STUDY TOURS TO SRIRANGAM -- 1988 (CONTD)

The first photo is the Thai Car festival in Srirangam. I am giving my Tamil poem on the Temple Car in my Tamil Blog entry. The poem visualizes the Car or ThEr, as it is called in Tamil, as the symbolic form of the social communion of the whole society with its own values. It exhorts all and sundry to participate not only now but always in order to make meaningful and total the topographical filling of one's existence. The second photo is a rare pic of the Shakespearean play Merchant of Venice staged by my father and Prof C.S.Kamalapathi in aid of The Boys High School, Srirangam in 1980s. See the lively action arrested in some ancient architect's work of an elephant being tamed! Last one above is fundamental to the mythology of the Temple Town, Srirangam. Srirangam temple is called in tradition as the Ikshvaaku Kuladhanam. The story dates itself from the times of SriRaamaa, who on his coronation finals gave away important gifts to his friends and associates in the hardtimes and the war. Vibheeshanaa, the brother of Raavanaa of SriLanka, was given a special gift of the family tutelary deity of Ikshvaaku kulaa, viz., SriRanganaathaa. Vibheeshanaa chose this place to consecrate the Deity and built the temple around. The local story is that Vibheeshanaa comes even now in the mid of night, unseen to worship the Lord of the Lords, PERIYA PERUMAAL . In the snap shot of a statue on a pillar of Sesharaayar Mandapam, Vibheeshanaa is portrayed as carrying the Divine Casket, perhaps towards Srirangam.