He's the Juggernaut, bitch! (Orissa, Part I)

This past weekend, I went to Orissa. We had off of work on Tuesday for Republic Day, which is the anniversary of the adoption of the Constitution of India, so I took casual leave on Monday to create a 4-day weekend. Orissa was incredible, despite a few frustrating moments.

Now you know where Orissa is.

We boarded our plane as if it was on time. But it wasn’t--we sat on the tarmac for three hours, waiting for the fog to lift. I don’t understand why they boarded the plane in the first place; it’s not like they didn’t know it was foggy! Obviously they should have boarded only when the visibility was far enough to take off, because it is much more comfortable to be waiting in an airport than on an airplane. But alas, this is India, and as Gandhi says, this is “a country of nonsense.”

When my plane finally arrived in Orissa, my first impression was positive: it’s warm and I can breathe and see blue sky!!

On the bus from Bhubaneswar, the capital of Orissa, to Puri, a beachside town, I sat down next to a middle-aged man and his shy 6-year-old son who tried to hide his face from the scary white foreigner. Before I could slip on my headphones (all that waiting on the tarmac had exhausted me and I wasn’t in the mood to talk), the man started talking to me. He spoke in broken English, and I responded in broken Hindi. So languages were being butchered all around. The man and his son were extremely friendly, in a non-sketchy way, and they invited me to stay in their home in their village. The man, who is the principal of his village’s school, said that his wife would cook traditional Oriya food and his students would give me a tour of “a real Oriya village” (whatever that means). And he wasn’t just saying this—he wouldn’t let me get off the bus without giving me his phone number first, in case I ever venture near his village! This man’s hospitality is a perfect example of why I fell in love with India in the first place. A visit to his village would have been awesome, but unfortunately the village was kind of far, and as you’ll read in a later blog post, there was a bandh* threat.

*If you don’t know what a bandh is by now, you have not been reading my blog and/or have never heard my “escape from Sikkim” story. In any case, here is a definition, one last time: a bandh is a “general strike.” Everything—and I mean EVERYTHING, from shops to restaurants to roads—is closed.

When I arrived in Puri, I went straight to the beach. I hadn’t seen a major body of water since July, so I was in desperate need of breathing in the salty sea breeze and staring off to the horizon. After satisfying these needs, I headed to Jagannath Temple in town.

Bay of Bengal

On my way to the temple, I passed by a wedding procession, and I saw something I've never seen before: a cycle-train of men playing instruments in cages. It very much reminded me of a traveling circus.

cycle-train of musicians in a wedding procession

caged man playing a drum

caged man playing a keyboard

Jagannath Temple, built in the 11th century, is a Hindu pilgrimage site and represents the east in the Char Dham (4 abodes of God, one in each direction). Lord Jagannath is “a part of Vishnu,” according to one Brahmin (priest). I asked if he meant one of Vishnu's many manifestations or forms, but he said no, "a part." But then when I looked up Jagannath online, I found that he is a form of Krishna, who himself is an avatar of Vishnu (at least according to Vaishnavism). So I don't really know who Jagannath is, other than Orissa's deity of choice. Also, he is often represented with huge eyes (at least in Orissa). Non-Hindus are not allowed inside Jagannath Temple, so I went to the roof of Raghunandan Library, across the street, to steal a view.

entrance to Jagannath Temple


view through the entrance (thank you camera zoom!)

mustachioed lions, this one crushing an elephant, protect the entrances of many temples in Orissa (this one is not Jagannath Temple but is nearby)

view of Jagannath Temple from the roof of Raghunandan Library

view of Puri's busy streets from Raghunandan Library

The English word “juggernaut” comes from Jagannath. I think the origins are a British misunderstanding of the Rath Yatra festival. During Rath Yatra, three humongous chariots carrying three deities (Jagannath and his siblings Balarama and Subhadra) are pushed through the streets of Puri. The British believed that these chariots crushed everything and everyone in their paths—they were unstoppable. And so the word “juggernaut” came to mean something that is unstoppable. I was sort of hoping someone would yell “He's the Juggernaut, bitch!” but given the probably nonexistent popularity of X-Men 3 in Puri outside of CT Road (where all the foreign backpackers hang out), that did not happen.