The First Stop: Tiruchendur

 A few days back, we planned a small trip to a few southern districts. That too after so long, we four as a family planned a trip. So it kind of took us back to our childhood days. Just wake up, dress up, blindly follow the places wherever parents take you to, having packed homemade lemon rice for the train, visiting temples, playing Raja-Rani game, and having random conversations, ending the day with fulfillment and a long sleep. Those beautiful days!

That's the reason I said this trip was special. The very planning itself felt exciting. Our parents wanted this to be a devotional trip, and I personally saw it as a spiritual trip.

However, only going to temples disappointed us a little, as we wanted to explore other places as well. But later, we realised that through these temple visits, we could explore other special places as well around the locality. And I'm glad we did.

I would like to share the four major places we travelled to in my blogs.

So this blog is going to be about the first place.

1) Tiruchendur

We went to the Subramanya Swamy Temple. It is a Hindu temple dedicated to the Hindu god Murugan, located in the Thoothukudi district, Tamil Nadu. It is one of the Six Abodes of Murugan (Arupadai Veedu), a set of foremost and sacred Hindu temples dedicated to Tamil Kadavul Murugan. Unlike most Murugan temples that are built atop hills, Tiruchendur is located directly on the shores of the Bay of Bengal ( online articles ) .

You could read more about its history, architecture, and mythology on the internet, as it is largely available.

Here, I would like to share my experience, which my readers can't find on the internet. We decided to visit this temple in the afternoon, as people there suggested that the crowd would be less by that time.

So before paying a visit here, we went to Vana Tirupati.

I never knew such places existed. This temple is dedicated to Lord Venkateshwara. The very atmosphere itself was serene, well-maintained, spacious, with fewer people gathered around. It was built by the founders of the famous Hotel Saravana Bhavan chain. Their branch hotels and cafes were there. We tried rose milk and badam milk. OMG, the same authentic taste.

The perfect mixing of milk and rose-milk essence. And the best part is the milk was thick and dominating, and along with it, the essence blended perfectly, offering a heavenly taste.

After paying our respects, we came out where they were offering prasadam.

The Divya Sugandam (divine fragrance) pulled us to the entrance. They were serving ven pongal and puli sadham. Ven pongal and ghee complement each other as if they were like a child and mother hugging each other. That's how much warmth and comfort they provided while having them.

And puli sadham—any day, I would choose temple prasadam puliyodarai over anything else. Their pulikachal (tamarind gravy) has that speciality. We were blessed to have such food.

Next, coming to Tiruchendur, we stood in the first queue at 3 PM. There were 6 waiting rooms. We were put there, and every 20–30 minutes, doors were opened, and a bunch of people were moved from one room to another, so that the next set of people waiting outside could be accommodated.

Till then, we didn't really feel tired.

But the difficult part was when the standing queue started. So it would be around 2 kms to reach the inner chamber (Moolasthanam). But the problem is that the line was poorly arranged. In such a small place, they put such a large crowd. Also, the very management itself felt poor. The unorganised queues, confined spaces, and dangerous staircases made it difficult. Another thing was the lack of adequate drinking water and restroom facilities. While there were a couple of drinking water points available in the latter part of the queue, they were insufficient for such a large crowd. Waiting is fine, and it's understandable as the crowd is too much. But along with that, to manage it, there should be proper arrangements and accommodations, I believe. I hope they make better arrangements soon. Like how Tirupati temple is functioning.

People even refer to Tiruchendur Temple as the second Tirupati-like celebrated temple, but how it's managed is a question mark.

Even in this chaos, witnessing the temple walls being hit and washed by the foaming waves of the sea was beautiful.

Peacocks and crows singing, dancing joyfully, having their own conversations in their own little world by the sea, murmuring along with the waves, unworried about the gatherings of human beings, though their noise was like crashing waves.

Finally, after standing in the line for two hours, which people actually considered a blessing, because usually it takes five to ten hours, so two hours felt shorter.

We got into the temple. After all this, the spiritually elevating smell of vibuthi, the resonant ringing of bells, and devotees chanting "AROGARA!" and "MURUGA!"—it was divine to hear.

But amidst these beautiful moments, one thing that disturbed me was how, at the end of the day, everything is being commercialised.

How priests stood in queues to sell the prasadam, with a few literally forcing devotees to buy.

However, Finally, we got to see Murugan standing majestically holding his Vel. People offered their prayers and came out with hope, smiles, satisfaction, and humility.

Though it was tiring, to witness a place holding such strong mythology, history, and devotion was still a blissful experience.