Sri Sailam (awake)

Sri Sailam .  There are NO photos allowed in the temple, and even photos on the web aren't any better than what I have to post, so if you Wiki the temple, you won't see anything except maps really. I could only discretely take photos of the outside once we had gone through and come out to the vendors.  I had NO idea what I was in for = I thought this might be a half hour trip or something to a tourist attraction.  Oh, no, silly gringa. My friend's co-worker Kirin has a nice car and he has never visited the temple, so as a favor to us (and because he had never been) he drove us with his wife and very well behaved 11 month old daughter.  I didn't know why they had  6 liters of water and a huge bag of snax with them.  We woke up at 6:30 and took an hour long taxi ride to meet our driving friends, we drove south through Hyderabad and, well, you can figure it out on a map on wiki.  We stopped for breakfast (approx $2 for 4 people and a liter of water), and at some point stopped at a nice big tree and we all took turns peeing (excpet me bcuz I still had no idea how long the trip was and I felt it would be rude to ask) and daipering. It's slow going in the countryside because the roads are not paved as well and there are a lot more speed bumps.   Shoot, you want speed bumps, wait until you get to the game preserve = they're about every 2 or 3  liters to keep you from hitting the kilos and kilos of monkeys that are all over the place.  So we drove through a Tiger Reserve which took a few hours, it was cool to see all the termite hills, they look like elaborate sand castles that have been cried on a lot.  THEN after the Tiger Reserve we HAD TO DRIVE OVER THE MOUNTAIN.  Damn, I used up all the granola bars last week.   So we drove up the mountain TO THE DAM , then we crossed what was labeled  a "narrow and unstable bridge" to the other half of the mountain.  Since you don't just drive straight up a mountain , we had to take a jillion (ooo I love that word) VERY sharp turns on a single lane road. On these roads it's a good idea to pre-emtively honk before going around a turn becasue you don't know what's coming. I have to go eat some dinner, so I will finish later.
    It's tomorrow and I didn't save what I wrote this morning so I have to do it again.  We got to the temple, checked our shoes and went in.  THere were brass queue railings to keep the 100s of people moving through evenly.  The temple was stone and partly open aired with lots of carved pillars.  One room had 5 smallish cow statues in a row and people were burning incense and smashing open coconuts and flinging the water on the statues. There were bits of paint, flower petals and coconut rind everywhere.  upon leaving each room a priest ladled sweet curd water into your hand which you drank.  There are metal yellow boxes everywhere for you to put money donations.  I think you put in a small amount because you do this repeatedly.  In one room a priest put a red dot on all our foreheads and I gave him all my coins, he looked a little amused. Some priests would give you the liquid, and put a metal dome over your head and say a blessing.  We went into a little area where a priest did this to each of us an extra bit, especially the baby, and we gave him 100rp.  The baby isn't walking yet, but at some point a priest insisted she take off her shoes by gesturing to her feet, bringing his hands up to his forehead in prayer and pointing into the temple.  The shoes went into my purse.  I still had my purse because I knew we would need money and possibly water. They seem very hesitant to check a purse at a coat room here, but I have a wristlet that holds my $, i.d. and camera that I usually take with me in case I need to leave the purse behind.   When we got into the inner temple the line moved a lot slower.  The queue railings wrapped around and let us before 2 rooms which housed a god- I think an incarnation of Shiva.  The more serious people were blocking up the view to the room or praying there.  I didn't shove to the front because it's not there for me, but I saw a form of a god.  I skipped the last ladle of curd water because it was icky and it was all over my shirt anyway.  Lots of people leaned against the walls after the last room composing themselves.  My friend had been to this temple once before and our Hindu friends had not, so I followed behind everyone else doing what they did and having some coins ready.  When we left we sat on a grassy area for about an hour while Kirin got in line for some holy sweets.  We walked around a bit, but it was late, the temple closes at 3:30, so we got our shoes, changed the baby and left.  There was a waterfall to visit about 5 minutes up the road.  I got to wash my face and hands there at the water spout.
     About 1 in 3 or 4 people at the temple had a freshly shaved head.  There is another temple where you can shave your head before visiting this one.  A baby gets its head shaved when he eats his first solid food, a woman does it when she becomes a widow, and anyone can do it if the are praying for something very serious.  Lots of people were wearing nice, respectful, fancy clothing.  There were also a lot of ascetic men dressed mostly in orange with long beards and hair.  I was told that most of the ascetics are real but some are beggars who are lying and I wouldn't be able to tell the difference.
     Please keep in mind that I have NO IDEA what I am looking at, but this seems to be a very serious place where real pilgrims come.
    So after the waterfall we drove back the exact way we came.  It seemed a little easier on the car going down the mountain than up, and there was less traffic in our direction.  Going through the game reserve took a lot longer because the monkeys were all hanging out on the road.  Once we had to pull over to the far left because the monkeys wouldn't move and we couldn't get around them and leave room for oncoming traffic, so we just waited for the trucks to pass, then we went around the monkeys!  Termite hills about every 3 feet....ooops, I mean liters.  Oh, also, we got stuck in 2 cattle drives coming down the road in the opposite direction.  Just kind of had to stop and let it happen. In the coutryside there was very little traffic but everyone had high beams on.  Once we got back to the city we stopped at Kirin's parents house for a while so that they could kiss the baby, then we got a cab and got home at about 12:30. Dang, that was a long day.
  Photos 1)visited a waterfall on the way back 2)countryside was VERY beautiful 3) a roadful of monkeys 4)big statue near the temple 5)I let a strange foreign man in a loincloth touch my forehead 6) yes, cows wander around the temple grounds. The gate on the left is the exit from the temple, you come out into an area of drink vendors and a sitting area.  7)the first side of the dam, you can see the zig zaqg roads up the other side of the mountain