Happ Dasain!
Gupt Kashi Vishwanath Temple and Kedarnath Temple!
We didn't know that we would be staying in Guptkashi for the next 4 days. We had a hard time getting on the helicopter because of bad weather and the long line of pilgrims ahead of us. This reminded me of when my friend Gamveer Rawal and I were younger. We had to cancel our Everest Base Camp trip twice because we couldn't get on a plane to Lukla because of the same problems. Also, because they paid in USD, foreign tourists got priority over us, so our chances of flying were slim. So, we changed our minds and went to Annapurna Base Camp. We had one of the best trekking trips of our lives, which we called Nepal: Never Ending Peace and Love!!!
The next day, we went on a trip to the Ancient Temples of Vishwanath and Ardhnareshwar. The three words "Ardha," "Nari," and "Ishwara" are combined to form the name "Ardhanareeshvara," which describes the lord whose half is a woman. Goddess Parvati, also known as Shakti, is the female component, and Lord Shiva is the male component. As Ardhanareeshvara symbolizes, male and female principles cannot be separated.
When we got to the temple in the early evening, it was surrounded by clouds. The colors of the temple stood out against the white misty background, making it look like we were floating in the clouds. It is believed that Ganga and Yamuna rivers meet at the Manikarnika.
Gupt, which means "hidden," because it is believed that Lord Shiva hid here for a while to avoid the Pandavas, who wanted to ask for forgiveness for killing their own brothers in the epic battle of Mahabharata.
Our team was able to get us tickets, but we could not all fit in the same helicopter or even have the same operator. Still, we thanked Kedar baba and made ourselves available at the helipad around 6 a.m., even though our flights were between 12 and 3 p.m.
We ate freshly made parathas, pauwas, chai, and other foods while we waited. India has access lot of freshly made food, but most people prefer processed and packaged FMGC.
This kind of spending is seen as prestigious. First of all, they have done a great job with the packaging and have made it very accessible. For example, the packs are very small so they would be affordable. Second, they leverage mega-celebrity power to do the selling for them. Superficially, taglines like "Welcome to the Maggie & Ad-Man Country " could be accurate for India, in my opinion.[inspiration from Phillip Morris’s ad-man & copywriter].
People say that India is a country full of extreme paradoxes. I had mostly noticed the beautiful ones, like "one in many," but as a marketing artisan, I noticed heavy irresponsibility and hypocrisy across the supply chain. For example, famous actors & sporting icons who are known for being health advocates might promote chewing tobacco and other unhealthy foods including fizzy drinks, instant noodles, or even gambling apps. This observation encouraged me to ask myself what might be the reason that our ethical standards were so apart both at individual & societal levels?
Around 12:30 p.m., our names were called. We stood in line, clinging to other pilgrims on both ends and arguing with people who cut in front of us. We were tired, hopeful, irritated, and still excited. When I finally got to the counter, I was told that our tickets had been canceled because the flight was "overbooked." I froze and didn't know what to do. We had already lost a few days of time, and any more delays could mean that we won't get an audience with our 5th Dham, or Aama and Buwa, who were leaving for the United States on September 23.
We also lost all of our future reservations for places to stay and had to pay more for transportation. By that time, we were tired of changing hotels, waiting in the crowded area of the heli agency, drinking chai, eating maggie, paua, and parantha to kill time, arguing with or begging the staff to let us on the helicopter with our valid tickets, etc.
Finally with drum rolls came Holy Tours to the rescue, they were able to get the Uttarkhand District Tourist Officer to help us by issuing fresh tickets for the next day. We checked into a hotel across from the helipad.
Today was the day, and we took a short 10-minute flight to Kedarnath, one of the holiest Hindu pilgrimage sites at an elevation of 3,584 meters near the source of the Mandakini River. Once we got off, we walked past a few kilometers of pilgrims in line and entered the temple through a side door for a special viewing. This was a very rare chance for regular people like us, and it seems that Holy Tours set it up by using their connections.
Adi Shankaracharya built the beautiful shrine of Lord Shiva in the eighth century A.D. It is one of the most important temples in India.
It is said that the Pandavas built the temple in the beginning. There are statues of the five Pandava brothers, Lord Krishna, Nandi, and Virabhadra in the first hall of the shrine. One of Lord Shiva's 12 Jyotirlingas is in the garbh girha, also called the inner sanctum. The Jyotirlinga looks like the hump of a bull, and it is worshipped as Lord Shiva in his Sadashiva form. Prayers in the morning are called "Nirvana Puja," and prayers in the evening are called "Srinagar Darshan."
After worshipping Sadashiva, we went outside and prayed to Bhimshila, a huge rectangular rock that saved the temple from flash floods in 2013. After that, we took a walk around the temple and gave alms to the sadhus.
Following, I went to pay my respects to Adi Shankaracharya at The Samadhi temple for a blessing from the great Indian philosopher and seer who unified the doctrine of Advaita Vedanta and traveled across India. He founded four mathas (monasteries) in the four corners of India to help revive Hinduism back to life. He went into Samadhi here when he was only 32 years old.
Though we wanted to stay back, feeling blessed and secretly wondering when/if we would come back, we proceeded to the helipad with sadasiva in our hearts.
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