see the bright eyes of deer surrounding you in a clearing. Leech-protection socks, flashlights and raincoats are provided. You bring yourself, with good boots and a big sense of adventure. Price: Rs 500 ($11) per person.
The Tiger Trail treks: These are 2-day-1-night or 3-day-2-night treks into the heart of the forests, with primitive camping in the night. It's conducted by the Eco-tourism development association, an organization founded by ex-poachers and smugglers, people with unparelleled knowledge of jungles and animals, and legendary tracking skills. I took the 2-day-1-night trek, and it was something!
We began the day at around 9am, with a 3-hour hike into the jungles towards our campsite, which was the base for all our hikes over that day and the next. We had two guides with us, and three others who went ahead to the campsite with all the ingredients for a meal. The tourists for this trip
included two Swedish guys, besides myself. On our hikes we were pointed out tons and tons of interesting trees, birds, insects and so on. Some rare bird sightings were really cool, including the hornbill (sorry, no pics!). The photos include that of a sambar deer, black Nilgiri langur monkey with baby and a huge tiger spider.
The tiger spider is so named because of its black and yellow markings. The specimen in the picture was about the size of my hand (palm+fingers). I'd have loved to place my hand next to it for comparison, but was unable to convince the spider of my honorable intentions. This spider bites, and a pretty painful and poisonous bite, I hear. One of the Swedish guys was totally phobic of spiders, and we had a good time ribbing him about what he'd prefer finding in his tent at night, a tiger or a tiger spider! Sure enough, he wakes up screaming during the night because of a (harmless) spider crawling over him.
During lunch, the guards heard from some of the tribals about an elephant sighting, so we set off crossing the lake on the flimsiest of bamboo rafts. Sure enough, after 15 minutes of vigourous rowing, we see a single elephant, which we dare not approach too close coz single elephants can be very dangerous. But the rafting was an experience too!Later in the afternoon, we struck gold. Well, silver, because gold would have been a tiger sighting. During one of our hikes we almost ran into a little herd of elephants, and a herd of
bison in the same open clearing! The two female elephants had a baby elephant with them, so they were protective. Our guide lit up a beedi to determine the direction of the wind, as long as the wind blew towards us from the 
elephants we were good. Then the wind changed, and one of the elephants began to move threateningly in our direction. We just had to hurry out of the area! The bison in the picture was a bit far away, but we got to see it nursing a calf!The tigers stayed hidden, perhaps for the better. We did get to see some fresh pugmarks and dung, but little else :( Well, all good for a first-time forest excursion. The night in the tent was dark. It started raining heavily during the night, and let me assure you that the sound of rain in a forest on your flimsy
tent is one of the most wonderful sounds on the planet! The guards cooked up a feast of aveggie meal on a little wood fire, with rice, sambar dal, and 3 different vegetable entrees! They set up a watch at night with a campfire going, and played cards deep into the night. These people made the jungle their home. While we were resting, some of them amused themselves by fishing on our little bamboo rafts.
I'll just have to say that this was one of my most memorable excursions ever, and has left me with a new appreciation for forests and their wildlife. Definitely not the last time for me in forests!Wednesday, December 07, 2005
In Madurai, the city of temples...
In Madurai,
city of temples and poets,
who sang of cities and temples,
every summer
a river dries to a trickle
in the sand,
baring the sand ribs,
straw and women's hair
clogging the watergates
at the rusty bars
under the bridges with patches
of repair all over them
the wet stones glistening like sleepy
crocodiles, the dry ones
shaven water-buffaloes lounging in the sun
The poets only sang of the floods.
From "A River" by AK Ramanujan. Here's the complete poem. and for good measure, a picture of the dried Vaigai river that I just had to take :-)
So I flew from hometown Mumbai on the west coast (see map!) down to Coimbatore in the south of India, and then a five-hour bus to Madurai. This is a Government transport bus, part of the
Indian Government's egalitarian public transport system. Which, in other words, meansthat the buses thunder with bone-shuddering efficiency across the country, defying entropy and mechanics, since by all rights they look like they should be falling apart. But they're cheap, with a five-hour, 100-mile trip costing less than a dollar. And more importantly, the bus did have a DVD player, with a very loud music system. When you can watch a movie, why bother about other minor things like crowds and comforts? Over these bus journeys, I was compelled to appreciate the distractive potential of over-the-top Tamil movies, especially the histrionics of Rajnikanth.The Meenakshi Temple
Madurai, is a tiny city known for and seemingly build around the awesome
Meenakshi Temple, one of the holiest temples in India. Dedicated to Shiva and his consort Meenakshi (the fish-eyed one), this temple represents the pinnacle of South Indian traditional architecture. The temple itself was completed in the 17th century. but has been progressively under construction for 2000 years before that!The temple itself is a huge complex, with 5 towers (gopurams) adorning the boundaries. Inside, there's a dizzying array of divine overload, with majestic gods and voluptuous goddesses looking on you from every angle. The intricately rainbow-hued towers narrate hundreds of stories from Hindu mythology, some of which are more familiar than others. The physical structure is supported by 8000 pillars, each carved out of single stone in shape of some animal, usually with a lion on the top. Inside, there is a labyrinthine array of smaller temples, each connected to others by dark passages.
Other sights
Other than that, the city is a small bustling human beehive with all the usual sights of an Indian pilgrimage sites: labyrinthine streets, colourful, crowded bazaars, touts and sellers peddling every possible thing imaginable, tour guides asking for a small tip to take you on the shortcut to salvation by bypassing the lines for the temple, overly friendly and underemployed auto-rickshaw drivers who want to take you to every store belonging to their "brother" and "cousin", and so on :)
Madurai, and this part of Southern India, is famous for it's textiles, however. Gorgeous sarees adorn every other store, shimmering in their silks and embroidered fineries. A section is dedicated to the Tibetan women who spontaneously spring up all over India just before winter, selling ridiculously cheap (if you haggle) jackets and sweaters. Sweets, chai stalls and streetside food vendors wait to satiate the more physical hunger of the seekers of spiritual bliss.
Kanya Kumari
From Madurai, I took a one-day trip to Kanya Kumari, the southernmost tip of the Indian mainland, where three seas: Bay of Bengal, the Indian Ocean and Arabian sea meet. This has another couple of famous temples, and the sunrise is definitely watchable, with lots of early morning fishermen adding to the scenic view in their little colourful fishing boats. Other than that, it is known for the temple dedicated to India's "Wandering Monk", Swami Vivekanand, who meditated on a rock out in the sea for a couple of days and found his true calling.