We are strong in will,
To strive,to seek,to find and not to yield."
A.L.Tennyson
Ulysses,the great adventurer,continued with his adventurous attitude even when he and his comrades were past their youthful age. His vigour may be a thing of the past but his will remained the same and where there is a will there must a way.
The aged are often believed to be getting their 'priorities'wrong but they are actually more focussed about their priorities than their gen-next counterparts! It has been the dream of every vaishnavite past sixty to have a glimpse of each of the 108 'divyadesams' (vishnu shrines glorified by the alwars in their pasurams).The highest of these shrines perhaps is the "muktinath temple" situated at a height of 3800 meters at Muktinath-Chumig Gyatsa on the Annapurna - Daulagiri circuit in the Himalayas of Nepal. A trip to this shrine is fraught with the risk of severe high-altitude sickness and the other related symptoms. But the devout does not get deterred by these risks just as a mountaineer gets motivated by the risks of his endeavour. We therefore enrolled with the SREE TRAVELS CHENNAI for the six-day- Muktinath yathra- by flight.About 20 of us who travelled up to Kathmandu by flight, were to be clubbed with others travelling by train/road there, as per the programme.
We(me,my wife,my brother and his wife) took the 7-15 AM Indigo flight No.6E 276 to kathmandu from Chennai on 02 October 2011Sunday and reached Indira Gandhi International airport NewDelhi at 10 AM without any incident. For travelling to Nepal,a SAARC country in the neighbourhood,one has to follow all immigration formalities except that one can use his original Voter ID card as a valid document in place of the passport and visa. After going through all the security exercises and document-verification formalities at the airport, we managed to down some vegetarian delicacies at the 'Idly.com' outlet in the food court there spending a fortune! The three- hour gap was just enough for completing the formalities during the transit and to board the Spicejet flight No. SG045 to Kathmandu at 13.45 hrs.
After a flight of about two hours, we landed at the Tribhuvan International Airport at Kathmandu in the pouring rain at about 4pm. We had to wait for another one hour for two more members of our party arriving by Nepal Airlines from Bangalore. We were taken to a Jain Guest house at Kathmandu by our host Sh. Munna Agarwal. We took much-needed rest after a hearty veg meal offered at the Guest house. As we had to give way to some other tourists who had also booked the same accommodation, we had to pack our bag and baggage the next morning and proceed with our local sight-seeing trip in a vehicle provided by our host. We had a good dharshan each of PASHUPATHINATH TEMPLE, KATHMANDU and JALNARAYAN TEMPLE with the rain threatening to disrupt our programme every now and then.Our host Munna owns a "Rudraksh Bhandar" near the Pashupathinath Mandir and the women members of our group promptly attempted to empty the wallets of their husbands in their attempt to procure pearls,rudraksh,idols,Saligramams,other nick-nacks and what-not! We were housed in the "Kathmandu Hotel Planet" for the night with rooms allotted from second to fourth floor there. (no lifts in the 'planet!) As there was no official programmes fixed for the evening, some of our members visited a nearby Buddhist shrine on their own.Our programme was aleady running late by a day at that point.
The next day we had to help ourselves with some sort of a break fast and lunch(nothing special to mention about the quality except that they had been prepared by our own cooks!) Bad food cooked by our own cooks should any way taste better than the good food prepared by 'others'!We had to rush to the Kathmandu domestic air port to catch a small 30 seater aircraft of YETI AIRLINES to Pokhara, an intermediary place at a height of 1500 meters above mean sea level.Here, We were joined by more people who had arrived by train up to Gorakhpur and then crossed over to Nepal at Sonali and travelled by road up to Pokhara.The weather at Pokhara was just pleasant with breath-taking views all around of the majestic Annapurna and Daulagiri range. The woolens and thick jackets were not out yet. We met the tour organiser sh.Ilanthirayan of Sree travels here at last! We had to complete many more formalities here like paying airport taxes, paying for Nepal Tourist permit with our details entered and our photographs affixed in the papers. An exhaustive local tour was promised at Pokhara after our return from Muktinath.(It was a promise which was conveniently forgotten later!) We were instructed to be ready to proceed to Jamsom the next day at 6-30 AM. We could get some first hand details and tips from some of the pilgrims who had visited Muktinath the previous day and staying in the same hotel. All were eagerly looking forward to the D-day to visit Muktinath.
The Tara air flight from Pokhara to Jomsom was even smaller than that of the Yeti Airlines flight. It had just two rows of 9 seats each with just enough space for two pilots and a flight stewardess. The flight took just 17 minutes but it offered breath-taking view of the mountain range and the majestic Gandaki river winding through it.The only other means of transport to Jamsom from Pokhara is the Jeep but it takes 24 hours as against the 17 minutes by air.The tour organisers ensured that we got into our sweaters ,jackets,monkey-caps and socks and gloves before we got into the flight to Jamsom. Thank God! What a cold and shivering draught welcomed us there! The tour bulletin says that the wind at Jamsom makes even stones to fly! No exaggeration indeed.
The Pokhara Airport is at an altitude of 2800 meters and is frequented by trekkers and hikers from all over the world besides the pilgrims to Muktinath shrine.You do not get good star hotels here unlike Kathmandu. They are just humble lodging houses without attached bath facilities. They however supply woollen blankets, rajais etc. From Jamsom airport, one has to climb up to 3800 meters to reach Muktinath-Chumig Gyatsa and to overcome high-altitude sickness symptoms like head ache, nausea,dehydration etc.
The small parties reaching Jamsom airport had to wait for the others to join them before proceeding further.It was 5th October 2011 Wednesday, the D-day for our tryst with Lord Muktinath.We sarted by bus to cover the 2km distance till the bank of river Gandaki. we crossed the river through a narrow wooden bridge and trekked for about a kilometer to the Jeep stand situated at a point on the other side of the river.We were accommodated in three jeeps (about 13 in each jeep) from here for our rough ride through the hill and river. It was an arduous odyssey with the rattling jeeps winding through narrow mountain trails(no roads mind you!) full of pebbles and round ,naturally-polished stones called shaligramams and at times passing by dangerous precipices that one dreads look below.These jeeps are driven by expert Nepali drivers who do not seem to be perturbed by the adversities all around. In fact ,to many of my co-passengers, these drivers looked like the incarnations of Lord Muktinath!
Legend has it that Lord Vishnu kept his promise to Tulsi by taking the form of small polished stones called Saligramams in the river Gandaki and offered her salvation when she took the form of the divine river Gandaki.The locals sell these polished stones taken from the river(containing many shapes and designs by nature) to the pilgrims who take them home and do daily pooja to them as the incarnation of Sriman narayana.It said that Thirumangai Alwar and later Sri Ramanujacharya visited the shrine on foot.When we struggle so much even with all modern technologies like the air travel,how these saints managed to reach such an inaccessible place, is no small wonder.
On reaching the jeep stand after a back-breaking 2-hour drive, we had to still trek for about 10 minutes to a particular point in the hill. From here we had to ride pillion in motor cycles driven by local Nepali youth for abut half an hour.A trip up to the temple and back costs 300 rupees. All one has to do is to sit cross-legged in the pillion, hug the brave rider and close his/her eyes for fear of fainting at the twists and turns in the steep hill through which the rider negotiates to reach the foot of the temple.These riders are again local youth who have very good control of the vehicle and are very encouraging and supportive to the pilgrims in alleviating their fear.Women members of our group had already come dressed suitably for this part of the journey and so they faced it sportively.
Now we entered the campus of the Muktinath shrine and slowly climbed the 40 odd steps leading to the main temple, feeling mild giddiness and nausea all the while.As we entered the outer parikrama,We were welcomed by water from some unknown source pouring through 106 outlets lined all along the four walls of the outer parikrama. There are two ponds on either side of the entrance.Devotees who take holy bath on all these 'theerthas' signifying the 108 divyadesams ,do not mind the near zero temperature of the water. The main temple is a very small structure with Nepali architecture and the main shrine of Muktinath(Saligrama murthy) is adjoined by his consorts Sridevi and Bhoodevi.The idols are just three-foot high and are mounted on a stone pedestal. You do not find costly ornaments etc on the idols as we see normally in South India. There is a lady priestess who does the pooja in the Nepali style. But we are allowed to touch the idols and offer our prasadams(nuts&spices) in our own way. There is no written proof anywhere in the temple that it is one of the 108 divya desams and is commemorated by Thirumangai Alwar.But we find the majestic idol of Sri Ramanujacharya in the inner parikrama.We met the main priest(whom we had seen in the You tube videos when we typed 'Muktinath darshan') near the entrance who explained the significance of the the temple and performed the 'sankalpam'. We lighted oil lamps in the parikrama and chanted Thirumangai Alwar's 'Periya Thirumozhi ' the ten verses starting with "kalaiyum kariyum parimavum" and the two verses of Peryalwar's "palai karandu". We did feel an exalted saturation permeating through us during the entire one hour we spent in the temple. May be, this is a prelude to our becoming eligible for our 'striving for salvation'.I could not help but to remember the words of Rabindranath Tagore at that point of time:
This is my prayer to thee,my lord.
Strike, strike at the root of the penury in my heart.
Give me the strength lightly to bear my joys and sorrows.
Give me the strength to make my love fruitful in service.
Give me the strength never to disown the poor
Or bend my knees before insolent might.
Give me the strength to raise my mind
High above daily trifles.
And give me the strength to surrender my strength
To thy will with love.
The trek back was equally arduous and frightening. Already one of our pilgrims was suffering an attack of high-altitude sickness vomiting bitterly and suffering head and body pain and had to be rushed to the local doctor.The motor cycle riders dropped us at Jeep stand in the return journey thus saving us some walking in the hilly terrain! The next two-hour jeep drive and walking brought us back to the hotel,battered and bruised but satiated and salvaged!A night's rest in the warmth of the cottage worked wonders for the cold-battered pilgrims.
Next morning came the news that our sight-seeing programme at Pokhara was to be cancelled due some over booking in the flight during festival season(Vijaya Dashmi is Nepal's national festival) and that we had to rush straight to Kathmandu by a connecting flight immediately. Tempers rose and we witnessed heated arguments regarding this let-down by the organisers. Some suggested that we should make our own sight-seeing programme at Pokhara and then go to Katmandu by bus at night.Since it was very risky to travel by night in the dangerous Himalayan slopes, the idea was abandoned. Our tickets to Delhi and to Chennai had already been booked on 07 October and any such journey would have jeopardised that proramme.
As an alternative,we arranged a paid sight-seeing trip at Kathmandu visiting "Dakshin Kali Mandir" and 'Pattan Bazar' and a second visit Agarwal Rudraksh Bandaar to conclude our 5-day tour.
The return journey by Spicejet flight from Kathmandu and by Indigo flight (via Mumbai) from Delhi were indeed comfortable and we reached Chennai at 9-40 pm on 07 October 2011(Friday) safe and sound and in one piece!
Though we came across some minor problems and disappointments,overall it was a worthy trip that enabled us seek the blessings of Lord Muktinath for us and for our near and dear ones.
Sarve janah sukhino bhavanthu.
