High point of Tiruchy....

Paid my respects to Tiruchy, (pop: 866,000) aka Trichy, aka Tiruchirapalli! Not unusual for Indian cities & towns to have several names for the same place. Ditto street names which could be marked on maps with their post independence Hindi name, but known popularly by locals/taxi drivers by the former colonial name. All adds to the excitement and confusion of the travel experience, n’est ce pas.

              Located just about in the centre of the state of Tamil Nadu, Trichy is not a large city comparatively, but is well able to compete in the noise and bedlam league- table with some of the most ear splitting klaxons yet encountered. My plan today has been to visit Rock Fort Temple, perched high on top of a huge rock, 3-4 kms away at the north end of the city. Last night some heavy rain and everywhere is a sea of mud. With open sewers, not too pleasant to imagine what is mixed into the cocktail of brown sludge.

           The ride out to Rock Fort Temple was well worth the effort. The entrance is guarded by a patient and friendly jumbo-sized real live elephant. The pachyderm apparently has special significance in Hindu mythology and is featured as part woman in the motifs adorning temples. Should know, but don’t, the significance of the fair sex as elephants. Like all good tourist sights, Rock Fort Temple did not disappoint in requiring special effort to attain it’s rewards. In this case, it was 486 stone steps that had to be climbed bare foot---this is a Hindu holy sight and to wear shoes in a temple is disrespectful---shoes are made of leather, leather comes from cattle and cows are viewed as the mother source of humanity! Anyway, that’s what the man told me. On my climb, not exactly comfortable for one with particularly sensitive feet, I passed several dark (and rather forbidding) Hindus only, candle lit prayer shrines carved into the rock. The summit of the climb provided great views of the city and one could see the grandfather of Hindu temples, to which people from all over India come on pilgrimage, in the distance. Personally, my ration is one temple a day only.

A group of pretty Tamil ladies almost at the summit...

               Carefully descended the 486 steps, back down into the narrow streets that compose the main bazaar district of Trichy. Light rain falling, I retired to a small restaurant for a glass of hot almond flavoured milk—delicious. Firmly support the concept of trying all the fruit & drink varieties on offer, but just cannot adapt to the heavy doses of spice on local food. 

               As locals have explained, Tamil Nadu (TN), a large and prosperous state in the Indian Union, has significant negative feelings about its role in the Indian Union. Firstly, the language spoken by the vast majority in TN is Tamil, as unlike the national language Hindi, as Russian is to English. There is significant resistance in TN to learning Hindi, which is seen by many as the language of the imperial ‘oppressors’ from Northern India. Secondly TN’s resistance is also centred on the issue of caste, central to the Hindu religion. The Brahmin are the top caste, ideally very light skinned and European looking---a la the Bollywood movie stars. Most people in Tamil Nadu have much darker complexions, to the point of being black skinned. There also appears to the outsider somewhat different facial features in TN compared to northern regions. In the north, there is wide spread feeling that Tamils are darker skinned and therefore lower in the caste system---a fact resented in TN.Interestingly, some contend that Tamils may be associated racially with the austro group of which Aboriginals in Australia belong.

          Doesn’t this all seem similar to racism issues in the Western world.

Rock Fort Temple