Ashoka

We decided that we actually had planned an extra day in Orissa that wasn’t needed, so we worked with our local operators to change our itinerary. They were amazingly cooperative and fast in executing our changes.

We started off in Puri going to a potting village. We almost cut this out of our itinerary. We are thankful that we didn’t. It was a wonderful experience. The village was actually in the city of Puri. I expected them to be selling all kinds of pots to tourists. I was happily mistaken. We walked down narrow dirt streets, with potters working in almost every small house. The pots, however, were not meant for tourists, but in fact were being made for Hindu Temple services. No one tried to sell us anything.

The dirt street was too narrow for a car to drive down, and we walked quite a distance. It appeared there was a small temple almost every 50 yards. They were dedicated to various Gods: Shiva, Vishnu, Kali and especially Jagannath, the reason we were in Puri.

Puri is one of the 4 most holy cities in India. At the end of their lives many Indians try to make a pilgrimage to all 4 of the cities, spread across the vast sub-continent. If they can only go to one Puri would be it. The God Jagannath is one of the cutest Gods going. He is an incarnation of Vishnu and is always shown with his sister and brother. He is the one on the right, in black face. They are always shown smiling. A fun God.

We drove towards the giant Jagannath Temple complex. Eventually we couldn’t drive any farther and we got out of our van and joined the hoards of people walking towards the Temple. It was extremely hot, and we stopped occasionally in the shade. We were surrounded by beggars, lots of people with leprosy and other diseases heading towards the immense towers of the walled in Temple. Non-Hindus could not enter, all we could do was approach it and observe the crush of people. It is from the constant crush of people that the word juggernaut was derived. There is a private very old library overlooking the temple complex and our guide had secured for us the ability to climb to its roof overlooking the temple complex. He was issued a large stick to scare away any monkey’s that would come to bother us. Luckily none did, although we saw many monkey’s climbing over the temple and the surrounding houses.

It was truly was a seen out of a Cecil B. DeMille Production as we watched the hoards of devotees streaming down the very noisy street. We left our vantage point and walked around the complex. When we returned from where we started we hired rickshaws to take us back to our van. We were exhausted from the sights, sounds, people, heat and experience.

We then drove to a village where they paint on canvas typical Indian Images and stories. The paintings were wonderful. As we walked through the village everyone wanted us to go into their house to see their paintings. It was very hard to say no, but you really didn’t know which one to enter. We visited a few, and then got lucky. We found wonderful pieces including a palm leaf painting. It looks like a venetion blind, and is created from palm leaves that are engraved and then painted. It is amazing. They said it took 6 months to make, we don’t doubt it. Somehow we will find room for it. It is wonderful to visit these various craft villages where these arts are maintained from generation to generation. I only hope it continues.

We then went to one of the highlights of our trip to Orissa. We visited the Buddhist Peace Pagoda. We could see it from the highway - a giant Buddhist Stupa. It shinned white and dominated the land from the top of a hill. It was here in 260 BC that one of bloodiest and most important wars of India was fought. Ashoka the Great, a fierce and ruthless Indian King fought and defeated the Kingdom of Kalinga (now Orissa) on the plains below the hill we were now standing upon. Over 100,000 warriors were killed. Hundreds of thousand were injured. The toll was staggering. Ashoka, who was feared by all, amazingly was horrified by the destruction that he had created. He adopted Buddhism and became a believer in non-violence. He spread Buddhism all over India. He built 85,000 Ashoka towers proclaiming his principles of non-violence. We knew all about Ashoka from both our reading about Indian history and the Bollywood movie Ashoka, starring Shah Rukh Khan – a fictionalized but enjoyable account.

It turned out this giant Peace Pagoda was not built eons ago, but rather built in the 1960’s. It was crawling with tourists.

We descended from the hill in our van, and then one of the most amazing events of our trip happened. The van stopped and the four of us got out. We walked down a small path; we were the only people there. No other tourists were to be seen. Our guide then walked us to a very large rock formation where there was the front half of an elephant carved into the stone. It was carved on Ashoka’s order right after the battle. The Elephant is the symbol of Buddhism. At the base of the rock formation was a small locked room. It was unlocked for us and we entered. One side of the room was the rock formation. On the rocks were inscribed the original Edicts from Ashoka, to bring non-violence to the land. We were looking at the actual writings from 260 BC that established Buddhism in India. Somehow the hoards of people looking at the huge white Stupa had missed the real basis for why Orissa is so important in Indian Spiritual Life. All they had to do was look down and not up.

We then returned to our Hotel for our last night in the State of Orissa. At the hotel each night after dinner we listened in the courtyard to an amazing woman singer. We loved the music that she and her group performed. I tried to find out her name and I am sure she has never recorded any music. I finally simply left my card and hope she emails me. If she does, somehow I hope to get some of her music. We shall see, if it is in my future. Tomorrow we return to Delhi.