Visit to Thiruvalla and  other temples in Kerala
Contributed by Smt Subashini Narasimhan

< style="font-family: comic sans ms;">        On 10.12 Monday we (my sister, her mother-in-law, my Father and I) boarded the Allepey Express and reached Thrissur next morning by 7 am. Driver Robinson was waiting for us at the station and took us straight to Guruvayur Preevinnya Tourist home around 7.40 am.  - this is very near to the temple main entrance.  After the morning refreshments in the nearby Arya Nivas, we reached the temple around 9.00 am.  There was a long queue, but luckily it was moving as the “Nadai” was open and public were allowed darshan at that time.  We had darshan of Guruvayurappan at about 10.45 am.  Once again I was not happy about the darshan mainly because of the distance from the Karuvarai, the pushing crowd, and the fact that the Moorthy is very small.  Anyway My sister and Father were happy to have had a good darshan. Maami did not want to go through the crowded queue and as she has visited this temple already she opted to wait outside the temple.
        After this around the noon, we went to the Arya Nivas again and had a good lunch – we have to ask for white rice and then only Kerala hotels will give us cooked raw rice otherwise it will be boiled rice which we are not normally used to.  It was almost 1pm by the time we reached back the hotel.  So we decided to take rest till 3 pm and vacate the room and start our evening trip.

We left the hotel at 3 pm and did some shopping nearby and left the place around 3.15 pm.

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        The first temple to visit was Thirumoozhikalam- Sri SukthiNatha Perumal.  It is in a remote village, which is somewhat developing now, and about 3 to 4 kms from Angamali station road. We drove for nearly 70 kms from Guruvayur to reach the temple. It was very difficult to locate the temple.  It is locally known as Lakshmanar temple. When we reached the temple it was nearing 4.30 pm and they were just opening the temple.  In Kerala, they call the bhattar as “Thirumeni”.  It was a wonderful sight to have the darshan of the Lord in the naturally lit oil lamps.  When the Thirumeni took the Aarthi the local people were so courteous and asked us to have the darshan from near the entrance and offered their place and told us “Thozhudhukkol – you are visitor here” – which is really remarkable with this crowd.  Keralites are generally calm people and there is hardly any noise or anyone speaking inside the temple premises. We went around all the sannidhis in the temple.  Thirumeni was lighting the lamps in all sannidhis with sincere devotion. The temple is maintained very well and the lamps – given the large number of them – are cleaned and maintained very well – which is not that common in our place. In these temples they take money only for oil for lighting the lamps inside the sanctum sanctorum.  < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">

        After this we took the guidance from the ladies working in the temple to go to Thirukatkarai temple. After having a tea in the nearby teastall (there are hardly any shops in the vicinity), we started our journey to Thirukakkara – VAmanar temple.  It is near Kalammassery and next to the Cochin University – however the route is very confusing and better to simply follow the roadsigns for Chhottanikkara as this temple is located enroute. From Thirumoozhikalam temple we came back to the main road of Angamali station and then followed the route to Ernakulam/Cochin. This is about 25- to 30 kms from Thirumoozhikalam temple.  People recognize it as Vaamanar temple.  This is the temple where the famous “Onam” festival is celebrated in a grand manner every year and even today there is a belief that Mahabli Chakravarty visits the town on that day. When we reached the temple it was almost 7 pm and the evening Aarthi was going on.  First we went into the Shiva temple which is located at the entrance of the complex.  We had aarthi darshan there and then went around the sannidhis and realized that the Nathaswara troop goes to the Vishnu temple for the final Aarthi and rushed to see the aarthi there.  We were lucky to have witnessed the aarthi here as well.  There was a man making garlands for Perumal and I asked him the price for the lotus garland for which he simply gave me a stare (and realising that I am a tourist) told me that pushpam is not for price there but only for Vaamanar and was kind enough to tell me that I can offer any amount of money I think fit. Then I took a garland and paid him 50 rupees on which he was extremely happy.  I kept the flowers on the peedam near the entrance of the karuvarai, but the Thirumeni was kind enough to stop me and told me that he will offer it to the Lord immediately as the Rakkala poojai was over.  The public there informed us to get the prasadams distributed which we were not aware of and even one of them gave us his share as he realised that we did not get any.  Keralites are simply well behaved people.  < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">

        After this we made our lengthy journey to Chhottanikkara Bhagavathy temple and in the darkness of the night it is really difficult. It is at 25 kms from Thirukkatkarai Vamanar temple – it looked as though the journey will never come to an end and at last when we arrived at the temple we found ourselves to be the last ones to enter the Sannidhi.  It was exactly 8.00 pm and after we entered in they closed the Nadai as they had to prepare for Seeveli of Bhagavathy Amman.  It is a real fiesta to be witnessed – the Utsavar in full alankaram is taken on elephant around the temple three times and then the temple is closed.  We were lucky to watch the Seeveli of the Goddess Mother.   < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">

        When we were coming out of the temple, our contact from Thiruvalla hotel called and informed us to have dinner somewhere nearby and then proceed to Thiruvalla, as the restaurant in the hotel will be closed by the time we reach Thiruvilla.  And so we had our dinner in the nearby hotel and reached Thiruvilla around 10.00 pm.- travelling about 78 kms.  < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">

Next day, on 12 Dec , Wednesday, we planned to visit the 6 temples near Thiruvalla area.

        We got ready by 6 am and left for Thiruvanvandur first (Keralites call it as Thiruvamandur).  They were opening the temple and we had very good Viswaroopam darshan of Pambanaiyappan – they call this temple as Nagulan Pradhishtai. The distance from Thiruvalla is 7 kms.  Generally in these temples one can find a small shop where they sell pooja items and also oil for the vilakku and it is special to give oil to the Perumal vilakku as they use only oil lit lamps inside the karpagraham - rather it is a chain of lamps decorated nicely that one can have a very good view of the perumal from the entrance of the sanctum sanctorum. It feels very good to have viswarupa darshan in that early morning when everything around is so silent and it looks as though the Lord was waiting for us to go and have HIS darshan in serenity.

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        The next temple we reached around 7 a.m. is the Thiruchengunroor/ Thiruchittathu ambalam.  Moolavar is Imayavarappan. Locals call this temple as “Dharmar pradishtai”. We had very good darshan but I could hardly remember the deities as we visited too many temples in one day and I realized that hereafter I should go to only 1 or 2 temples in a day and spend some time there so that I can recollect the place and the temple and the deities as well. This place is at a distance of 5 Kms from Thiruvanvandur.  < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">

        After this we had breakfast in one of the small hotels in Thiruvalla and proceeded to Aranmula. This is called as Thiruvaranvilai temple in Tamil and Keralites call it as ‘Aramula’ temple.  This is at a distance of 10 kms from Chengunroor. There are plenty of shops at the main entrance and one can buy all pooja items from here.  The temple is on a small hill and hence we have to climb quite a number of steps to reach the main entrance.  Moolavar is Thirukuralappan – Parthasarathy and this was the place where Arjunan did his penance after the Kurukshetra war where he killed Karnan in an unethical way.  We bought plenty of flowers for Perumal and the Thirumeni was very happy to receive the flowers and politely asked my permission to adorn the Lord with the garlands after the Uchi kaala pooja as the same will remain on the Thirumeni of the Lord till next morning otherwise they will have to remove the flowers before the Uchikala pooja and adorn the deity with fresh flowers. I happily agreed to this and the Bhattar was also looking very happy and as a result to my eyes the Moolavar also looked happy. To me what matters more is the ultimate darshan of Perumal and I do not mind if the flowers are offered in my absence.  This is a very huge temple and I decided to do a pradakshinam of the outer praakaram as well.  I was really blessed to do that as this only gave me the chance to see the Pambai River flowing on the other side of the temple touching the compound at the northern entrance.  I did not miss the chance to go down the steps (quite a lot of them) and touch the serene waters of Pambai.  This is a great sight – the long and wide Pambai in full directly flowing down from Sabarimala.  I thanked the Lord for advising me to take the outer Pradakshinam.  This temple is located in a place called “Pandalam” where the ornaments of Sri Ayyappan are kept and are brought to this temple before going on procession to the Sabarimala for Makara Jyothi.   < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">

After this we decided to go to Thirupuliyur temple and on the way at about a distance of 10 kms we saw Chenganoor NArasimhar temple entrance and so we stopped by to have Lord Narasimhar’s darshan.  He was adorned in Golden Kavacham and it was a feast to the eyes.  The bhattar was very kind and gave us plenty of prasadams.

Then we went from here to the nearby famous Chenganoor Bhagavathy temple.  Here, eventhough the main deity is Shiva, Parvathy has the first sthanam in this temple.  Here too there was golden kavacham adorning Parvathy.  As my Mother-in-law had some offerings to be given in this temple, we spent little more time in this temple and had good darshan of Goddess Parvathy.

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Then we went to Thirupuliyur temple which is at 5 kms distance from Bhagavathy temple. We had good darshan of Mayapiran – this temple is known as “Bhima Kshetram”.  < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">

From here we decided to go to Thirukodithanam and I thought we will be able to make it for the Seeveli there.  But we were not fortunate enough for this.  By the time we reached the temple it was closed.  So we rushed back to Thiruvalla as they told us that the Seeveli there is performed by noon time.  We picked up our local contact Mr. Giri from the City Union Bank and then went to the temple. Unfortunately here also we missed the Seeveli.  However, we had the glimpse of Perumal Srivallabhan exactly when they were closing the temple.  Giri told us that it is very important to have the freely distributed annadhana prasadam in that temple as that is the Neivedya prasadam of Perumal. (This is the reason I am writing so much about the anna prasadam)  It is distributed to whoever comes there at that time, be rich or poor, and it is all done very neatly.  In Kerala, they mix everything in one plate and give it – rice, sambar with plenty of vegetables, buttermilk, pickles and they even offered to mix the sarkarai pongal and a banana in that.  I politely refused the sarkarai pongal and banana and took them afterwards.  My Father and Sister also had the food.  Here, all of them wash their plates and put it back in its place and it is surprising to note that more than 100 or 150 people would have eaten in that place and everything looked so neat and clean after the distribution.  We donated some money for the daily annadana prasada scheme and then left the temple.  < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">

We reached back the hotel at around 12.30 or so and hence we had plenty of time to take rest.  Around 3 pm we got ready and left to reach Thirukodithanam in time so that we don’t have to rush in the evening for the train.  We reached the temple which is at a distance of 10Kms from the hotel.  Temple was not yet open.  The story behind the temple is that there are only 3 Vishnu shrines in India which have the word “Kadi” in their name – Thirukadinagar (Deva Prayag), ThiruKadigai (Sholingapuram Narasimhar temple) and Thirukadithanam (called as Thirukodithanam in Malayalam) and that if a person does a penance even for a “kadigai” time ( that is 24 minutes only) in any one of these temples they are sure to attain Moksham.

We were lucky enough to spend nearly an hour’s time in the temple premises waiting for the Nadai to be opened.  Also, we were lucky enough to have the acquaintance of an old man living in the local area who voluntarily came and told us the stalapuranam – in half Malayalam and half Tamil – and we managed to grasp whatever possible with the little bit of Malayala gnanam we have.  It seems there was an article about this temple recently in one of the famous Tamil dailies.  Temple was in preparation for their famous 10 day utsavam which was to start on 14 December.  Legend has it that it was here where Sahadevan worshipped the Lord Vishnu and from here KunthiDevi attained her Moksham – and it seems they light a lamp for KunthiDevi in that place till date.  When the nadai was opened we went inside and had a serene darshan of Arputha Narayanan and we were the only people there at that time and so we could stand near the Karuvarai for a longer time and could catch the eye-captivating image of the Lord in our memory. Bhattar lit the lamps which we offered and it feels good to think that we also contributed in some way to light the sanctum sanctorum of the Lord. In this temple exactly behind the karuvarai is Narasimhar deity – all in one circular type of a karuvarai.  We had several pradakshinams and had excellent darshan of Narasimhar as well.

  < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">From here we went straight to the temple in Thiruvalla as Giri told us to be there before 6 pm to watch the evening Aarthi.  This was a feast to the eyes to witness this Aarthi for Srivallabhan perumal.  He was adorned in full white Dhoti which was also drapped like his Poonul (sacred thread on his left shoulder).  He was adorned with a Thulasi maalai and a long golden Haaram and a golden crown– with his chathurbujam and his grand smiling face – it was a real feast for the eyes and the soul. We were lucky enough to watch the entire aarthi.  Then we took the prasadam and did the pradakshinam and left the temple.  This temple seems to be comparatively in much better financial condition that they even have an elephant in the premises. Giri gave us the music CD which he and a group of his friends have brought about this temple and Srivallaba Perumal.  The dwajasthambam has golden coating and there is a huge Panchaloga Garudar in the front.  It seems the structure which holds the Garudan (a very tall “Thai” type of architecture) goes below the ground as much as it is above the ground.  < style="font-family: comic sans ms;">

In Kerala it feels good to go around the temples especially when we are able to offer fresh flowers and oil for lighting the lamp and also knowing that it serves the purpose it is meant for.  Also all temples are maintained very neat and clean and the credit goes to the local population who take pride in maintaining their sthala Ambalam. Keralites are also quite and well behaved people who respect tourists and give way to them to have good darshan.  Above all, the officers in-charge of maintenance of the temple should be really honest that the temples are maintained properly and I think the revenue and the allotments are spent for the purpose they are meant for and not eaten away (partly or fully) by those in charge of it.  (vaeliye payirai meigira cases)