The forest remembers...

Even when people forget, the forest remembers.

Beneath tangled vines in a forgotten dense forest, on a sleepy hill, old, old ruins lay buried in hard soil, half-hidden in earth’s quiet embrace. Mossy stones carved with exquisite designs, symbols and script peek shyly through greenery, playing a timeless game of hide and seek with curious, foolish wanderers like us. Time feels warped here – soft, malleable. Old spirits wander this place. It’s a feeling I have never felt anywhere else before. They flicker in the corner of my eyes, solemn, eerily watching from behind crumbling bricks and mossy pillars. The earth breathes secrets here – through leaves on the tall, tall trees that rustle mysteriously as you pass them by, through thick vines that seek to wrap themselves around your ankles if you linger too long, through the dark water in the ancient wells in the earth that threaten to show you your soul if you look too deep. In this realm history is not dead – merely buried. It’s sacred and strange, waiting to be remembered in dreams.

Long ago, 450 years to be precise, on the sea-soaked coast and beneath the pepper-scented skies of Karnataka’s Malenadu, ruled the indomitable Rani Chennabhairadevi – a queen so bold and commanding, I like to think even the waves might have paused and bowed before crashing onto her shores. Dubbed the “Pepper Queen”, she was known for her diplomacy and strategy, who charmed the Portuguese with one hand and fended off their cannons with the other. I imagine her bangles clinking like war drums and her gaze sharp enough to slice through royal intrigue – she reigned for over five decades – not just ruled, she REIGNED! Her forts stood tall and strong, her people flourished, and history, if it had taste buds, would still be savoring the legacy she left behind.

But history – with its fondness for forgetting fierce women – let the mists of time settle too thickly over Rani Chennabhairadevi’s story. While swords clashed and empires crumbled, she held her pepper-scented ground for over half a century. But in the end, she slipped quietly through the cracks of grand tomes and gilded archives. No granite statues sing her name, no schoolbook doodles sketch her crown. Did the chroniclers shy before her strength, or perhaps they got too enchanted by the tales of kings to notice the queen who outlasted them all? But her story waits still. In sea-salted legends and whispers of Avvarasi’s worshippers in the Western Ghats – hoping, perhaps, for the world to take notice and bow down in awe and reverence.

It has been a dream – a relentless tug in my ribs – ever since I heard her name, to visit the places where she would have once walked. Not like a tourist thirsting for ruins, but like a dreamer chasing a half-remembered song. Finally the two of us with the same mad thirst made plans, booked tickets, sought permission from the forest department (it's a restricted forest) sat on the scooter and off we went on an adventure. Little did we know how this trip would change us, leave this indelible mark on our hearts...

When we stepped into the moss-draped embrace of Rani Chennabhairadevi’s fort inside the dense forest of Kanuru, we felt something in the air – not quite wind, not quite memory, but a tingle, like the echo of war cries and anklets long gone. The stones whispered in riddles, the roots curled more protectively over ancient foundations, and I swear the air smelled faintly of pepper and old pride. It wasn’t spooky, no – more like stumbling into a room where someone powerful had just been, and the silence still bowed to the Rani. I felt watched, welcomed, blessed and slightly warned, as if Chennabhairadevi herself had raised an eyebrow and said, “Ah. Someone who remembers.”

Why did Hanuman cover himself with sindhoor?

 

A popular story about why Hanuman’s body is smeared with sindhoor goes like this –

One day in Ayodhya, Hanuman saw Sita applying the red powder on her forehead and asked her what that was and why she was applying it on herself. Sita replied, "Hanuman, this is sindhoor, and I apply it to ensure a long life for my beloved Rama." 

On hearing this, Hanuman too appeared the next day with Sindoor applied on his entire body to ensure Bhagwan Rama's immortality. Rama was overwhelmed by Hanuman's actions and he declared that whoever worships Hanuman with sindhoor would be free from all problems and difficulties.

Since today is Kannada Hanuma Jayanti, what better day to recall my ajja's version of the story. I remember this cute story from my childhood, those unforgettable sessions as he told me stories from the Mahabharata and the Ramayana. On those sultry Udupi afternoons as he spread a mat on the floor on the veranda and settled down for a post-lunch nap, I would lay down next to him and pester him for a story. So here goes...

When Rama, Sita and Lakshmana returned to Ayodhya after vanquishing Ravana in Lanka, Hanuman, Angad, Sugreeva and many others also accompanied him. After a suitable welcome to the victorious party and after a prolonged celebration, Angad, Sugreeva and the others decide to return to their kingdom of Kishkinda, and asked to take their leave. Hanuman though, refused to leave Rama’s side. Rama and Sita sent all their guests off with a tearful farewell, filling their persons and vehicles with loving gifts. Hanuman of course stayed back, never leaving Rama’s side even for a moment.

That evening, after all the guests had left, Rama, Sita, Lakshmana and his wife, Bharata and his wife, Shatrughna and his wife, all sat in the main antahpura chatting about everything that had transpired, and talked late into the night. Of course Hanuman also sat there with all of them, happily sitting by Rama’s feet, listening to everything with a content smile on his face. Finally Lakshmana, Bharata and Shatrughna got up and began to leave with their respective wives, wanting to be with their own wives and also wanting to give Rama and Sita their privacy. Hanuman though just continued to sit by Rama's feet. Bharata signaled to him to get up and leave, but Hanuman did not understand. So Bharata went to him and whispered in his ear, "You must leave now, let your Bhagwan Rama have some alone time with Sita Ma." But Hanuman did not understand. He wished to continue staying beside his Bhagwan and he threw a tantrum, saying, "Why is Sita Ma allowed to stay by his side then?" Upon hearing this Sita Ma laughed and told him, "See Hanuman, I wear the Sindhoor tilak on my forehead to show that I belong to your Bhagwan, and that is why I get to stay with him."

Still not convinced but unable to defy Sita Ma’s request, Hanuman finally left the room.

The next morning several merchants from the city came to the palace complaining about Hanuman and they said, "He is such a menace, he has looted all the Sindhoor from our shops and he is rampaging everywhere!" So Rama called him to the palace. Hanuman came, having smeared himself all over his body with Sindhoor. Rama and Sita were taken aback. 

"What have you done to yourself?" Rama asked him. 

Hanuman said, "My Bhagwan, Sita Ma wears one sindhoor tilak and she gets to stay with you day and night. So I figured if I wore sindhoor all over myself, I can stay with you till the end of time."

Such is Hanuman’s innocence and his devotion and love towards Bhagwan Rama. And that is why his murti is always found with at least a big Sindhoor tilak on his forehead, and in some places his whole body is smeared with sindhoor. No devotee will ever dare to keep him away from his beloved Bhagwan Rama.

How I once waved at a lamppost like a pro.

 

It had been a long time since my world went slightly out of focus. There were days when I felt I wasn’t quite all there, when I thought a small part of me was floating somewhere above the earth, watching all the worldly happenings from a great distance. Some days the faces that passed by during my morning walks were blurred, like the people were slowly fading away from their outer edges. Some other mornings I thought that dew drop on that solitary leaf had forgotten how to be itself. There were evenings when I thought the sun was melting instead of just sinking down. The birds coming back home after their day-long toil had lost their defined wings, the clouds were just vaporizing.

Was the world always like this? I had forgotten how it was before. Long back, when sharp focus was a thing. When objects held their respective shapes and did not rebel.

Then I had a revelation. And it came in the form of an eye hospital. 

No, it wasn't me who was having a mid-life crisis and contemplating the meaning of life. Or even a mental breakdown where I was perceiving the world to be a bizarre carnival ride. It was not even that part of my weirdly wired brain that once thought it would be a good idea to put on 3D glasses in a 2D movie.

All that had transpired was I had turned 40, and I just needed a pair of spectacles to turn my wonky world right again!

 

Book review: The Curse of Anuganga by Harini Srinivasan

 

 My rating: 4/5 stars

I picked this book up as a light read in between two heavy research kind of books I’m reading, and thoroughly enjoyed it. Set in 403 CE, the book is a historical murder mystery fiction, what’s not to love?

The events in the book take place in Nandivardhana, in modern day Maharashtra, and there are mentions of Pataliputra, Kashi, etc., throughout the book. I loved reading the author’s imagination of what common people’s life would have been like, and especially the real words that are used throughout the book. There is no business of “clarified butter” in place of ghee, if you know what I mean. The conversations feel genuine, the incidents and events feel not forced. The progress of the mystery slowly unfolding kept me wanting to read more. 4 stars from me, because I thought a few things in the book felt disjointed and could have been tied together in a better way.

If you’re an Indian history lover and a mystery lover, definitely pick it up!

Book Review: The Idol Thief by S. Vijay Kumar

 

My mind is still reeling, hours after I’ve finished reading this book. The sheer scale of looting that has been going on in our temples is mind boggling. Billions of dollars are spent on ancient Indian art - idols, sculptures, paintings, without bothering about how it got to them.

This book reads like a fast-paced thriller, even though it’s non-fiction. A must read for everyone who is proud of their culture, heritage, ancestry and history, to understand how our national treasures are being looted and smuggled out of the country into greedy hands of museums and private collectors. 

It also pains to see how indifferent Indian authorities are towards these crimes and how unconcerned they are about catching the criminals.

The author Vijay Kumar has been closely involved in efforts to bring at least some of the idols home. A blogger keenly interested in Indian temple art and iconography, he has built an invaluable community and database which is helping enormously with this effort.

Why is it so important to bring the idols back home to their temples? What is the problem if they’re sitting inside glass cases in museums or private homes for people to ogle at? This paragraph I’ve reproduced here from the book explains why. Our gods are connected to us in a very personal, emotional way and in my opinion, there has been no better description of what these idols mean to us…

“First, idols were not created as just pieces of art but as representations of god meant to be housed, taken care of and prayed to inside temples… The technical brilliance and the artistry of these idols is meant to be experienced inside a temple, at the intoxicating confluence of spirituality, art and aesthetics. They are meant to inspire awe and devotion. They are meant to be seen at the same time as you hear the ringing of bells, the chanting of shlokas and mantras, the beating of drums. They are meant to be seen in the light of oil lamps or on magnificent chariots on festival days. They are meant to be seen when your senses are consumed by the smells of ghee and incense and fresh flowers and camphor. They are not meant to be seen behind cages of glass, inside sterile museums or galleries that cannot even begin to recreate the unique sensation that overtakes you when you view temple art while it is in its womb, in and around the temple's sanctum sanctorum.”

So go read this book. Learn, understand. The more people are aware and are talking about it, the better the chances for more of our treasures to come back home.

Book review: Temple of a Thousand Faces by John Shors

 

34%, 170 pages in and this book is getting tedious to read. I picked it up because Angkor Wat fascinates me and I wanted to read its story. Who built it, how did it look, who were the people who lived during those times, etc. But this book is set a little after the temple complex was built, there’s a siege and a war between the Khmers and the Chams. There’s a whole lot of bloodshed, torture, spying on each other and more war, not something I want to read right now. The writing is superb, and if you’re in the mood for blood and gore and a whole lot of heartache, it’s a great book, but I’m not sure when or if I will ever pick it up again to finish it.

Book review: The Walking Brahmin

 

What an amazing story this was. A personal adventure, as well as an insight into the political upheaval of one of the most pivotal period in the Indian Independence movement. It’s not a very large book, and I finished it in 3 days!

Vishnubhat Godse and his uncle Rambhat go on a pilgrimage from a small village in Maharashtra to Kashi, in order to earn some dakshina to help the financial status of their large, poor family. Not long into their travel, they get caught right in the thick of the 1857 war. They almost lose their lives twice during the looting and pillaging in the aftermath of wars, get robbed several times of all their belongings including the dakshina they had earned until then, and meanwhile even get to meet Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansi. 

They do manage to complete their teerthyatra, also visiting Ayodhya on the way before finally reaching Kashi. They return safely 3 years after they left home. The journey changed Vishnubhat’s perspective, worldview and his lifestyle, and he gives up the idea of a life of luxury. He spends the rest of his life in austerity. He pens down their adventure in detail several years later for his descendants, and one of his disciples gets it published in Marathi a few years after his death.

The book has details about the Jhansi war that I found most fascinating, but also left me disgusted at the way the British systematically looted the city afterwards. This knowledge is not new, but reading about it from the perspective of a commoner hits you anew. Thousands of men between the age of 5-60 were slaughtered mindlessly just for the mistake of having lived in that city. Crores of rupees worth of riches were taken from Jhansi and Kalpi alone! Vishnubhat was a witness to all this. 

I’m thankful to Maneesh Godbole for discovering this book and then deciding to translate it in English. The story has been narrated largely in just the way Vishnubhat had written it, with some commentaries of his own. It makes for a very interesting, illuminating read.

Book review - Ponniyin Selvan

 

If I had to tell you in one sentence what I thought of ‘Ponniyin Selvan’, it would have to be this - One hell of a thrilling rollercoaster ride! Oh, to have been a fly on the wall in those times! History, mysteries, intrigue, conspiracies, secrets, romances, philosophy, art… it has everything.

This was my first step into Tamil literature, and I cannot think of a better book to start off with. The Chola empire is a familiar name, but my knowledge of Tamil history is confined to the very restricting pages of high school textbooks. Who were the Cholas, what were the kings’ names? Who were the kings’ families and friends? Who were their subjects? How did they live? The author has skillfully blended answers to these questions and more with his vibrant imagination and woven them all so intricately and beautifully into the story, and this in my opinion is the reason why it makes such a compelling read.

There isn’t much I can say about this series that hasn’t been said already by readers who have loved this story from the beginning when it was published as a serialized novel. I started off with the first book slowly, expecting it to be just another historical fiction, but soon ended up devouring all the six books in the series one after the other in just under a month.

I cannot read the book in original Tamil by Kalki, but enjoyed the English translation by Karthik Narayanan nevertheless. It’s not the polished language that an original English book would be in, but I think that’s a good thing, because it very satisfyingly conveys the “mannina suvaasane” feeling (literally translated to 'scent of the soil') (can’t think of a better way to say it) of the Tamil people and their glorious, ancient history.

Book review: Women of Pride by Lakshmi Vishwanathan

The first time I heard the word Devadasi was about 22 years ago, when as part of my job, I was assigned to accompany a few people visiting the Devadasi rehabilitation program by an NGO in Saundathi in Belgaum. The town is known for its historic Yellamma temple, also known as Renuka temple, where girls are dedicated to Goddess Yellamma in an elaborate ceremony once a year, and become Devadasis, also called Jogatis. What I learned about the Devadasis in this visit was from the NGO reps, and they painted a picture of abject poverty, prostitution, exploitation, and disease. Unfortunately, what I remember most is their matted hair, which was the first thing the NGO helped get rid of when they convinced a Devadasi to get out of that system.

I had visited the Yellamma temple, and the homes of several ex, as well as practicing devadasis, in remote villages in that district. The poverty cannot be denied, and for a long time now that is what has been driving the parents to dedicate their young daughters to the Goddess. When the girls attain puberty, they are immediately claimed by men who pay small amounts of money, which enables the parents to eke out a living. Many many of them eventually make their way to cities like Bombay and become one among the thousands in the red-light district. Basically, it has turned into a religion-sanctioned prostitution racket.

That visit stayed with me for a very long time. I was intrigued by the Devadasis, their history, and their lives, and wanted to know more, but life took over. When I saw a review of ‘Women of Pride’, I had to pick it up.

What I found was that the Devadasi tradition of Saundathi was nowhere close to what was depicted in this book. But it was a fascinating read, nevertheless. Where did the term Devadasi come from, what does it mean, who were these women, what did they do? There are so many myths debunked in this book. The Devadasi heritage is one of empowerment, not exploitation. The women were married to the Deity, and played important roles in temples, as well as in kings’ courts. They were educated, cultured, independent, powerful, and held in a high regard in society. How progressive the society was then!

The book not only traces the history of the Devadasis but elaborates on what caused their downfall too. When the British came, they brought with them colonial prejudices and prudishness, and began taking control of temples. Undermining and ultimately destroying Indian culture in order to divide and rule became their utmost priority. The Devadasis were branded with the label of immorality, their children were labelled illegitimate, their assets including the lands that were given to their ancestors by kings were seized and they were left to languish in poverty. In the end, because of their various laws, the Devadasi system came to be regarded as a social evil that needed to be abolished from society.

The stories of all the famous Devadasis mentioned in the book gives us a glimpse of our rich culture and heritage. It tells us how Bharatanatyam as a classical dance form evolved over centuries and came to be what it is today.

This book was an eye-opener of sorts for me, but has left me slightly unsatisfied too. I now want to read more on the subject, especially the Devadasi culture of Saundathi. Any recommendations are welcome!

Book review: Kintsugi by Anukrti Upadhyay

 

Picked up this book for the title, and because of the author’s other two books I’ve loved – Bhaunri and Daura. Kintsugi, the Japanese art of mending broken things with gold, stems from the philosophy that damage is a part of that object’s history, and does not need to be hidden. Rather, it gets enhanced by gold. I love that.

But what happens when people break? How do we mend our broken hearts and souls? Doesn’t the philosophy behind Kintsugi apply to humans too? How do we teach ourselves to accept and love our damaged selves and start believing that we are stronger and more beautiful now because of that damage and not despite it?

This book is about extraordinary women, incomplete, beautiful, broken, and damaged, connecting India and Japan, also taking us to Singapore and Borneo. Most of these women find the strength to mend themselves with gold, enamel, precious stones, and love, and a few of them believe they are too broke to be mended ever.

The simplicity of the writing is contradictory to the complex characters and the way their relationships are intertwined throughout the story. Despite this complexity, there is also a sense of serenity, calmness, and a quietness between the sentences. It’s a feeling difficult to describe, but something you won’t miss noticing.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading it and will happily give it 5 stars. Kudos to the author Anukrti Upadhyay for this beautiful beautiful story. I must also mention, I finished reading this 200+ page book in just under 3 days!