The deities, the huge flower garlands adorning them, the Nadaswaram, the band, the kolams on the Mada veedis, the devotees thronging the Mada veedis to get a darshan of Kapaleeswara, the traffic diversions, the pandals on the Mada veedis where the deities rest for a while, the koDa rATnams/merry-go-round, etc. – It’s that time of the year when Mylapore has an aura of festivity and divinity to it with the Panguni Festival on at Kapaleeswarar temple and today is the day of Adikaara Nandi. The deities are taken out in procession at around 6:00 in the morning. I went there at around 8:00 am and saw the deities in procession at South Mada Street.

Lord Vinayaka:

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Day 4:

It was a bright and sunny morning the next day which meant that, devoid of mist, we had an even clearer view of the surrounding hills. It was then that we realized that the view from Gun Hill was visible right from our room!

I could stand in the balcony and gaze at the snow-capped Himalayas to my heart’s content.

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Day 3:

We wanted to start the day with visiting the most-written-about place in Mussoorie – The Mall Road. Every website I checked had a mention of a walk on Mall Road as a must-do activity in Mussoorie. On enquiry at the resort, we came to know that a taxi to Mall Road from the resort would cost a hundred bucks, which was too high considering the fact that it was only about 1 km from there! So we decided to walk to The Mall Road itself and from that moment on, walking turned out to be the main mode of commuting for us.
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And it’s now time to enjoy the yellow of the Copper Pod flowers and the pink of the Rain Tree flowers!

(Photo of rain tree/thoongumoonji poo taken from the terrace of my house)

Concert on 27th February at Hanuman Temple, Alamelumangapuram, Mylapore

The last thing on my mind was going for a kutcheri, but when I came to know that Sanjay’s concert was to happen at a venue which is just a 5-minute drive from home, I thought I would try listening to it for 15-20 minutes at least.

But, nowadays, Sahana is keeping all of us at home so busy and she is the only one who has got all our attention, that all of us totally forgot about the concert! I suddenly remembered about it at 7:45 pm and rushed to the temple where the concert was happening. The concert was to start at 6:15 pm and it is only a 2-hour concert there generally. So I knew that I would be there just in time for tani Avartanam. And that was exactly what happened. Sanjay was finishing Mohanam swarams and Tanjavur Murugabhoopathy started the tani.

Post tani, the concert lasted for 20 minutes and the 20 minutes turned out to be a surprise. Sanjay started singing the viruttam ‘jAnAti rAma’ in blissful Kedaragowlai. Kedaragowlai was followed by Varunapriya and another rAgam having rain in its name – Amritavarshini. You generally don’t get to hear lovely sketches of these rAgAs in the tukkada section. Trust Sanjay to make even the last part of a concert special! Jonpuri was the last rAgam of the viruttam. As he included the tune of eppo varuvAro in the Jonpuri part, the audience’s enjoyment was evident. He followed it up with the song Dasharata suta, which I don’t think I have heard before. Varadarajan’s playing matched Sanjay’s singing throughout, as always.

Sanjay then sang mAvalla kAda in Maand and concluded the concert with Mangalam.

20 min or 3 hrs, duration doesn’t matter. Sanjay’s concerts are always satisfying even if you listen to it only for a few minutes!

P.S.: Can someone who attended the concert give me the full song list? Thanks in advance!