The City of Temples

Chennai, India, July 20, 2008, road trip to Kanchipuram, SW of Chennai, (Dravadian temple picture, video of huts). Today was a day off. Last year’s Fulbright-Hayes participants complained the schedule they kept was to rigorous so this year we get a day off a week, usually Sunday. Many people are blogging for home town newspapers so they get caught up on blogging, others go shopping or hang out at the pool and then there are the hard core adventurists. Shawn is our hard core adventurist who is always looking for an adventure. I hooked up with her and two others and we rented a car and driver to visit a city of temples, Kanchipuram, two hours away for a day of adventure. For the first time in India we got to see the country side and villages. It was an awesome day. On the way out we saw many American companies that have manufacturing plants here. Temple hopping, as I call it, takes savvy and patience. India is full of temples. There are three main Hindu gods and they can take 1000’s of forms. Think of all the different churches in your community, times it by two and that is how many temples will be in a city. Some temples may be really small and many are small and located by the ghats at the rivers edge. We went to visit the Kailasanatha temple that is dedicated to Shiva. We also went to a temple that was made in 600 AD. It was the oldest building I have ever been in. The carvings are incredible. Temples close from 12:30 – 4:00 so if you want to see them, you have to plan accordingly. When going to the temple you have to take your shoes off. Now, everyone wants to take your shoes and hold them for ransom. This is the first place you can easily get separated from your rupees. We found if we go all the way to the very front door of the temple and deal with temple people, it is the best deal. On some occasions (holidays), the lines are so long and the shoe system is overwhelmed and you have to give them up early. Today the temperature was really hot so the stones in the temples were really hot and the black igneous rock was so hot I burnt one foot. The local’s were watching this crazy American running gingerly across the court yards at break neck speed to find a cool spot. Another racket is the tours of the temples. Some rickshaw drivers and auto drivers have a scam were they have a friend meet them there and pose as a guide. We found that you can tour a temple for free but some of the tour guides can really give you an insight of the building and significances of very parts. Other temples have a person from the temple give tours and they want you to make a large donation to the temple. Some of it is very high pressure sales. You just have to be savvy enough to know who knows there stuff. The best temple of our tour day was the large Kailasanath temple dedicated to Shiva which has a famous mango tree that is in the courtyard next to the shrine. By the time we get to the second temple I have noticed there is a guy from the last temple. I pointed him out to my fellow Fulbrighters and they think I am nuts. At the third and fourth temple when he shows up, now they are trying to figure out the scam. We ask our driver to go to a silk house and we end up at a fifth generation silk house. Guess who is there, are mystery man. We believed he paid our driver to get us to come to the silk shop. We see one woman working a silk loom at this large silk house. We ask the owners were the other looms are and the answer was interesting. He has over 500 looms which he provides one or more looms to individual families and all the silk supplies. They get paid by the piece for what they produce. It takes about 2 weeks to complete a silk sari. That means that not only dad and mom work the loom but also the kids. It is a cottage industry that thrives on the poorly paid labor force. There are so many people here that if you don’t want the work, some one will take the job. On the way back we took a back road that got us onto a rutted dirt road among the rice patties. This area produces lots of rice and this state is an exporter of rice. The fields were beautiful green fields. We did not see another car on this road, only tractors, ox drawn carts, bikes and motor bikes. We also saw flocks of geese, herds of cows on the road, and thatched hut villages. It was a very interesting perspective than what we have seen in the big cities. We made it back in time to go to a restaurant with a group. We walked to the restaurant and found out that it is reservations only and they are booked. We bring out are weapon, our local Indian. Chandra is a native Chennain (also a Brahman, or high caste) who now teaches in American and is a Fulbrighter. His ability to speak the native tongue has helped us out so many times. He talks to restaurant management in Tamil, the native language, and lets them know who we are and how far we have come. Boom, they suddenly have space for us. It was an awesome seven course vegetarian meal. This was my first time not eating at a hotel. 24 hours later, I have no digestive excursions, so I am was very happy. Being white in India means you are automatically thought of as being wealthy. The rickshaw drivers will charge a local 40 rupees to go to the beach but will charge us 75. We usually have Chandra negotiate for us to get a better deal. We also have a group that will walk to prove a point, we don’t need rickshaws. We now get out and walk around town a lot by ourselves with out rickshaws and the rickshaw drivers think were crazy.