Tamil Nadu Temples
Virginia and Kate, my wife and daughter, volunteered to come along with me on my one-week trip to South India. So, I extended it to two weeks and added a trip to Madurai as part of that. After visiting Aravind Eye Hospital and Aurolab, we started on our vacation time. South India is famous for its temples. People are quite religious, and have a great deal of pride in their religious heritage and temples. We especially appreciated getting the run-down on major deities and the great stories: it helped us understand what we were seeing as we toured the area. One of the largest and most famous temples is in Madurai: the Meenakshi Amman Temple. It has numerous spectacular towers. When we arrived, all but one of the largest towers were covered: they need regular painting. We watched as men passed wooden poles up the last tower, as they built scaffolding lashed together (picture above). After the frame is up, they cover the frame with what looks like thatching: so you have this gia...