temple

We zoom though the city streets in a rickshaw passing noisy bazaars and main streets of the city, our legs pressed tight against the vibrating bar supporting the drivers seat. We turn off onto an alley way and zip through the narrow back lanes of the city. Turning a corner, the driver forgets to honk and Mona lets out a gasp as we nearly run head-on into a motorcyclist. Tucked away in the maze of alleys in the city, invisible amidst the crowded slums, noisy bazaars and tightly packed apartment buildings, is the small peaceful temple of their Lord Krishna.

We purchase flower pedals from a man whose offerings are spread out neatly on a tapestry in front of the entrance. We walk up three steps, though the yellow painted brick marking the entrance to the temple, then touch our face and chest with the same hand. We remove our shoes and let our bare feet touch the cool white marble floor. We complete one parikarama, which is a clockwise walk through the temple where we leave offerings in various places and touch trees, flowers, and rocks with out hands or forehead as a symbol of veneration. There are stray cats crouching in the nooks of the temple walls. I am standing under thick foliage in a part of the small temple that is roofless, despite the still existing rusted metal bars that once served as a supporting roof structure.

We make our way to where Lord Krishna is covered by beautifully carved wooden doors surrounded by an even more graceful, elaborate wooden trim. On either side of the wide beautifully carved wooden panel doors is a painting of a woman in a red sari sprinkled with jewels and looking towards the opening where the doors still remain closed, concealing Krishna.

We sit on the floor with the other men and women who are chanting and clapping and singing to awake their Lord Krishna. Women clothed in their exotic saris some yellow or red or blue are in front, while the men are sitting in the back. Many of the women have scarfs draped gently over their head. As the followers continue to sing and chant and clap I marvel at my surroundings- men laying with their bellies flat against the smooth floor with their arms outstretched, foliage peaking through the arched glassless window opening, a closed giant green arched elf-like door with a smaller arched entry in the lower left hand side. All the while I am hearing the entrancing sounds of the singing and chanting and praying that once fill up the room with their rhythm and unity, begin again.

A man in a white robe opens the panel doors, exposing a simple white sheet serving as a curtain, which Krishna resides behind. The sounds intensify with the eagerness of the singers clapping harder and straining their voices making themselves speak louder and faster, louder and faster. Women are scooting forward struggling to feel closer to the deity while the sounds continue to rise.

The man in white, unaffected by the harsh, eager atmosphere, opens to curtain with a most delicate manner.

A sudden hush sweeps through the room. The thick silence steeps only for an instant before a large bellied old man whose greying hair resembles a blonde color kneeling beside their awakened Lord Krishna begins reciting the prayers, sprinkling the god with red powdery kumkum, pink powdery gulala, and white powdery abli. Then the man sprinkles Krishna with a light orange liquid that is made from soaking kesuda flowers.

Women drape scarfs over their heads before the man kneeling besides Krishna whose prayers are echoing off the temple walls turns to us to scatter those same blessings. I feel the soft sensations of the red, white and pink powder landing abruptly on my skin, and the cold feeling of the kesuda dyed water being shot from a gun to my arms, feet, and face, hearing the prayers continue without pause or disturbance. I listen and feel.

All senses working at once. Seeing the intense black from my closed eyes or the soft red stained material of my jeans. Hearing the prayers, the breathing, the passing of gas, the squirt of the water shots, motorcycles mindlessly zooming past the temple. Tasting my salty thirst. Feeling the kesuda liquid slowly drying on my arm. Enveloped in a thick stench of pheromones and gas, I wonder whether or not we are merely animals kneeling before granite, hoping all throughout our lives to be organs working within something greater, but never being really sure.

The scattering of blessings slows down. The verbal prayers cease. We stand, performing one more parikarama before slipping on our shoes, and touching the floor with our hand, then our hand to our face and chest. We pass the giant green arched door on our walk down to the noisy streets to signal a rickshaw.