The Lazy Cherub Enigma: Three Breasts and a Butter Ball

October 23, 2015

And so the journey continues. As we round the bend and begin our way up the other side of India we come to Madurai. Situated in Tamil Nada, Madurai is considered the soul of Tamil culture and the oldest city in India. Long before Delhi or Mumbai came into their own, Madurai was trading with the Romans and was a thriving metropolis. It still is. Today Madurai is a dichotomy of medieval architecture and a growing IT sector. It is probably the most untouristy tourist city in India.

There is a thriving local tourist trade here due to the Meenakshi Temple. A 6-hectare complex dedicated to the Goddess Meenakshi. Built in the 17^th century the temple is an architectural wonder lined with 12 gopurams swathed in intricate carvings of gods, goddesses, and supernatural beings. Inside is a labyrinth of chambers, halls and reflecting pools. All around you are people praying and paying homage to the deity of their choice. Holy men and their followers converse in the courtyards. Women pray quietly for a good husband or a healthy baby. New mothers hang cradles on a tree to give thanks for their fertility. The feminine influence is heavy. Meenakshi was born with three breasts, one of which would melt away once she met her husband. Along came Shiva and the rest, you can say, is temple history. Everywhere, there is an erotic energy. Carvings of Ganesh have him cavorting with big-breasted dancers while Krishna plays his flute. The air is perfumed with incense and ghee. At the main entrance is an enormous statue of Meenakshi in all her tri-breasted glory. At her feet is a handsome blue Nandi bull – the vehicle of Shiva – ready to charge between her legs. Spread out before her is the Pudhu Manapada - a 16^th century pillared hall lined with merchant stalls. On weekends, classically trained Tamil dancers frolic for the gods and turn the complex into a sea of gyrating color.

From here we took bicycle rickshaws to the Tirumalai Nayak Palace (which just looked like a Gilbert and Sullivan stage set with a shit load of pigeons) and the Gandhi Memorial museum. The idea for taking the old school bike rickshaws was to provide income for an otherwise rarely used mode of transportation. In principle, this seems a good idea. But doing it is another thing altogether. These poor guys look like concentration camp survivors. The bike rickshaws even without a passenger weigh a ton. It is hot as hell out – easily 38 Celsius. Most people in the group felt so bad they spent most of the time helping the driver push rather than ride in the back. I think in the end we paid around $5 CDN each for all their hard work. Such an insignificant amount to us but it is more than each driver would make a week otherwise.

The Gandhi Memorial Museum was “provocative.” Unlike other museums we visited that concentrated on Gandhi and his life this one was mostly devoted to educating a person on just how shitty the English were to the Indians. And lets be clear – there is no question it was pretty shitty for an Indian when the British East India Company was in town. If you were a white person reading those wall displays you weren’t going to leave the place feeling at all good about your heritage. In my opinion that is a good thing. Because after that, it makes HOW Gandhi (and his followers) managed to remain in a place of non-violent protest all the more remarkable. It’s hard not to see the irony of the West with our “enlightened” stance on other countries violent regimes. Yet during the time Gandhi was alive, the “White Man’s” solution to any “push back” by the natives was to simply kill them. It was not uncommon for a massacre to happen because a group was thought (rightly or not) to be planning an uprising against the British. It was incredibly violent and oppressive. The US had slavery. The British East India Company had India. The bloodstained dhoti Gandhi was wearing when he was assassinated in 1948 is enshrined here along with his meager personal effects. The reason behind this is that in 1921, it was in Madurai that Gandhi first took to wearing the dhoti as a sign of his native pride.

Up next: Mamallapuram – ancient seaport of the Pallava kingdom and home to Krishna’s “Butterball.” The entire town is littered with temples and rock carving dating back to the 7^th century Pallava king Narasimhavarman I (The “Great Wrestler”). What makes the temples so intriguing is that many of them are carved entirely into the rock. Indeed, Mamallapuram is the carving capital of India as is made blindingly obvious by all the stone carvers grinding and chiseling all through the night (No one carves in the day because it is too damn hot!). So if you are in the market for a 20-foot high Buddha head for your garden this is the place to order it. You can check out the heritage quality of your commissioned work by visiting Arjuna’s Penance – a giant stone relief carving considered the finest in India. It bursts with scenes from Hindu mythology as well as life-sized carvings of animals such as a herd of elephants and a cat performing penance to a crowd of cheering mice.

The temples and rock reliefs are, in my opinion, best seen at sunset. During this time the town and the sites come alive with locals reveling in the coolness of the day. You can head up to precariously balanced Krishna’s Butterball and watch local boys attempt feats of strength while children play among the ruins. Slowly take it all in as you follow the cows to the beach via “Backpackistan” – the narrow road devoted to pizza, pasta, pancakes, and cheap Tibetan imports. Along the way, stop in at Masi’s. He’s the guy with the weird rainbow painted woodcarvings and psychedelic Ganesh paintings. You can’t miss him because he and his art look entirely out of place in this town. Or maybe a better way to put it is he is the only true artist in the town. His work is completely “outside the box” and his studio is insanely cluttered like his mind. I spent a long time looking at his life long obsession with Ganesh paintings. I was never sure if they were created out of torment or love. All I knew was they were evolving into something other than they were before.

Is it any surprise then that I ended up here?