Amma Amritanandamayi, Nov 23, 2009

Many of my friends spoke very highly of Amma Amritanandamayi in the past. But I never felt the 'tingling' to have her darsan. In the recent past, our friend Bob from the Sai group kept on sending e-mail info about her. He adores her and cherises his visits.

At first I was very skeptical going to Dearborn, Michigan to see 'Amma'. Then, I thought that like in every other situation, I will not know until I experience it. Soon, I started reading about her and felt quite impressed. Her organization is doing similar things like the Sathya sai organization. So, I told my husband Rao that I would go. My not going would not have stopped him from going anyway. He likes to visit all 'holy' persons. He happily made hotel reservation for Monday, Nov 23rd night at Hyatt where all the action was. We were told that Monday evening and Tuesday daytime, there were free public programs and Amma hugging and blessing the devotees. Rao's young Tennis friend Alex joined us. We left Cleveland around 10 a.m. The check-in was before 3 p.m. We arrived before 2 p.m. On the way, we had fun learning and using our newly acquired GPS (along with printed directions for Rao's satisfaction)which was a present from my adopted (??) nephew Raj.
The room was quite spacious with two double beds. The men put our overnight bags in the room and then went to tour the activity area. Amma's food service was buzzing with volunteers. Also, there were many booths and tables that were being set up for sale of several types of items like, cds, dvds, incense, clothes, jewelry, pictures, massage, acupuncture, healing and so on. Alex and I commented a bit on the commercial part of the set up.
They were expecting a big crowd inspite of it being a working day. All the volunteers were very cheerful and ready to answer any question you had. After the preliminary tour, we went back to the room to rest. The line for darsan would form at 5 p.m. and tokens would be given to go inside the hall and Amma will arrive at 7:30 p.m. - this we gathered, rested a bit and went downstairs by 4:30 p.m and I stood first in the line, watching the 'Greeters' desk that was being set up.

Yatra 4 is still so far away.....

A few in my friends' circle offered good advice, some contacts to talk to and I hope to get good tips from them. One person had already made the trip to Amarnath and Vaishno Devi and is willing to help us in anyway she can. When the intention is good and strong, things fall in place, I guess. But, we still need all the feedback we can get. Once Nirmala reads all the material I sent to her via e-mail (which is sitting in her mail for two months now) we can start making reservations etc. Our latest major list includes Amarnath, Vaishnodevi, Amritsar, Kurukshetra, Shakti peetham in Assam and Sabari Malai. After that, time and energy permitting, we would like to cover other Shakti Peethams, Draaksharamam, Bhadrachalam etc.

You must have noticed that we begin and end our yatra by having darsan of Sri Venkateswara in Tirumalai. Also, we always have darsan of Sri Sathya Sai Baba during every visit to India. Without Him, nothing in my life moves!!!

Kolhapur Mahalakshmi

One friend asked me what I felt about the Idol of Mahalakshmi in Kolhapur. I said she was beautiful. As I said in my post at that time I was disillusioned by the administration of the Temple. I visit a Temple with the same purpose - to feel the divine presence. Anyway, the friend added that she looks very angry. I somehow did not recall that!! Then, come to think of that, it looked a little fierce and added that comment to my old post. Now in this post, I am adding a close-up picture of Kolhapur Mahalakshmi and you decide for yourself.

Madurai Temple

Some one sent this to  me via e-mail. Please have the speakers on and if you click on the pinkish dots on the layout that shows up, you are taken directly to that part of the Temple. Whoever took this have done a super job. If the click doesn't work, copy and paste.

http://www.view360.in/virtualtour/madurai/

Tanjavoor Shiva

Yestrday was Sani Trayodasi - I felt like beginning this month of November with a new post. Just found this picture sent by a dear friend. Let your Tamil friends read the inscription under the photo for you.


Below, copied and pasted from my old post is about the Temple - to refresh everyone's memory.
The famous Temple here is of Brihadiswara, a Shiva Temple. The inside shrine wasn't that huge. Perhaps the Royal family of ancient times built this just for their family!!!!!

It takes a life time to really see all that is here in these temples. This visit was the first one for the other four in the group. They were extremely happy. Now about this Temple in detail:

The entrance on the east, where we enter, is very imposing. On either side of this are two small shrines of Ganapathi and Subrahmanyam (Murugan). When you walk further, there is aGopuram about 90 feet in height. This way leads into an outer court. A second and more magnificent Gopuram leads us to the main court in which the temple is built. The inner court is is surrounded by something like a court yard about 500 feet long and 250 feet broad and is well paved with brick and stone. The western and northern wings have Sivalingams and there are paintings over these walls depicting sixty-fourNayanars. The outer portion of this temple is about 800 ft X 300 ft (a little less perhaps)
The main shrine is of Brihadeeswara (I am not even attempting the Tamil pronunciation here) which in Samskrit means, the Great God. It is situated on the western end of this court yard.

Besides the the Sanctum sactorum (garbhagriham), there are 5 mandapams here. I think this why the actual temple appeared small to me. Several in the same yard!!. Anyway, the five mandapams are:

Araadhana mandapam, Maha mandapam, Narthana mandapam, Sthapana mandapam and Vaadya mandapam.
Sthapana mandapam has a shrine for the great saint Thyagaraja.

The statues of the dwarapalakas (guardians of the gate) were exquisite!! The sivalinga is the grandest!
The tower over the shrine is called Dakshina Meru (at Kailasam, it is the Uttara-Meru).
There is a lot of history about the king Rajaraja Cholan who reigned this part of the country and I don't have much knowledge in that area.

The great Vimana is a little over 200 feet and is of the Dravidian style of architecture, and has fourteen storeys.
The other sub-shrines are of Subrahmanya (northwest corner), Goddess Brihanayaki, Ganapathi, Chandeeswara. Dakshinamurthy and Nataraja on the Northeast corner. Worth mentioning are the great Dhwaja-sthambham and the huge Nandi (the sacred bull) located in the center. The Nandi measures 12ft in height and close 20 ft, in length and width and weighs about 20 tons. There are two versions of where the stone was brought from and I forgot what they were.