Visit to the Temple

January 6th, 2006

I was enjoying the winter morning, snuggling under the bed sheets when a splash of cold water came down on my face (Drat!!!). It was my mom shouting at me, not to waste the beautiful margazhi month. Grumbling, had bath and was off to the nearest temple. Infact, mom was right in the context of beautiful margazhi because, the roads on the way to the temple were decorated with colourful kolams (rangolis), some in the center of which had akals (diyas) and flowers shining brightly. They had taken the trouble to do this the previous night itself, and for all the trouble taken, i made sure i didn’t step on any. My mood took a transition from the grumbling one to the sunny one :-).

Soon, i reached the temple. After me, came a small boy and his mom. The boy had not yet started going to school. He was sooooo cute with chubby cheeks smothered with powder, with his blue t-shirt neatly tucked in and his tiny foot making its way to the temple. He also had a ‘U’ shaped namam on the middle of his forehead, at the center of which was a bright red pottu.

He started singing some rhymes and was hopping around the sanctum, when his mom called him for accepting the theerth (holy water) given to us by the poojaris. He stopped and asked the poojari a superb question, “Why is God black?” by seeing the idol. The poojari was blinking for a second. Everyone around him started smiling. Getting embarrassed, he replied that he didn’t know. Then came the next question, “Without knowing even this why are you doing pooja daily?“…Well, this was something i couldn’t hold on to. I broke into peels of laughter with everyone following the same ha ha ha…

The poojari was too embarassed to talk anything…his face becoming paler by the minute. The boy’s mom was too bewildered to talk anything else. She surely didn’t expect such a question from this small guy. The boy had started hopping around again….I still couldn’t control my laughter….oh!!! what a superb morning i had…

5 Responses to “Visit to the Temple”

  1. revatechnic Says:

    hmmm..
    well, actually when you think about it, many of us do many mundane daily activities without finding out the reason for them.
    For that matter, many don’t even know why they are supposed to pray..
    So, all those who leave in god have good habits, does that mean that those who don’t pray are all bad?

    i know this topic has been much debated on. But it is like the poosari-boy story.

    Anyway, 1st time to your blog, keep it up. Cheers

  2. Aswin Anand T.H. Says:

    Thanks a lot reva…keep visiting 🙂

  3. unknown Says:

    nice post….so many things we are doing in our day today life with no reason…so many superstitious beliefs….don’t know when all this will change?

  4. Sriram Says:

    Hey Aswin..
    I really miss the margazhi masam kolams and early mornin temple visits.. Well, your experience with the Kid is reminiscent of some instances I had too..my wife’s nephew here went to temple with his mom/dad.. a couple of minutess into the temple, he was missing..people searched in vain..after 5 mins of search they found him in the last place u wud ever think.. inside the sanctum sanctorum of the temple, eating the fruits kept in front of main idol..looked as if this guy had the direct access to Almighty..
    by the way, I did join the YES group..guess I have to send a Hi mail and proceed from there..

  5. Aswin Anand T.H. Says:

    @ammu:
    ya…thats exactly what i meant..

    @sriram:
    ha ha ha…fancy a kid in the sanctum. Atleast he eats fruits…many “modern” kids dont like fruits 😉