Kissed by an Elephant

Today my host family, Pratipa and Santosh visited a few of the many temples in Coimbatore. We had lunch at a hotel where I had fried rice and a mango milkshake (what I know as a mango lassi is actually called a milkshake here. Lassi's are drinks that contain curds). After lunch we drove for a little while to a temple called The Patteeswarar Temple. This temple was under construction to maintain it's 2,000 year old existence, but luckily we could still go inside most of the rooms. In this temple is where I got to watch my first big religious ceremony, and also where I was kissed on the head by an elephant. When we first walked into the temple, my hot father asked me "Madi, how many elephants have you seen before in your life?" I told him that I had seen a few, and then I saw an elephant not ten feet from me! His long tusk was slightly painted with lines with ash from the religious burning for the Gods, and he was HUGE! My host brother Surya handed me a coin and told me to give it to the elephant, and so I placed it inside it's trunk and the elephant started trying to touch me with it's trunk- I was confused and so I moved backwards, and then I saw another woman give the elephant a coin and realized what I was supposed to do. I took out another coin and handed it to the elephant, bowing my head as it gently "kissed" the top of my head (as a blessing).
The religious ceremonies here are very interesting, I got to watch a few and participate in a few also. What happens is there is a statue of a God or Goddess (the Patteeswarar Temple is a temple for Shiva) and there are a few religious men who work at the temple. People who come to watch stand around a fenced off area and observe or pray as the men cover the statue with flowers (gifts from the audience) and use fire in a bowl to circle around the front of the statue's head a few times, all while chanting a mantra and ringing a bell.
After spending some time in the first temple, we drove for a while through fields and fields covered completely with palm trees and banana trees. As we drove, the sun was setting in the distance over the Nilgiri Hills, and as it was getting darker, Pratipa pointed out some lights in the distance on one of the hills- another temple, the one we were headed for. When we got to the foot of the hills, there was a street filled with vendors and so we stopped to have a coconut. I've never had the chance to drink coconut milk strait from the husk, and neither have I ever eaten soft coconut from the inside, and it was a very odd sensation. The milk is almost like drinking water with some dust added to it, and the meat of it tasted the same and the the texture of raw fish. Of course, I was offered the biggest coconut, and when I couldn't finish it all, I had to have my host brother help me out a bit!
The temple that was settled in the Nilgiri's was called The Murugan Temple, and no surprise it is a temple to worship Murugan, the son of Shiva who was a brave warrior. We went again to one of the ceremonies, and this time I bought a lotus flower as an offering- we got to sit down inside the gate during this ceremony, and it was performed in the same way. When these ceremonies are finished, the religious men will walk out inside the gate with the bowl that held the flame. Each person will place a small amount of money on the plate, and then the man will give you a pinch of ash from the burnings in your hand. You then transfer the ash from your right hand to your left and using your index finger, rub a bit of the ash onto the center of your forehead. When the ceremony was over at the second temple, we started to get up and a man came over and put a lei made of jazmine flowers into my hand. I asked Pratipa what it was for, and she smiled and said "it is a flower from earlier in the day- one that Marugan has already blessed! It is good luck, they only give a few out at random and they are said to be auspicious. Well then, that's two things that have signaled good luck for me in the past few days, the lizard climbing up my leg, and now the lei too!
We finished off the evening with dinner at another restaurant, and for the first time I got to eat off of a BANANA LEAF!!! I had been excitedly waiting for the moment to happen since I found out that it is common to eat from the giant leaves!
Now it is 11:00 p.m. exactly, and the family is going to finish off the day with a few card games!