Thursday 2 October 2014
I'm not sure how many Indians (others are out of question) know about the Ashtavinayaka.
Well, 'ashta' means eight and 'vinayaka' means Ganesh so, 'Ashtavinayaka' loosely translates to 'Eight Ganesh'. A lot of Ganpati followers go on 'Ashtavinayaka yatra'. That is a pilgrimage to the eight temples that house distinct idols of Ganesh, in a proper sequence. And, it is customary to visit the first Ganpati after visiting all eight, just to complete the circle or 'dakshina'.
All of these temples happen to be situated around the city I live in, Pune. My parents had already done this pilgrimage when they moved to the city, along with my brother. However, I wasn't born back then and had missed it. So, when my uncle suggested a repeat pilgrimage, my mother made it compulsory for me to come, but my brother was allowed to sit home. Back then, I hadn't told my mom about my atheism so...I couldn't back out of it.
Anyway, as it turns out, these eight temples are not near each other. And, it would take a whole day to visit all eight. Which means, my sunday was going to be spent. Well, here's a map of the eight temples:
Now, guess what? Here's the sequence:
- Mayureshwar a.k.a Moreshwar
- Siddhivinayak
- Ballaleshwar
- Varadavinayak
- Chintamani
- Girijatmaj
- Vighneshwar
- Mahaganapati
Here's the sequence:
So, a messed up sequence which involves visiting the two ends of the city. That means, 2 whole days are required for the pilgrimage, 2 sundays.
Instead of making the trip easier for the followers that this God has, it has made it even worse.
It wasn't enough to make eight temples instead of one.
It still wasn't enough, so they were built far from each other.
If that wasn't enough, they were given a crazy sequence to follow.
And if that wasn't enough, these temples had a god damn obstacle course.
