Akshardhaam Temple

The biggest temple in New Delhi with water shows and full 2 hour journey representation via exhibition, models and theatrical movie. A treat for tourists, travelers and locals. It is a modern temple, not ancient. It is opened in 2005 for public. One of its kind, you will be amazed with the architecture. No doubt it will make you peaceful and spell bound to the ambiance of temple.

So what is the thing that makes it unique? What is in there? Can you show us some snaps?

Let’s answer them one by one. One thing on which we all can agree that social and digital media in mobile phones , tablets and television most of the time corrupt our mind. A lot of information is already there and we are creating information on phones in each second. So whatever distractions are there, all are gone by submitting all cell phones and camera in temple. The phones, any cameras or gaming pods are not allowed in temple. People often check there pockets for phone within the temple. Either for Whatsapp messages or for clicking selfies. But this tension is gone by submitting the phone at the entrance. After a point you stop searching your phone in temple. It is good thing. Your mind will be tension free. No calls, no messages, no selfies, no fear of dying battery. Isn’t it good? After cutting off from material things you will start focusing on the temple and architecture.

When you enter after security check, there is entrance of 10 gates through which water is flowing. You will see when you will get there. You can hear the water flowing. The real natural voice of water. 5 gates on left and 5 gates on right. And in each gate water is flowing in parallel rows. After crossing that, you will find amazing architecture of how stones merged out to small umbrella/dome with 4 pillars. It’s all stone. Many architectures and stone casting persons participated in this. If you look at them closely then you can realize that each and every small details are also taken care of. After going through this you have already forgotten about the outside world where mobile phones exist.

Going forward there is small museum. A mini fountain is placed after the museum, which is cute. On the right-hand side of mini fountain is the main temple. On the left, there are statues of great Freedom Fighters like Rani Lakshmi Bai, Maharana Pratap, Bhagat Singh etc. with audio roaring for their courageous story. You will get to know about some legends of India while walking through them. It’s a good walk and it will take around 30-40 minutes to go through all.

After wandering among the legends of India, you will move towards the temple. You don’t have to follow the same route as I am describing. You submit your shoes, so that temple would be clean. You follow the stairs. You reach the main temple with a huge dome and the roof contains very good architecture. If you keep a guide, then he will describe the meaning of each sculpture and design. Very minute and delicate structures and each is visible separately. You will wonder how they have created this. And there are mini domes and each dome has different structures or painting on roof. Apart from the statue of gods which are as beautiful as possible, there are painting which is telling a story. It is the story of Swaminarayan. After a full circle, you come out from main temple. The base of main temple is full of elephant statues and trees. I heard some tour guide saying that these big elephants’ sculpture is carved out from single rock. I aback by that. Oh wow! What a careful work have been done by architects. There is water around the base of main temple. At night you can see the reflection of whole temple in water. This view has different beauty.

I forgot to mention. Please buy the Musical fountain show tickets and Theater tickets before entering the temple. So that after visiting the main temple you don’t have to wait in queue to buy tickets. I have seen musical fountain show 3 times. After visiting the main temple, you can go for the water show and sit there. You want some water showers then please sit at the bottom of sitting area. If you are hungry then popcorn and juice stall are there by the side. Enjoy the water show. After seeing so much aesthetic things which sooth your senses, you will be very peaceful after seeing the musical fountain. There are kids, water moving on the beat of water and light effects. I can’t describe that in words here. It is a feeling. And if you see that then you will suggest the same to others. Just go and see the musical fountain. It is must visit thing when you are in India.

The Dream Catcher (Part 4)

The Traveler

What do you do when you meet a person again? I am very bad at this. We have met in Kasol and now here. What to do? Say Hi and Wave my hand or a professional handshake? What they will think that I am a stalker or something? With lots of dilemma in my mind, I drop of the jeep and went to them and said “What a small world! We met again”.

They shook hands with smile and one of the biker said “Are you following us dude? Because following a group of guys is lame and LGBT is still not legal yet here”.

I replied “No, even If the LGBT is legal.” And they laughed. “Good to see you guys here” I smiled.

Its evening so I started searching for place to stay in Kaza. They have pre-booked theirs, not like me. So when they checked in I asked in same home stay if they have any available room. The person was making excuses. Then one of the biker said he is with us. So that worked and I got the room. There are many home stays so they have adjusted one for me.

After getting a place to stay, I got of my bag and took my camera again and started wandering in Kaza Village. Kaza Village is very neat and clean. I have never seen a village so neat and clean. Even I can say the cities in India are not as clean as this village. I am impressed. Very well maintained. And you can see the Key Monastery from Village. It around 30 Km from Kaza and it takes around 1 hour to go there.

There is NGO also who accept the donations in form of monetary or cloths or food. Many artifacts made by village people only. You can buy souvenir from there. I don’t have much money. So I have donated some photographs, so they can use them as wallpaper in advertisement or album to show tourists. It’s getting dark as the first thumb rule of mountains is sleep early and wake early. In the night we can’t go to Key Monastery but we can go to roads form where we can get the front view of Key Monastery.

We have bikes and I hopped on one of them with my camera. I recorded the night view where all is dark and only lights from villages and key monastery are visible. On the bike you can spread your hands and feels like flying. Because the breeze is so cold as it feels like above the cloud. One of the biker is showing same stunt with hands spread but he is the one also driving the bike. Well he succeeded in doing that.

We stopped on the very quiet and vacant road. No vehicle is arriving at this time. We have all road to our own. We slept, danced and litter on the road. The view is great where the whole sky is canvas and the stars with black mountains are drawn on it. And the lights on mountains are decorated at them. Even darkness has its beauty and charm. We all 5 just sat for some time and no words were spoken. Only the cold breeze is there to be felt and the view to be enjoyed. The aesthetic beauty which satisfies your soul. And India is full of these kind of experiences. I am like viewing this without any blink an eye. The cold breeze hitting the naked eyes which is causing the flow of tears. One of the biker broke the silence. He said we have been here at this place many times but this view never has still his charm. Each time it is more beautiful and refreshing. Many tourist and travels go here and there but these kind of things are eternal.

We are all spell bound and after sometime we all get up and started moving for the bikes. I stopped all and asked for a group click. Snapped some memories and they have also shared their email ids so that I can share the pics. We are all silent not talking much on the way to home stay. All are at peace. Not much noise from inner or outer. We went for dinner where we enjoyed local cuisine. We have Thukpa and fresh green peas vegetable with gravy. It is good. I am a foodie but I hesitate while trying any new food. But the food here is good and not much spicy but tasty. It’s almost 8 p.m. in night and whole village is close. Not a single person you can see outside on streets. Markets are also closed. We are walking after the dinner. We only here the voice of the wind passing by.

While going upstairs, I am again thinking of having a home here for living. It happens to me. The places which I like the most, I want to spend rest of my life there. These kind of thoughts bug me very often. I shared the same with the bikers. They said nice thought but how many homes you are going to build? There are a lot of peaceful and beautiful places in India. You will get tired of making houses at each place.

“True that”, I replied.

One of guy said “When you have whole country as your home so why should we bother to build a house at one place. Let’s live everywhere. We are travelers, not tourists. We don’t build houses. Tourists build a home at one place. When they fed up with life, they start searching for peace in places like this. After finding peace for some time they again left to their respective homes. But, travelers are nomadic. They just travel. They are travelling and will be travelling.”

“It is deep. Now I know the difference between traveler and tourist. But sometimes I think that how last it is going to long. We will age and our body will not support travel. We have to stop at one time.” I added.

“True. That’s why we have our jobs for retirement. Always have some savings for your retirement.” The guy answered.

As we moved to our rooms. We shared a good night with smile and went to bed. These are the things which can’t be learnt in a school or college. These comes with experience. And our India is full of experiences. More people is equal to more lives is equal to more experience. We were taught knowledge in school and college but wisdom is gained only through experiences.