18-20 March, Bharata Yatra 2008,
Kolkata Brahmasthana Pratishta
the brahmasthanam, 2oth of its kind, is being installed by amma here. i was there for the first one when amma installed in kodungallur. during the time of abhishekam, there is something in amma’s face, that you simply cannot miss. it has been the same for the last 19 brahmasthanams i have seen, soooo radiant, blissful, an enchanting, silent smile on her moon-like face. when you see the love with which amma pours water on the murthi, you wonder, is the stone image alive? it is the same expression when amma consoles a distressed one! for amma, worshipping the stone or wiping the tears are all same. they are all divine.
during pratishta, eagles were circling around the temple. i always wonder, what is the connection with these eagles and amma’s installations and other religious festivals? who sends the sms alert asking them to come?
the new brahmasthanam /ashram/school complex is in a compound where a company used to be. as you enter, you see the temple, then the ashram, and the school.
i saw ‘hanuman maonkeys,’ long-tailed, black and white ones. they can throw themselves up in meters.
i heard that the mosquitos were vicious, but it didn’t bother me much. some westerners used great amounts of repellant, all kinds, to no avail.
the landscape of bengal has so much similarity with kerala; the rivers and ponds, especially. the food and the clothing is totally different. language is also different. i thought if you want to speak Bengali, it’s easy. put a rasagulla (a bengali sweet, the size of a table tennis ball) in your mouth and say it. it will sound bengali. for example, they don’t have letter v, they used b instead. so veena ( musical instrument) becomes beena. ‘devi’ becomes ‘debi.’
amma sang a lot of bengali songs. in one bhajan, the lines are ‘jai jai ma, jai jai ma’ but in bengali it becomes ‘joy joy joy ma.’
what a joy in singing the glory of the divine mother.