May 2010, The Tirupathi Pilgrimage
Place & Year: Tirupathi, AP, India / May 2010
Author: Srivathsa
It has been a very very long time since I’ve been to Tirupathi to get the Darshan of the all power Lord Venkateswara and was longing for the trip. My desperate longing came to a climax this week. Dad, Mom, Aunt Indra , cousin Sridhar were part of the trip with me.
We had booked a Toyota Innova to fit in all of us for the Saturday morning. The packing for the one day trip was already over on Friday evening. Of course, if it was only me, I would have preferred it to be done by Saturday morning. We (Mom , Dad and Me) got up at 3:30 AM IST, got ready and were joined by our Aunt and Cousin from Adyar at around 4:40 AM IST. The Innova was a bit late and came around 5:05 AM.
In Innova - Sridhar and Perimma
We jumped into the car, started the trip. First, was breaking of coconut at the Badala Vinayagar Temple at Madipakkam ( a typical trip start). Then it was all the way drive towards Poonamallee, discussing about routes, families and all that. Had a couple of biscuit bites. The sun was rising , glowing in deep orange. Although the outside of the car was in real beginning to be hot, the air conditioning in the car made us feel the other way.
Around half the way, Mom wasn’t able top tolerate the jerks of the bad roads and was puking. We stopped the car, for quite a few minutes. And after a few minutes of drive, again halted at a break post with Expresso Café (Espresso wrongly pronounced), and Hotel Vima. Had the breakfast with Idli, Dosa and Vada there along with a very hot tea. It made Mom better.
It was 9 AM IST. We reached Thiruchanoor, to get the darshan of Goddess Alamelumanga. Since we were in a kind of Package tour, we got into the temple, quite easily and the darshan was as simple, but astonishing. We came out perplexed after the darshan of the so beautiful , yet powerful deity. We, of course forget to pray on what all we’ve wanted to.
Hotel Vima and the Cafe
Roads of Tirupathi and Garuda
The up route to Tirumala began. The route was full of turns, but the road was superb, which you couldn’t find in most of the places in India. Since it was uphill, after the police check up of the car, the air condition was turned off. We had the windows open. A great view.
Entering Tirumala
Reached Tirumala. Had all our foot wear, cell phones and bags in the car. All we had was our wallets. We were guided with the Rs.300/- ticket route by one of the ladies arranged by the trip planners. It was relatively a short wait of just one hour to reach the Golden Sannidhi of the Lord. Yes. It was crowded and you don’t see the place anytime without people. When it was front of the Big Lord, the view from back of the crowd was a stunner. It was in fact a surprising fact that, we had the startling darshan for 6 to 7 minutes. Unbelievable, that we never heard “Jargandi” till the 6th minute. You don’t see such treatment usually. I was satisfied. It was as if everything I believed was true.Its a great feeing, which ofcourse, those who don’t believe will never understand. We came out having darshans of the Vimana and the Vimana Venkateswara. Luckily it was not very hot then. Now that we are done with the Darshan, we had to wait for another cousin of mine, Uma and her baby, hailing from Bangalore. It happened so that the wait was for a long time, which was unplanned. In between, we had our lunch in two different groups due to the various situational confusions. It was good one at Hotel Srivatsa (Annapoorna). Glady had a small nap in the car, underneath the tree , with scorching sunlight meddling between the branches. Turning back, I had a very spectacular glance of the golden vimana, from the parking lot.
The Srivari Pond
Time didn’t quite fly. It took us three long hours from 2 PM to 5 PM for us to wait. I missed out the tea break in between. During the long wait, in the parking lot, there were people who were down trodden, selling goods like ropes,rings and all that. The kids were wandering and drooling in the hot sun,playing in the sand. No one cared. And there was this guy who was selling the designs for Rangoli powder. It was that innocent yet, poverty struck look on him, that made me and my mom feel bad. He was standing next to my dad asking him to buy the thing he sold. While, I was just feeling bad, my Mom made a step forward and offered him an amount to buy a lot of things, which might not be even useful for her. Even then, we do not have money to offer everyone in the world like that.
The Golden Vimana
The downhill was a good view along with Uma and her Baby in the car. It was beginning to get dark and I was beginning to get worried, since I never had missed the Saturday Archanai to Lord Saniswara, for the past one and half years. We were sure, we would be reaching Chennai only by 10 PM, and no temple would be open till that. We were searching on the way for temples, before we halted at the same Hotel Vima for a tea. When we started back , I almost lost hope of finding an open temple and with Navagraha in it. Atlast at a bizarre time of 8:45 PM IST, we found a temple, at Tirumazhisai (a famous one) with a separate Lord Saneeswara Bhagwan’s Sannidhi. For me, it was a miracle, since I had been praying for the same. We did the archana there and then it was non stop to Madipakkam. Boy, I knew, I missed Sriram for the trip.
In the Parking Lot - With Aunt and Mom
We got into the house, to see our posts and newspapers arranged neatly outside. Thanks to our neighbor. As soon as I came in, I had to drive my bike to the Adyar Anandha bhavan at 10:15 PM to get the dinner.
