Amman Temple Festival

Submitted by judelined on Tue, 08/03/2010 - 01:40
There is a small temple next to my house "BALA NAAGATHAMMAN KOIL". Every year during the month of Aadi the temple festival is celebrated very grandly. They have a four to five day long programme beginning on Friday with 108 Paalkudam in the morning and dance and drama in the evening, followed by the Vazakku Maram Pooti on Saturday, Koozhl in the afternoon and Amman procession on Sunday night (started this year at 10 pm and ended at 5 am next morning) and finally a light music programme on Monday night. I am uploading a picture of the decorated Amman that came in procession by our house on 1 Aug (sunday night). It was a diving sight for everyone which i wanted to share with all my friends here...
brindhanagesh
This is a lovely divine treat, Judy:) I always like to see the decorated Deities with nice colourful flowers. There is a Vinayakar temple in the campus where i stayed in Chennai and we used to have Vilakku poojai in the month of Aadi. For that i used to drape the saree to the main Vilakku and make alankaram with others help every year. It was a pleasure and thought that i had some blessings to get that oppurtunity which i miss in Kolkata.
Tue, 08/03/2010 - 03:07 Permalink
ammuchandhini
hai judy...thanks for sharing this....here also at chrompet coming sunday d same festival is going to take place at our Padaivettamman koil...let me see if i can take a snap and share it here....
Tue, 08/03/2010 - 03:46 Permalink
sjnt
Well captured picture Judy. I will upload vilakkupooja and Bhagavathysevai pics from our aptmts held on Sunday.
Tue, 08/03/2010 - 04:33 Permalink
jayamohan
Judy, the moment I see 'Amman koil aadi festival', what comes to my mind is the 2-3 days loudspeaker 'alarals' near my house where they would place 4 conical ones(inspite of being banned) and drive us go mad with sound from morning to night. Children cannot study, we cannot attend phone calls nor watch a TV program......If we request them to reduce the sound they wont oblige saying it is an onetime affair of the year! Iam intersted to know the opinions of our members on this subject!
Tue, 08/03/2010 - 08:05 Permalink
judelined
Jaya don't talk about the noise pollution during that week of the festival. My house is 'bang' next to the temple and those days when my kids were schooling they used to play music not only during that week but the whole month of aadi and maargazhi too. It used to kill us - I literally used to go on the road and fight with those men to reduce the sound and sometimes threatened to sit on the road until they reduced the sound. Best joke would be that all the cone speakers would face my house only. I would fight with them and make them turn it in all directions so that all can enjoy the noise. 5 mts later they will be facing my house again (because the others would object). Finally I would tell them, "please make the speakers face the sky thereby the god will hear the music directly and shower all his blessings on you". All of them used to have a good laugh when they would see me fighting. I am quite famous in my area because of this. Finally with much difficulty we managed to convince them to change to box speakers (not that it makes any difference at all) and whenever they see me outside, they will reduce the volume - but the moment I go inside they will increase the volume. We also managed to convince them to reduce the time frame for the music - like few hours in the morning and evening and only during the festival. In fact we gifted the temple a small music system so that they played the music only inside the temple on other days (that way we have less headache during those months). Not only noise pollution - we are alco faced with garbage problems during that week. Cooking for these 4 days takes place next door/ outside my house and prasadam is served at intervals in 'dhonnais' which are scattered all over, not to mention the "annadhanam" on the day of '108 paalkudam' - tables will be put in front of our gate and everyone will sit and eat, spit paan and drop litter and empty water packets all over in front of our house. We have the time of our life, sweeping and cleaning after that. You won't believe, this temple festival got over on Monday and we are still getting rid of the excess garbage till today. Then on the day of the Vazukku Maram, they will put this big log of wood in the junction outside my house and the boys (not less than 50) will be jumping up and down and all over. One water lorry will be parked outside and they will keep on filling big plastic drums (they will mix manjal podi in the water) and pour water on the boys who are attempting to climb up- so entire street gets full of water, slush and messy. If these festivals were conducted in a more organised and neater manner I am sure everyone would enjoy it. Now everyone heard my freshly experienced tales of woe - anyone else??
Tue, 08/03/2010 - 23:16 Permalink
Lata
Nice picture. Yes, loud music during the festival days...who could forget that!? I enjoyed reading all that has been said so far. :)
Wed, 08/04/2010 - 00:11 Permalink
umaraja
s ofcourse its a grt torture experiencing such sounds, i luv 2 hear divine songs, but the neighbourhood temple just makes me cry ,, esply early morng they begin by 5.30 and start their screamings polluting the entire early morning. we cant even hav a peaceful walk in the garden, and kids are highly disturbed while making up 2 skools. i jst used 2 go stealthily near the set and jst reduce the vol, but smhw or the othr they immediately raise.. thank god its al ovr by tmrw.. jude i coudnt control my laugh 4 ur idea 2 face the speakers towards the sky,, though v laugh its really a painful session during those days,, and i stil pity people 4 hwcome they could pray in such a noisy atmosphere ,,,ooommmgggg
Wed, 08/11/2010 - 07:44 Permalink