Marathon Blogger Prompt 2- Thirst

It’s a thirst for knowledge that makes us go to places where we wouldn’t go on our own.

Visit to any place/venue is an adventure by itself, be it at a restaurant, movie, or even at a spiritual discourse.

If you have been to a spiritual discourse, you will realize that there is nothing new that you are likely to learn. Every discourse has same message to give. The magic mantra to peace and love is to watch your thoughts.

But thoughts play a very tricky game. Have you watched your thoughts today?

Lets do one experiment.

Sit straight, cross-legged and close your eyes.

Think only of a flower. The flower is red in color. It has sweet fragrance. It has velvet touch.

Set your alarm clock for twenty minutes. You must only think of this flower and just repeat ‘This is beautiful”

Visualize the red color, feel its velvety touch, inhale the sweet smell.

In twenty minutes, did your mind wander? What else did you think?

Your thirst for knowledge will never allow your mind to rest. While repeating the words “This is beautiful” your mind might wander to many more such beautiful things, then maybe to ugly things, about the people you met on that day, the things they said to you, the number of times you got irritated and thoughts wander on and on….

Did it happen to you? The more knowledgable we are, the more distracted we are.

What do I talk about twenty minutes? Even if your mind was still for just two minutes it will be a miracle.

While reading this two-minute post, were you able to keep your thoughts on this post alone?

What else were you thinking while reading this post.??

Want to share???

Marathon Bloggers Prompt Post 1 – Colors -Fractal Art.

I am in creative mood.

Many years ago, in moods like these, I normally would take the paints and color the walls of my room. There were many such patches on the wall with blotches of paints here and there. Some near my bedside, some on the table, some behind the doors and some even in the stairways. But that was long time ago.

I can’t possibly do that now. Can I?

But still I do get creative sometimes, and since most of my time is spend on digital activities, photoshop comes closest to honing my creative spirit.

Working on few layers, with blotches of colors here and there, playing with vector design, I was able to create this fractal art.

This gave me an idea to work on an eye.

Quite happy with this frame, I decide to work on this eye on many layers.

In every layer, I played with transformation, changing the width, length and angle of the design. Added filters to some layers  and a circular 3-D effect

Voila! Finally made a visual digital fractal painting that looked like this.

Chap Book For Little Dude

Little dude has started school. Early morning he wakes up, dresses up, takes his breakfast and water bottle and goes to school.

He learns nursery poems, listens to stories, and gets potty training and learns how to socialize with other kids.

I thought he could be ready for some sight-reading too and decided to make for him a chap-book.

The easy way to get the child interested is to show him something that he is familiar with. Every child is familiar with the people he meets everyday. The family that is close to him. Hence I decided to make a chapbook with the pictures of his family members.

I went through his album and selected the pictures of all his family members. I then worked on Photoshop, writing text, drawing balloons wherein I inserted sounds, splitting the words into syllables.

With all the pages in order, it was ready for printing, cuttings and arranging the pages in order.

Next was stitching the pages to make a book.

The greatest joy was seeing the little dude excited to see his own pictures in a book!!!

Yes, he is learning phonetics now!! I am extremely happy……

Miniature Replica of Balaji Temple at Narayanpur

Everyone who visits India makes at least one visit to the temples or mosque. Spirituality is so strongly observed that even an atheist is confused. It is difficult to explain about the crowd standing in long queue for six hours just to get thirty seconds glimpse of the idol inside the temple, of offering garlands and coconuts which are recycled and resold at stalls outside the temple, of eating oily and sweet Prasad even though the health does not permit. To an atheist, temples are just architectural monuments to be enjoyed for their carvings on pillars and ceiling, but to a devotee, it’s a place where their prayers can be answered, it’s the place where they can find peace and compassion.

Whatever the reason, the temple devoted to Venkateswara at Tirumala is believed to be one of the richest pilgrimage center in India. The temple is visited by about 50,000 to 100,000 pilgrims daily, while on special occasions and festivals like the annual Brahmotsavam, the number of pilgrims shoots up to 500,000, making it the most-visited holy place in the world. The popularity of this temple is so high that they have made replica of this temple in different parts of India.

Image source 

 One such replica is in Narayanpur, near Pune. Not having the opportunity to visit the temple at Tirupati, I was curious to visit this place at Narayanpur.

We started from Pune early morning; it was warm and sunny day. Driving through the crowded traffic took a long time; we finally touch the express highway for a pleasant drive through vast fields spread for miles. The plants and trees on route were yellow and light green, family informed me that in rainy season the fields come alive, with lots of greenery and waterfalls on hills. It makes a pleasant drive.

After a long drive of more than 100 minutes, we finally drove through dirt part to reach the beautiful Balaji temple.

You are suddenly transferred to a different world as soon as you enter the gates. The lawns are manicured, the cleanliness is maintained, against the backdrop of the hills, the temple stand proud and prominent, mimicked in wood and painted in grey oil paint. The sculpted spire over the sanctum sanctorum is painted yellow to pay obeisance to the gold spire of Tirumala-Tirupati temple.

On special request from authorities, we were allowed to bring our car closer to the temple; we left our slippers in the car and walked on the red carpet into the temple. No photography is allowed and we were asked to deposit our gadgets with the security.

Inside the big iron carved gates, was a gold temple. Family informs me that it is exact replica of the original temple. Even the black stone and other building material have been brought from Tamil Nadu, The construction of the temple went on from 1996 to 2003. The prayers and procession also take place on festivals. The priests who perform the puja also hail from same families as those of the original temple. One of the most important offering in this temple, is the ‘Thulabharam’. In Thulabaram ritual, a devotee sits on a pan of a weighing balance and other pan is filled with materials greater than the weight of devotee. Devotees usually offer sugar, jiggery, holy basil leaves, banana, gold coins; this is mostly performed with newborn babies. We took ‘parikarma’ around the temple. There were carvings on the walls and paintings in bright colors on the ceiling. Deities were housed in small cubicles where people offered their prayers. At the end of the round, big size laddoo was distributed to every visitor.

We finished seeing the temple in 15 minutes, family tells me that they spend many hours doing parikarma at Tirupati, and they have to pay extra cash to cut short their queue or enter from the back entrance.

The unique ritual of tonsuring of ones head is also done here at temple premises and I did see many people donate their hair in exchange for the blessings of the Lord. The collected hair is publicly auctioned to international buyers from time to time for cosmetic use and hair extensions.

On our way back, the ride was picnic style, feasting on figs, guava,

mangoes

and of course bhel puri at the dhabbas.