Old Tales - Devi Amma to the rescue

DISCLAIMER: I am not taking lessons in moral science or decrying any religion or faith or beliefs, so please just ensure that you drink a a good quantity of sense of humor before starting to read
This is a lore which came to me very recently and amma gave me a TL;DR version which goes 

This temple is not your dad's but someone named "in fond memory of some one who once had a life".

Full story (with lot of ice gola and golgappa)

Long long ago, so long ago, nobody knows how long go, but definitely not very long ago, somewhere near present day Coimbatore Shanmuga, Vinayagar and Ayyappa were playing in a new Shiva temple. Unlike temples of old this was a shiny concrete affair. Shiva and Devi were snoozing in the garbhagudi (sanctum).

Seeing appa and amma sleep, Shanmuga called his younger brothers. "Deyi Mani! Deyi Ganu! engada thoongindirukkal (where are you guys sleeping)? Eppa pathavulum aravanai puliyodharai daana? Stop eating aravana and puliyodharai all the time. Lets go play. Amma and appa are sleeping. No one to tell us dont do this, don't do that. I will also ask that Nandi and Bhairava to warn us when amma or appa wake up". Kanna Parvani (Parvani, shanmuga's peacock, his trusted vahana/mount) please squawk when amma or appa wakes up. If you sleep again like y'day no more snake snacks for you. Mind it! 

    Nyaan ningalude kude Kalikunalla(I will not play with you guys) said Ayyappa. Ganu huffed and said "there he goes again in Malayalam- Tamil buddy! Tamil!" Ayyappa repeated in Tamil that he did not want to play with them. Suddenly Parvani squawked so loudly that the lord of the gods woke from his slumber and came out running thinking that his kannukuttis (little calves) were in danger. Shanmuga turned to Parvani and asked "Kanna Parvani! yenda? yen? (why da? why?)". Parvani replied, "lord, I was doing mike testing 1, 2, 3". Shiva roared and gave him a hard knock on the head with the end of his trisoolam; turned to his kids and said "kanna! can you chaps just give us 1 day's sleep. Devi wants to binge-watch Kaliyuga from the beginning". All three of them said "Sorry appa! We will also take a nap." The lord of the gods gave an enigmatic smile and went back into the garbagudi. 

The three of them waited for the door to close and as soon as the door closed, Shanmuga and Vinayagar turned to Ayyappa and asked why will you not play with us? Ayyappa asserted that the two of them don't play fair. "First you said let's race riding each of our mounts. Your Parvani and Mooshik ran away when I came riding a tigress. So you cancelled the game and now you want to race without animal mounts. Tcha! Hutt! I don't want to play with you", pouted Ayyappa. Now Shanmuga and Vinayagar felt sorry for their attitude towards their anujakumaran and asked him what he would like to play?Ayyappa suggested to climb atop the temple structures. He said "It has been some time since we appreciated the art and architecture". Shanmuga and Vinayagar rued their decision; but they were gods and god-children, and they could not go back on their word and now they had to play Ayyappa's game of study art and architecture! and that too on a shiny concrete affair. Not very interesting. But they would not give up. Yet! And they looked around for the first structure to climb and their eyes fell on the gold leaf covered dwajastambam (flag pillar) and their eyes fully reflected their mischief. They turned to Ayyappa and said, "ok, let's start with studying the dwajastambham, We can use any implements to do the climb".  Shanmuga called for Parvani; climbed on his back and asked him to fly up to the top of the pillar while keeping his beak shut. Parvani had this useless uncontrollable desire to squawk during his short bursts of flight. Now Vinyagar using his 4 hands (chaturbuja) started ascending the pillar on his own. The two  reached the top of the pillar one after the other; Vinayagar was tugging at his tusk. He wanted to poke Shanmuga for cheating. But to their surprise, they noticed Ayyappa seated on top of the pillar, calmly eating aravana. Vinayagar forgot his irritation and said "Deyi Mani, enakkum thada aravanai(give me also)". They sat slurping aravanai and did not notice the flag pillar leaning out slowly. The  pillar could have supported may be one god, but three gods and one mount was one too many and started crumbling outward. it crashed into the gopuram (tall structure on gate) with a resounding crack. Parvani gave a competing alarm squawk. Jagatjanini came out as Bhadrakali; blue with red tongue lolling.  She broke the heavy door and wrought iron gate of the garbhagudi; She couldn't be botherd about the niceties like opening doors and gates properly when she was all worried and and angry thinking that some one was trying to harm her children. She screamed - "evan da angey (who is there?)" - Ayyappa, Shanmuga and Vinyagar on cue responded in unison "thillana thillana". The Bhadrakali gave way to Bhavasagaratarini. She sat down and collected the children in her lap and started crooning a lullaby when she noticed the fallen pillar and the crumbled gopuram. She asked who did this? Vinayagar and Shanmuga as was their wont pointed to Ayyappa and said he did. He climbed on top to eat aravana when it fell. She asked Ayyappa why did you climb the pillar and whom did you ask? Ayyappa pouting at the other two asked "It is my appa's temple. Why should I take anybody's permission". Bhavasagaratarini smiled and said, it is not your appa's temple. it is someone else's. Then whose temple is this they asked in unision. See that broken plinth over there. See a name written on it. On the plinth was written "in fond memory of ..." . The temple belongs to that maanga madayan (mango idiot or aam admi) and his children. It is not your Appa's temple. Ayyappa said sorry and nestled in her lap for his afternoon nap. The other two also nestled with a contended sigh! They could always win over their mother. With a wave of her hand, Devi restored the gopuram and flag pillar. Vinayagar asked "why did you repair the temple"? She said it is my husband's temple, how can I let it be broken. Shanmuga on cue (he always like to point out things), "just now you said it belonged to a maanga madayan and now you say it is appa's. Which is it?" The Jaganmata gave him a smile and said "you are kids, you wont understand meta-metaphysics"

Note: Fans of Rajnikanth will readily grasp the relation between "evan da angey" and "thillana thillana"

The day I almost met the Dalai Lama

A couple of days back I was watching two day old episodes of the food series - Master Chef Australia when lo and behold, I get to see the Dalai Lama which made me nostalgic and reminiscence about the past.  

Tis was 1997 and I was just out of college, job less, self-respect had reached the nadir, my worth in societal eyes was zero and I learnt from The Hindu that the Dalai Lama would be coming to Hyderabad for the installation of the massive Buddha statue.It later transpired that he did not consecrate the statue (that happened much later in this post). I read about the Dalai Lama a few day earlier in the Reader's Digest magazine and was much impressed by his fight against the Chinese. He is also one of the reasons why I have some respect for Nehru. When the Dalai Lama rode into India, Nehru gave him sanctuary much against the political wisdom of those times. Some say this act of Nehru ensured the Sino-India war actually took place. I have neither the information nor the bias to say anything about that war. Anyway back to the Dalai Lama. I wanted to see the Dalai Lama when he came to Hyderabad. Now to do that I needed some transport money and hence went to ask my amma and she ticked me off with a good word lashing. Any way, I managed to sneak out old newspapers, sold them for the fare and went to see the Dalai Lama. Murphy ensured that "everything goes wrong". I took the wrong bus, went to the wrong place and trudged 4 Kms to see the Dalai lama and by the time I reached the venue, the Dalai Lama had left. On the journey back home, disappointed and weary with thirst, I pondered on why I wanted to see him. What did I hope to achieve. I still am pondering. Fast forward to 2nd January 2006, the Dalai Lama was going to consecrate the Buddha statue. This time I was not in hell's hole. I was earning comfortably and was the master of my ship. I booked myself on a bus from Pune to Hyderabad on 30th December 2005, put an action plan to meet the seer and was quite happy with  the thought that I was going to meet the Dalai Lama. On D-Day I left home early (my mom didn't bother asking where was I off to) so that I could grab a good place. Reaching the venue, I noticed it was filled with people, careful probing and questioning revealed that most of them were "babus" who were to ensure that protocol was not breached. Whose protocol I still am not sure. Anyway I sat myself down and waited, waited, waited and then I got a glimpse of the seer. I tried to nudge closer but the security personnel ensured that I did not breach protocol. I moved slightly away, managed to get closer to the cordon, close enough to touch him and waited with abated breath. Then I managed to go into a time warp and ponder "why am I doing this?". I finally got out of the warp with the realization that it was just a whim. By the time the warp closed, the Dalai Lama was on the boat going towards the statue. 

Back to 2011 and Master chef Australia. The cooking was good, The seer did exactly as seers do-bless everyone and everything and I am still pondering why did I want to meet the Dalai Lama