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Well having been on the train, in a taxi and autorickshaw, we opted for the bus for our next leg of our journey from Mangalore to Hassan, in western Karnataka.... and because it was the only way we could get to Hassan on the day.
A gentle bus ride over the hills.... a brain rattling, teeth chattering, bone cracking, stomach churning journey over the Western Ghats...for five hours.
The deluxe bus journey run by the state transport corporation, began with a beaming and helpful conductor. We thought he'd given us the best seats on the bus - right at the back, where we could keep our ruckacks close, spread out and enjoy the ride. A promising start with air conditioning, free bottles of water and a cleansing tissue, which we were a little bemused at....later we learned it was necessary to wipe the sweat of fear that broke out over our foreheads periodically.
We landed (and that's what it felt like) in another dusty noisy busy market town. For some reason we were expecting it to be a small quiet version of Hebden Bridge with its historic temples and quaint villagers. What a mistake that expectation was!
Knowing that the ancient temple sites around Hassan, and nearby Belur and Halebid, were on the outskirts and not easy to get to by public transport, we went in search of the local tourist office. Starting with the map from the guidebook, and after many dead ends, we realised the book was a little out of date (published August 2007), and resorted to asking people. By what felt like the following morning we ended up at the steps of the hotel, that would direct us to the tourist office.
On route we crossed several hazardous roads. Hassan's roads were full of potholes, buses, cars, autorickshaws and multifarious carts pulled by fine looking bullocks or were they oxen? We even spotted a horse and foal sitting in the middle of a busy road seemingly unclaimed by any human and quite at ease with the lorries, trucks and buses speeding past them.
The tourist office scene, and it very much felt staged, reminded us of the DSS scenes in that classic comedy 'Bread'. Firstly we have to say it was a very well presented tourist office; glossy photographs and brochures of various temple sites andthen some. Behind the desk, that stretched the length of the room, sat the chief officer in her saree, with a number of people at her beck and call. We felt as if we had interrupted something, and were asked to sit down and tell her what we wanted. Following the usual theatrics of forms, passport, father's names, curiosity about our origin and blood type, her face glimmered with a sudden realisation of exactly what we wanted and she clicked her fingers, made a phone call and barked some orders. Before we knew it, we had booked a full day taxi tour for the following day to visit at least 8 different temples. We later realised that people here liked to do everything at once; we knew we would not be able to hack that much stimulation.
It was worth it, the 11thand 12thcentury capital cities of Belur and Halebid, had some amazing hoysala temple architecture. The detail of the friezes in the stone walls, the carvings in rocks and pillars depicted elephants, birds, dancers, musicians, battles and the gods in various heroic postures. The temples, according to the guidebook, were built as thanks for victory in battle. Our favourite on the outskirts of Hassan where we were the only visitors at that hour and got a detailed tour. The others however were full of mainly Indian visitors who would have recognised the stories depicted in the carvings and the various incarnations of the gods which sadly surpassed us - our knowledge of Hinduism being fairly tokenistic - although Col did narrate the story of Rama, Sita the 13 year Exile and Hanuman for a play when she was 9 - but she'd forgotten it.
The hawkers in front of temples selling everything from sandalwood mortars and pestles (we could do with one of those now) to tiny metal effigies of the gods and photographs of the temples were relentless. In addition we had to de-chappal and buy them back for a rupee per 'pare' which made us laugh becauseit obviously meant pair but 'pare' is the Hindi word for foot. Maybe there are many one chappalled pilgrims, we don't know - the subtleties bypassed us. After our third temple visit, we decided to cut the tour short and end it for the day - the combined impact of heat, people and de-chappalling and taken its toll on us, and we headed back to Hassan.
The following day we decided to take the day at our own pace. We managed to get a bus to nearby Sravanabelagola to visit a 10thcentury Jain statue of Gommateshwara. The statue, 17m high, is of an enlightened prince called Bahubali, who surrendered his rights to a kingdom to take up the life of meditation. Can't remember where I read it, but it is the tallest monolith on earth...
The barefoot walk up the 700 granite steps to the statue was refreshing, the height bringing just the right amount of coolness to make the walk comfortable. We reached the top, looked up to what seemed a hundred foot Jain statue. The expression on the face is the same expression depicted on the Buddha. Jainism came about the same time as Buddhism, both founders coming from privileged Brahminic families, in the same border region of what is now India and Nepal.
The essence of Jainism is that all life is sacred and that every living entity has within it an indestructable and immortal soul. So much so that devout Jains carry 'whisks' to wave in front of them and cover their mouths to avoid accidentally killing insects or flies as they walk and breathe. We read that some Jains will not cook with potatoes and onions as they are thought to have microscopic souls. The ultimate objectives of Jains are to move towards a life which avoids intentional injury and does no harm to avoid leaving an indelible impurity on the soul, to practice chastity (including no sexual relations) and to give up all possessions (including clothes). We have yet to see the reality of this and it seems only a small minority of the Digambara sect of Jains have reached this level of actualisation and tend not to parade their piety as this would not be consistent with transcendence! Or maybe we're just too rooted in our creature comforts to think this possible!
We saw the splendid statue of Gommateshwara meditating, depicting a being who had been so still for such a long time that ants, worms and other earth bound creatures had set up home around his feet. Col thought it looked like a giant statue of her mate Pete.Joking aside, although the carving was not as intricate or as skillfully crafted, as those in the Hoysala temples (His hands and feet were huge, and his torso was disproportionately longer to his stocky legs); it was carved out of a single piece of rockand for us it embodied our reading of the Jain belief system and communicated a serenity more than these words can describe.
We left Hassan, its daily blackouts and mad traffic, for Mysore - the princely city.. watch this space
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