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In the morning I hired a taxi (800 Rupees/ $17.00) for a day trip to Puri. It is said to be one of the four holiest places in India.
India 2002 - Part Two: Bhubaneswar, Puri & Konark
Dougburnett2003-11-24 11:56:59
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I was flying to Hyderabad in the evening so I arranged with the desk to keep my room until 6:00 for half a day's rent. When I have an evening flight I hate being room-less in the afternoon and find it worth the extra money to have a place to rest.
I headed south from the hotel, disappointing all the taxi drivers by declining their service, and flagged down a bicycle rickshaw. I asked him to take me to Bindu Sagar, a huge tank (as artificial ponds are known in India) near Bhubaneswar's largest and best know temple, the Lingaraj Mandir.
This temple is also closed to non-Hindus, but as I was walking around I came upon a viewing platform. Well, actually a tout called out inviting me to view the temple from the platform. I walked over and he showed me a guest book where people had written their names and the amount they paid to view the temple. "Anything you want," he said, so I signed my name and wrote down 50 Rupees. He stood in my way and said, "Sorry, that's not enough." Then there followed a short discussion about exactly what "anything you want" really meant. Several other guys who were hanging around joined in - on the tout's side of course. In the end I change my entry to read 100 Rupees and was allowed to mount the platform.
From where I stood I could see the temples many towers. They looked like they were made of layers of rounded disks - kind of like a huge stack of stone cookies. There were also pilgrims walking from temple to temple, piles of flowers and the smell of incense was in the air. I asked the platform attendant to take my picture with the towers in the back and then left.
I walked around to the front of the temple where I saw a line of beggars and a guy selling change. I knelt down and bought 10 Rupees worth of coins, smaller in size and denomination than any I had seen before. I stood up and started to put a few
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See photographs from:
India Gallery
