A Typical Tamilian Marriage

India is a vast country with different religions and cultures. Here you will find people followingdifferent cultures. If you do not know what this preceding sentence means then I cannot help you as I am not here to explain.

Here you will find a slide show of a Tamilian Marriage. This is a simple one. A more Lavish one will have more activities but since I have not visited one such I cannot show you the same. But the basic procedures have been followed for a Tamilian Marriage.

However this is different from other marriages in India.. for eg. Punjabi Marriage,. Bengali Marriage, Marathi Marriage, Gujarati Marriage, sikh marriage, muslim marriage, christian marriage.. yes we have it all!!

Compare to Christian Marriages a Hindu marriage has lots of rituals!! And as said above, even in Hindu Marriages, the rituals vary from state to state (state means basic mother tongue is different even though they may be all Hindus). So here you see a Tamilian Hindu Marriage. Here they do a funny thing!! They hold the reception in the evening (and also the blessings ceremony) and the actual marriage on the morning next (at 6/7 am!!!!). I wonder what will happen if the bride or bridegroom thinks they do not want to marry next morning after getting all he gifts!! LOL!!

Oooopss!! Sorry no hard feelings!! That was just a joke!!

On the photos, well.. do not forget that I call myself an Amateur!!

By the way... I wish all that I can wish for the newly wed!!

The Indian Moustache!!

The Great India Moustache-. The chap is 75 years old and an ex-Indian Army Man!!

Moods

We go through different moods at different times.... and we react differently to the different moods depending on our nature. A loner will fall silent and brood if it is a bad mood or enjoy the moment alone if it is something good. Others would lash out if in a bad mood or share if it is something pleasant. When we see beautiful scenes we cannot always express them through words what the mind feels. This particular set will be a slide show of pictures which I have shot which gave rise to feelings inside me.. feelings that cannot be described in words by me ... I will go on adding to the slide. You can slowdown the speed by clicking the minus sign at the bottom.

Mahaballipuram (Mamallapuram), Chennai, India

You can see three things at Mahaballipuram or Mamallapuram as they call it in in Chennai (City near this place in the State of Tamil Nadu, India):
1. Arjuna's Penance
2. Five 'Rathas' or 5 Chariots
3. Shore Temple (on the beach).

The slide show shows only the first two for now plus an additional site which I am not recalling now!!! hahahaha!! It also show the lighthouse area which is not listed above.

East Coast Road (ECR) Chennai to Puducherry (Pondycherry), India

ECR is boring... this guy says ... come to think of it is...if you consider that it is a straight road leading to Pondycherry (Puducherry) & barring the barren beaches on the left side and a few good sights of water around you there is nothing else on the road. .. but then ECR has a lot of places to lose yourself. Read this here.... I believe that one can enjoy nature only when one is tuned onto nature..... you need to have an antenna that picks up the signals that mother nature keeps sending to us all the time....and if you are one who enjoys only the Shopping Malls..then you are certainly not one of them!! ... Here on ECR there are lot of options including virgin beaches for you to lose yourself on the sides as well as enjoy a full moon night on the water side.. as my photo shows...

Photographically speaking I am not very happy with my photos.... I needed to adjust for the contrasting lights for the beaches... I am making some mistake... I do not know what yet.. earlier when I have taken shots of Goa or Andamans the beaches with the sky in the background came out well.. but in Chennai it seems the lights are too bright on the beaches and so the images do not have any contrast within.. them....there is no lighting difference between the subjects in the front and the backgrounds... and also for the bright and plain lighting all along the sea, the sky and the beaches!!....I am learning too. Here I have taken the same scene with different exposures to see which comes out better., then thought why waste them?

MADURAI, INDIA

Slides of Meenakshi Temple Madurai, Tamil Nadu, India. The photos show you the temple from outside the boundary walls as I went when it was closed (the inside photos will be in the text book uploaded here. The other photos show the museum inside the temple, the Thirumalai Nayakkar Mahal (or Palace) and its own museum showing artifacts from 12-13 Century AD.

The story / Lores can be read / downloaded from here.

This is a pamphlet of Madurai which can give you some idea of spots to see in and around Madurai.

Ramar Sethu, Rameshwaram, India

You can read about Rameswaram here (the legend etc). This Shivastalam is considered to be one of the holiest shrines in India. It represents the southernmost of the 12 Jyotirlingams of India and has been a time honored pilgirmage center held on par with Banaras. The island-temple town is located off of the Sethu coast of Tamilnadu (south eastern). This shrine is regarded as the 8th of the Tevara Stalams in the Pandya region of Tamilnadu.
This temple is assocated closely with the Ramayana and Rama's victorious return from Sri Lanka. You can read further here.

For the photographer's eye there is this 2 km long Pamban Bridge also called Indira Gandhi Bridge (what the heck? Everything seems to be named after the Gandhi Family only in India) connecting Mainland with the island or Rameswaram lies on the Indian end of the Palk Strait. There is a road bridge on which I travelled and the one below is the railway bridge which opens up in the middle to let ships pass through.

Then there is Dhanushkudi the farthest point of India towards Ceylon now called Sri Lanka where the Mythological Bridge of rocks built by Lord Hanuman (in Hindu Mythology this big monkey is the follower of Lord Rama) to make it easy for Rama to walk into Lanka to rescue his wife Sita.. This gap between India and Sri Lanka is now a controversy between Tamil Nadu Govt and BJP the party. You can read about the Sethusamudram Project here.

At Dhanushkudi you will see the ruins of a British Railway Station !!!! on the beach near the sea. Just walk back into the past and think of those days.............................................. the road to Dhanushkudi is something to be seen. Sea on both sides as the road is narrow and is constant ly windswept from both sides and so covered by white sand. The beaches on both sides are white and vast. On the right side when you go there is the male sea and on the left side is the female sea as per the locals.. (male sea is rough and the female sea is not). It is a fantastic experience -- a desert near the sea!!

Here you can see the Railway Crossing System from British Times (India thanks British Rule for gifting us the wonderful Indian Railways which is the largest single entity in India in terms of people employed and in terms of efficiency considering the vastly spread tracks all over the country). This lever closes the gates when a train comes.

You can see the slide show of the road from Madurai, the Rameshswaram temple, the sea, and Dhanuskudi. You can see the Architecture, fishermen, people bathing in the sea which they consider Holy each place photographed as a Historical or Mytholiogical relevance. You can read about them elsewhere (like I said earlier, why not leave the writing to people who have already done so on the web?). There is a place inside the Rameshswaram Temple where you will see a square well and people are taking holy bath from that water. The water is full of algae & is green and this makes me wonder that Human beings are so overwhelmed by religion that they will do anything in the name of the same- even educated ones. Other photos you will see are of Salt Heaps at Devipattinam.

Fashion Show in India

Fashion & Glamour Girls

This has been fully shot by me and so copyrighted to me obviously!! LOL!! Of course the only problem is in some of the sequences. I really do not have time to move the photos in this slide!! Earlier I had hosted a few from this show, but then why waste the rest I told myself and here are them all.

The earlier links are here

Animal- Man's Best Friend

New Delhi through a Window

Have you ever wondered looking out from the window over a city if the city has a mind of its own?

Have you ever felt watching those numerous roof tops that each house will have a story to tell of its own?

Have you ever wondered watching the winding lanes and by-lanes which see the footfalls of thousands every day, what they see and experience every day about mankind and its behaviour?

Each city has its own heartbeat, its own life. Everytime I have gone to Mumbai and looked out from my hotel window in the silence of the night, I have felt that I am looking at a Bombay (Mumbai) which the daytime Mumbai did not know about- A Mumbai in the night which is completely different from the daytime Mumbai we are habituated to see.

Well... these are a couple of my photos of Delhi in the day time from a window. So long Govt has not allowed New DEelhi to grow vertically and so you can see the distance. But soon this may change due to lack of space if the Builders' lobby has its way.

Roadside Temple in Haryana, North India

Typical Village in Haryana

Cowdung is the common fuel used in villages... India's own Bio-fuel.

Village Belle wth workload

Red Fort, New Delhi, India

Red Fort, New Delhi, India. Just a few photos. It is a very famous place so lots of photos will be available on the web, I guess.

Plus if I tell you everything here what will be the fun of actually coming here and seeing it for real?

There are a few which have been taken at the beginning of the light and sound show and one during-so please pardon my camera shake in one/two.

Cassandra Crosing-- Ooo Buffalo Crossing!!

Buffaloes crossing the Highway-- Give Way..Even the Army Gives way!!!

Oh What a Relief!!!

Nothing can be closer to nature than this!!

Of course I could not get closer, then my camera would have got smashed!!

Mobile Fruit Shop, India

Typical mobile shops or stalls for fruits and ornaments in India

Sarnath, Varanasi (Benares), India

Varanasi or Benares is not called the Holy city without reason. Many think it is only a Hindu City when history says otherwise. It is here that Sarnath where Lord Buddha delivered his first teachings. You can also get more details of Sarnath here.

By the way this is the orginal buggy of Maharaja of Benares, now with Taj Benares Hotel.


And here are today's "buggies" on the roads of Varanasi or Benares.



The Photos of Sarnath are in the slide show. But you need to have latest browser, java and something else (I am not sure what yet) to be able to see the slide show properly. Normally I suggest everybody should have Java Run Time environment, Macromedia, Shockwave, quicktime etc and one of this should take care (I say this because I have and am able to see the slide show)