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| Siddhivinayak temple |
The best place to celebrate Lord Ganesha's birthday is in
Siddhivinayak temple Mumbai, and that
too especially on his birthday (Ganesh Chaturthi). This year I was fortunate enough to visit this divine place on this auspicious day. The program was very sudden, as I happened to be at my brother's place on 4th of September. My niece was supposed to fly there next day, she asked me and I just could not resist it. From that point onward everything fell into places, I got the air tickets of same flight, and interestingly found my identity card in my purse (which is mandatory). It was very unsusal as I generally do not carry my important documents with me. I took it as a divine sign and thought of to get along with the program. During our two hours flight, I just could not believe that, I am really going.
We were picked from the
Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport around 9.45
a.m and our host friend of my niece, was very jovial and fun loving, full of humor with his apt one liners, a rare quality, otherwise these days people are obsessed with their problems and possessed with jealousy and anger.
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| Road map |
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| Modakam |
There was an aura of festivity in the air and one could see
group of people dancing
on the drum beats, in front of their dear lord to give him
warm welcome. It is customary to have your own idol of Lord Ganesha either in your house or in your society.
There were an elaborate rituals associated with this function, prayers and special bhog called
Modakam was offered to the deity
. It was difficult for me to abstain from this caravan of celebrations. We had a great
darshan in the SiddhiVinayak temple our first stop.
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| Main entrance of temple |
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| DecorateD with blue flowers. |
The whole temple was decorated with flowers from entrance gate to main hall, which looked absolutely loaded with blooming flowers of every color giving it a very surreal look. After having a great darshan and paying obeisance to our dear lord, we wanted to eat and chill around. Our host made it a point to show us all the major roads and interesting points. We had a
very nice breakfast of "
missal pav and
vada pav" in the typical
mumbai style "
maska mar ke" means full of butter. After having
sumputious breakfast, we were out on the road again, shopping, sight seeing and appreciating new bridge. Bombay (Mumbai) is famous for its tall buildings, which looked spectacular against vast body of water. We also saw high tides in the slumbering Arabian sea in the hot afternoon.
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| Sea shore laced with high rising buildings. |
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| New bridge |
Lord Ganesha is the elder son of first mythological couple Lord Shiva and Goddess Parvati epitomized by
Purush and
Prakiti (nature), sometimes shown as half man and half woman embodied together in one form depicting the presence of innate energy in all the materials forms, in this universe.
Lord Ganesha is the God of arts and wisdom. He is honored at the start of every ritual and ceremony, as he is considered to be the remover of obstacles. He is widely loved among-st h
indu community all over the world. It is customary to seek his blessing before starting of any new venture
.
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| Lord shiva made with flowers. |
It was an amazing trip for me as I had good
darshan, had eaten tasty street food and done shopping, all in a single day and that too without getting tired. It must have been due to the benevolence of God Ganesha.
I had poured all my feelings, acquired knowledge and my beliefs in
my blog "Travelers views", had emptied my mind and soul in that and left with nothing more to share. And then this visit to the
sacred temple happened, which seems like a new beginning.
Lord Ganesha was always there for me, being born as a
Hindu, he has been the integral part of my everyday prayer since childhood.
In the end all I can say is, thank you my dear
lord, for blessing me in your own special way
by rejuvenating me.
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| Marine drive view in night. |
Good bye Mumbai, I am not sure when I will come here again.
