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The Unique Picnic

The Unique Picnic which was a great Revelation too.

For me picnic is not mere sight seeing or fun and frolic. I consciously look to

observe without prejudice the social, cultural activities of the people and try togain some experience. My picnic was to a village, to be more precise my daddysbirth place Karur. We went from Coimbatore by road. It was altogether not only aunique experience but also a great refreshing revelation.

Unique experience because it was

Unique route:-The route from Coimbatore to Karur on both sides of the roads, in most of theareas, had a cleanly cultivated green landscape of paddy fields and serriedphalanx of coconut and banana trees [ a thing which is almost non existent in

Chennai ] and yonder the uncultivated natural splendor of the westernghats[mountain ranges]. Nowhere else in the whole world within such a smallgeographical area one can see so many temperature zones.

Unique climate:-Being the first half January the coolest period in South India, there was thatpleasant cool breeze neither too chill nor too hot.

Unique festival:-We reached Karur on the day of Pongal, there was a unique festive mood, afestival of thanksgiving to nature.

Unique scenes:-All houses, from the tallest dwellings to the humblest huts were spruced up, cattlewell bathed and decorated, eye-catching Kolams [drawings/designs] on thefloor/roads in front every house, studded with cow dung balls decked withmarigold and pumpkin flowers, raw sugar canes stacked criss-cross, villagersmostly farmers boiling Pongal [a dish made of mixture of rice, moong dal jaggery,ghee, milk, cardamom etc in hand painted mud pots whose rims were adornedwith turmeric plants with the root.

Unique aroma:-When this Pongal boiled and the froth spilled over the rims to the cheering sound

of Pongalo Pongal the combined aroma of this dish, the jasmine flowers withwhich the ladies had adorned their head, the other flowers offered for prayer tothe Sun God drawn on the floor and the smell of camphor all together combed thenostrils and lingered into the brain cells, the strongest impact of a uniquefragrance which no artificial perfume can produce.

Unique dress:-

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There I also noticed some old women wearing a unique dress worlds biggest,best, unstitched/untailored single piece of attire the nine yards sari draped withsuch adroitness that it made them look graceful and most importantly it coveredthe entire body except the face, forearms and foot.

Revelation:-Revelation was that the simple and humble people are spontaneous, honest andhumane. They relate with everyone and everything without inhibition, ulteriormotives or hidden agenda. They had religious fervor but not fanaticism, passionin performing the festivities but no parochial exclusivity.

Religion here was a way of life but not enforced through any priestly authority orinstitutionalized sanction or sanctity. There was in fact contribution in some wayor other from people of various religions. Here religiosity manifested respect fortime tested values, reverence for the bounties that we get from nature unaskedfor.

Life was lively with natural harmonizing variety but not enforced homogeneity, asort of plurality much practiced but less publicized. There was this freeblossoming of happy human spirit and humane interactions, a sort ofmanifestation of immense cheerfulness unmindful of their material poverty, lackof academic qualifications, failure to update information on many subjects, lackof awareness of the latest trends in fashion and dress. But then cheerfulness is anoverflowing spirit of the heart and this coupled with humble consciousness is realreligiousness. [Religion etymologically is also from the Latin, religare (re + lig ='to bind'), that is, a linking of the part with the whole. Linking ourselves (parts)with the Universal Divine Self (whole) and need not necessarily express any greatreligion based on specific institution or script].

It was in short a real PICNICPeaceful,Interesting,CertainlyNice,Inspiring andCheerful experience.

By my daugter B.Srividya when in V th std