15th - 17th Dec 2011
The flight from Colombo to Tiruchirappalli ( Tamil Nadu, South India ) was courtesy of Kingfisher Airlines in an ATR72/500 turbo-prop. This is the same type of machine that I used to drive inVietnam. It took-off on time at 0200hrs and did a rather bumpy landing an hour later at 'Trichy', as it's commonly known. Otherwise an uneventful flight, except that I didn't have any Indian rupees, and the hosty selling tea and coffee ( no gratis drinks here; I had heard that Kingfisher were in poor financial straits ) only took Indian rupees. The chap sitting next to me bought me the coffee. How kind of him! I'm sure I was subsequently ripped off by the taxi driver but at 0300hrs who cares, and was safely delivered to the Royal Sathyam Hotel in the middle of what looked, at night, like a rather decrepit, ill lit and rubbish strewn town. This hotel, being 'Royal' sounds grand, but rest assured it isn't. Nevertheless it turned out to be perfectly satisfactory for a brief stop-over. Trichy is a large industrial city on the River Cauvery in the centre of what is now the state of Tamil Nadu. It has a long history of military conquest. The state was called the Madras Presidency during the days of the Raj. It is populated by rather religiously orientated Tamils.
To say this city is 'rubbish strewn' is perhaps understating it a bit. Maybe they have regular street rubbish collections, but like once every 100 years, on the dot. There were many very dirty and obviously impoverished specimens of humanity picking through the small mountains of streetside rubbish to salvage what they could. The poor buggers must have been a bit desperate.
Left: An example of typical street rubbish and, in the distance, people picking through it.
The old part of the city where I happened to end up is one enormous bazaar. The hackneyed guide book description 'bustling' ( which is tourist speak for 'crowded, noisy and chaotic' ) fits the place well. Indeed it is the most 'bustling' place I have seen so far. If there is a scale of 'bustlingness' from 1 to 10 then the Bustle Rating ( BR ) of this city is, lets say, 7. I am leaving a bit of space for perhaps even more bustling places that I might find. Actually, the guide book also mentions this bazaar as 'throbbing'. So throbbing equals BR7, superseded by frenetic, manic and, at BR10, a complete nightmare.
The streets are pot-holed and pavements cracked and worn. The miriad of cluttered little alleyways and backstreets would again suit the guide book term 'rambling' i.e. like an uncharted maze. There was no street map available. Right: Locals bustling about.
The people I met both in the hotel and on the street were absolutely charming and helpful. When, inevitably, they asked where I was from they all professed to say that they thought Britain was a fantastic country and much admired. Hmmmmm...I think they were harking back a bit to a more romantic era ( or listening to the BBC ).
Most of them, men and women, have that splodge of colour on their foreheads in combinations of red, white, yellow and black ( as per pic left ). I was told by the hotel manager that these Hindu symbols are painted on with a mixture of coloured cow dung and ash! They are great 'worshippers'. Cow dung?
.....As is apparent by the vast Hindu temple complex over the river to the north of the city. Due to a lack of much else to see or do I went to have a look. It is called the Sri Ranganathaswamy ( Vishnu ) Temple at Srirangam. The outer entry ( right ) is an enormous intricately sculpted tower. There are then a series of a further seven of these monsters before you get to the middle. Then into a shoes off zone. Money ( not much ) to be paid for entry and extra for taking a camera. I was, against my better instinct, persuaded to follow a 'guide'.
He took me to a viewing platform. This temple complex is one of, if not the, biggest in India and covers, I think he told me, 85 acres. It is huge, the size of a town, with many, I lost count, magnificently carved and ornate towers and structures. You might be able to see a gold ( several tons of real gold leaf! ) dome in the distance. This is where a large reclining statue of Vishnu resides and is only accessible to Hindus.
There were many colonnaded squares with lots of candles and burning incense with praying 'pilgrims' etc.etc.
My guide banged on at great length about all the many deities which are worshipped here and the very convoluted history of the buildings and carvings. It rather went over my head I'm afraid. I got bored. Also about how his son was at some college or other and it was costing him a lot of money.............i.e. the softening up tactic for a generous tip.
I was more interested to notice all the many old and infirm looking people lying about on the stone flagstones. They were scattered everywhere. I was told they were all cleared out at 6.00pm. After which I presume they went off to lie down somewhere else. I don't know why or how they do it. Have you tried lying down on cold stone and sleeping motionless for hours? Impossible. I don't think they were dead!
Left: Some of those lying about. There were many more crowded 'lying about' areas.
It amazes me to see so much ostentatious wealth, architectural expertise, careful planning and enormous human effort that goes into constructing and maintaining these immaculate and vast places of worship, which are then surrounded by the chaotic squalor and crumbling overcrowded slums that the people actually have to live in. I can't help but feel that if even half this money, effort and skill was spent on the city's infrastructure, the population would be entirely better off. Still, not my place to pontificate on such matters I suppose, but that's just my opinion. As this notice at a stall outside proclaimed "chill your dil". So I did.
This ( left ) is the Vishnu Hindu symbol, I think, for peace and well-being. I saw a few locals with it painted on their foreheads ( in ash and cow dung? ). The others, the Sheva sect, wear horizontal stripes. The twain do not meet.
In the middle of the old town there is this large tank, or reservoir, containing greenish-brown liquid ( right ). The village pond. It is smelly, polluted, putrid and strewn with rubbish and dead rats. It is so full of crap you could probably walk on the surface....a miracle. There are steps leading down into it and I was told that the cattle drank from it and people 'bathed' in it. What! You must be joking! I think this must be for religious reasons; it certainly can't be for the purpose of getting clean. I wondered who on earth would possibly want or dare to put a toe in that cesspit; maybe people who slap cow dung on their foreheads in the morning.
The transport in this city is quite entertaining. The place was teeming with three-wheelers, exactly the same model as in Sri Lanka but here called 'auto-rickshaws'. They are all of uniform mustard yellow colour ( left ) and are much more dilapidated than the Sri Lankan machines; some nearly wrecks. Instead of electric horns they have those quaint old fashioned air-bulb operated honk-honk hooters ( as on early 20th century motor cars ). It sounded like a herd of geese ( do geese have herds? ). A flock maybe.
The taxis and all official ( police ) cars are of this type. Very old Ambassador Classics which, I think, were originally made by Austin. There were fleets of them at taxi ranks. This one ( right ) was just about to be moved on by a policeman. Or maybe it is his car, but it left without him.
Another noticeable feature, in contrast to Sri Lanka, is that there are few street-dogs in evidence and no cows wandering around. I saw just a few goats. Yes, Bernie, goats.
This ( left ) is the Rock Fort Temple in the centre of the city. It is in fact two temples and a fortified area. It was another shoes off zone and I couldn't be bothered to climb up the hundreds of steps in my bare feet to not be allowed inside ( Hindus only ).
As inferred, there is not a lot to do in Trichy. There are few licensed bars and no restaurants of note. The hotel I stayed at could serve only Kingfisher beer in their rather dreary restaurant, but were not allowed to leave the bottle on the table because they didn't have a licence! I was told their sister hotel near the river had a licensed bar. I went to investigate. I didn't stay long. This is not the city you would come to for a jolly night out of pub crawls and gastronomic excess with the boys. It is therefore safe from the dreaded British Lads' Stag Parties.
I was to move on soon and began to study the Indian railway network and booking system. The excellent internet website 'Man in Seat 61' was invaluable for advice. I discovered that there are 8 classes of accommodation on Indian trains. I leave it to you to investigate if you are interested. It is a fallacy that people crowd on and hang all over the roof and side of the carriages. Certainly not on the main-line trains. It is necessary to reserve a seat. I went to the local railway reservations centre and managed to get a 'Waiting List 2' on an 'AC 2' sleeper carriage for the 0120hrs train on the 17th to Trivandrum, Kerala. I was 2nd in line on the waiting list for a berth. These trains get booked up quite early on, I discovered. Fingers crossed I get in, or I might end up in non-ac ( not air-con ) wooden seats in 2nd class for the 10 hour overnight journey. You will hopefully hear about it.
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| Rock Fort temple at Trichy. |
To say this city is 'rubbish strewn' is perhaps understating it a bit. Maybe they have regular street rubbish collections, but like once every 100 years, on the dot. There were many very dirty and obviously impoverished specimens of humanity picking through the small mountains of streetside rubbish to salvage what they could. The poor buggers must have been a bit desperate.Left: An example of typical street rubbish and, in the distance, people picking through it.
The old part of the city where I happened to end up is one enormous bazaar. The hackneyed guide book description 'bustling' ( which is tourist speak for 'crowded, noisy and chaotic' ) fits the place well. Indeed it is the most 'bustling' place I have seen so far. If there is a scale of 'bustlingness' from 1 to 10 then the Bustle Rating ( BR ) of this city is, lets say, 7. I am leaving a bit of space for perhaps even more bustling places that I might find. Actually, the guide book also mentions this bazaar as 'throbbing'. So throbbing equals BR7, superseded by frenetic, manic and, at BR10, a complete nightmare.
The streets are pot-holed and pavements cracked and worn. The miriad of cluttered little alleyways and backstreets would again suit the guide book term 'rambling' i.e. like an uncharted maze. There was no street map available. Right: Locals bustling about.
The people I met both in the hotel and on the street were absolutely charming and helpful. When, inevitably, they asked where I was from they all professed to say that they thought Britain was a fantastic country and much admired. Hmmmmm...I think they were harking back a bit to a more romantic era ( or listening to the BBC ).
Most of them, men and women, have that splodge of colour on their foreheads in combinations of red, white, yellow and black ( as per pic left ). I was told by the hotel manager that these Hindu symbols are painted on with a mixture of coloured cow dung and ash! They are great 'worshippers'. Cow dung?
.....As is apparent by the vast Hindu temple complex over the river to the north of the city. Due to a lack of much else to see or do I went to have a look. It is called the Sri Ranganathaswamy ( Vishnu ) Temple at Srirangam. The outer entry ( right ) is an enormous intricately sculpted tower. There are then a series of a further seven of these monsters before you get to the middle. Then into a shoes off zone. Money ( not much ) to be paid for entry and extra for taking a camera. I was, against my better instinct, persuaded to follow a 'guide'.
He took me to a viewing platform. This temple complex is one of, if not the, biggest in India and covers, I think he told me, 85 acres. It is huge, the size of a town, with many, I lost count, magnificently carved and ornate towers and structures. You might be able to see a gold ( several tons of real gold leaf! ) dome in the distance. This is where a large reclining statue of Vishnu resides and is only accessible to Hindus.
There were many colonnaded squares with lots of candles and burning incense with praying 'pilgrims' etc.etc.
My guide banged on at great length about all the many deities which are worshipped here and the very convoluted history of the buildings and carvings. It rather went over my head I'm afraid. I got bored. Also about how his son was at some college or other and it was costing him a lot of money.............i.e. the softening up tactic for a generous tip.
I was more interested to notice all the many old and infirm looking people lying about on the stone flagstones. They were scattered everywhere. I was told they were all cleared out at 6.00pm. After which I presume they went off to lie down somewhere else. I don't know why or how they do it. Have you tried lying down on cold stone and sleeping motionless for hours? Impossible. I don't think they were dead!
Left: Some of those lying about. There were many more crowded 'lying about' areas.
It amazes me to see so much ostentatious wealth, architectural expertise, careful planning and enormous human effort that goes into constructing and maintaining these immaculate and vast places of worship, which are then surrounded by the chaotic squalor and crumbling overcrowded slums that the people actually have to live in. I can't help but feel that if even half this money, effort and skill was spent on the city's infrastructure, the population would be entirely better off. Still, not my place to pontificate on such matters I suppose, but that's just my opinion. As this notice at a stall outside proclaimed "chill your dil". So I did.
This ( left ) is the Vishnu Hindu symbol, I think, for peace and well-being. I saw a few locals with it painted on their foreheads ( in ash and cow dung? ). The others, the Sheva sect, wear horizontal stripes. The twain do not meet.
In the middle of the old town there is this large tank, or reservoir, containing greenish-brown liquid ( right ). The village pond. It is smelly, polluted, putrid and strewn with rubbish and dead rats. It is so full of crap you could probably walk on the surface....a miracle. There are steps leading down into it and I was told that the cattle drank from it and people 'bathed' in it. What! You must be joking! I think this must be for religious reasons; it certainly can't be for the purpose of getting clean. I wondered who on earth would possibly want or dare to put a toe in that cesspit; maybe people who slap cow dung on their foreheads in the morning.
The transport in this city is quite entertaining. The place was teeming with three-wheelers, exactly the same model as in Sri Lanka but here called 'auto-rickshaws'. They are all of uniform mustard yellow colour ( left ) and are much more dilapidated than the Sri Lankan machines; some nearly wrecks. Instead of electric horns they have those quaint old fashioned air-bulb operated honk-honk hooters ( as on early 20th century motor cars ). It sounded like a herd of geese ( do geese have herds? ). A flock maybe.
The taxis and all official ( police ) cars are of this type. Very old Ambassador Classics which, I think, were originally made by Austin. There were fleets of them at taxi ranks. This one ( right ) was just about to be moved on by a policeman. Or maybe it is his car, but it left without him.
Another noticeable feature, in contrast to Sri Lanka, is that there are few street-dogs in evidence and no cows wandering around. I saw just a few goats. Yes, Bernie, goats.
This ( left ) is the Rock Fort Temple in the centre of the city. It is in fact two temples and a fortified area. It was another shoes off zone and I couldn't be bothered to climb up the hundreds of steps in my bare feet to not be allowed inside ( Hindus only ).
As inferred, there is not a lot to do in Trichy. There are few licensed bars and no restaurants of note. The hotel I stayed at could serve only Kingfisher beer in their rather dreary restaurant, but were not allowed to leave the bottle on the table because they didn't have a licence! I was told their sister hotel near the river had a licensed bar. I went to investigate. I didn't stay long. This is not the city you would come to for a jolly night out of pub crawls and gastronomic excess with the boys. It is therefore safe from the dreaded British Lads' Stag Parties.
I was to move on soon and began to study the Indian railway network and booking system. The excellent internet website 'Man in Seat 61' was invaluable for advice. I discovered that there are 8 classes of accommodation on Indian trains. I leave it to you to investigate if you are interested. It is a fallacy that people crowd on and hang all over the roof and side of the carriages. Certainly not on the main-line trains. It is necessary to reserve a seat. I went to the local railway reservations centre and managed to get a 'Waiting List 2' on an 'AC 2' sleeper carriage for the 0120hrs train on the 17th to Trivandrum, Kerala. I was 2nd in line on the waiting list for a berth. These trains get booked up quite early on, I discovered. Fingers crossed I get in, or I might end up in non-ac ( not air-con ) wooden seats in 2nd class for the 10 hour overnight journey. You will hopefully hear about it.
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