Bit exhausted but I promised a blow-by-blow account of the pilgrimage. Too late for the real ringside action as I've now left Tiruvannamalai, but this is as fresh as the meat of it will ever be.
The leading question of this pilgrimage boiled down to: man or mountain?
That is, did Arunachala juice up Ramana, or vice-versa, or both or neither or what?
When I rolled into Tiru after an exhausting but highly informative hours-long bus ride (during which, after I'd stood almost two hours and practically been bounced out the doorless rear exist numerous times on potholes, a seat was finally cleared for me by the instantaneously obedient compressive of six already jammed bodies on the back bench at the mere whisper of a comman by a civilian clad gentleman who on closer acquaintance of serveral bumpy sweaty sardined hours of conversation turned out to be a high ranking Chennai police officer who'd served in Cambodia as part of the international police training mission, but how did my ferocious looking all-male busmates know to obey him so servilely and with such alacrity?), it ws already night, so I just tumbled into my stay place with further ado.
Then I passed a horrible night as indicated in prior post. I subsequently cleared up this acoustic mystery, at least: turns out there was a CEMENT WORKS cheek-by-jowl basically sharing a wall, with my rooming, and they kept a 24 hour work cycle throughout my stay ARRRRGGHHHH....
But my stay place turned out to have an unbelievable compensatory feature I'd had no idea of. I passed a rotten night but the show must go on, I'd come to meet the mountain, and I thought I'd have to grab a tuktuk around to the Arunachalaswara temple (Chola, 11th cent. CE) or the Ramanashram to even get much of a start on that, but turn out, I just opened the back door of my room to a little porch and BANG! OH MY GOD! THERE IT WAS! ARUNACHALA SHIVA NAMA SHIVAYA!
I just stood there in shock but as I stood an amazing thing happend that instantly resolved the whole inquiry of the trip: what I have called in many previous writings the 'yang resonance' was immediately connected to the Mountain, I could feel the Shakti pouring along the cord. Then, the cord of attachment between the mountain and the resonance was very deliberately, surgically detached from it center in the tanden which is where I'd always cultivated it and assumed was its natural origin, and simply re-plugged directly into my heart center. Most amazing thing I've ever felt. Done without sentiment but with overwhelming power, as though by a very professional but somewhat impersonal doctor. Or ok, like a hawk snatching a rat, I was in its power, in shock. Then the newly heart-centric resonance vibrated through me at ever-increasing frequency until it subsided into complete silence, the silence of the heart.
So here's the answer: it's the mountain. I knew it then, before I'd even left my rooming place, first thing that morning.
Anyway I was tranced out for quite some time but finally came to myself and decided to head for the Ramanashram and check it out, flagged down one of these crazy little tuktuk's. Ramanashram is quite the happening place, I found. It is pretty and pleasant, but I'm not sure if the word 'peaceful' really appplies any more, no fault of Baghwan but the place seems to be nearly overrun by Indian and Western seekers of every imaginable description. But don't get me wrong it is pleasant and does very definitely maintain a sacred power vibe of the master. Yet... the meditation hall is occupied at one end by a kind of Hindu puja shrine to him, at which boy acolytes constantly chant and robed priests do day long devotionals and puja and on and on. Many people just sit in the Hall and watch or soak all that up.
A small amount of that went a long way for me. Don't get me wrong it was interesting to finally see all the scene of the master's great life. Just didn't have the impact on me that I now understand only the Mountain can channel to you.
Anyway I decided to continue this mountain-centric (literally!) theme with the GIRIPRDAKSHINA, which is the clockwise sacred circuit walk around the base of the Hill, keeping it on my right and in sight at all time. That takes four hours. That is also known as the Outer Walk.
About halfway through it I came up on the (only) other such walker who seemed to be out that day, a sadhu/yogi by attire, doing it barefoot over the burning, cracked and gravel strewn road, stepping over dung of monkeys, pigs, goats, cows, and dogs.
You aren't supposed to talk until you at least reach nearly the end of the circuit, at the Arunachalaswara Temple gate, so we walked together in companionable silence for several hours, past all the lingams and smaller shrine and temple landmarks that dot the outer circuit.
Finally at the Temple gate he indicated to me to follow him into the inner precinct, and though in fact I am so Ramana and Mountain centric that I hadn't even thought of entering the Temple per se (last major element of the Giripradakshina, about 2 km from the start/finish which is at Ramanashram). He led me silently through passages to an inner hall where we sat together meditating for about thirty minutes. We then returned to the walk and finished together at the R. ashram.
His English was very limited and my Tamil is non-existent, but we arranged to meet again in the late afternoon to go together up the Inner Walk, that is, up onto the actual mountain.
Meeting up, he indicated that I would get the most power shakti charge from the mountain if I also went up barefoot, like him. So I left my shoes at the ashram rear entrance and we started the ascent. It begins very gently over a smooth flagstone path and stairs for the first several hundred yards, so I though hey no sweat. Wrong!
Here is my mountain yogi companion just ahead of me on that early part of the path:
Well we kept climbing and climbing... as you get nearer the Skandasram (solitary hut home of the Maharishi from 1915 to 1922, now also a sacred but not so accessible site related to the R. ashram, and presently almost overgrown with mountainside jumgle), the path flagstones dissappear, there's no cleared or defined path any more, and you're walking over the rough gravel, sharp-edged boulders, and nasty thorny dry hard vegetation of the real slope. Take it from me, if you are not a life-long wandering sadhu like my companion, THIS IS SHEER HELL! I mean it's like you would imagine fire-walking is going to be (but actually real fire walking is comparitively easy).
I later red that Ramana himself only walked the mountain in sandals, saying when queried about it: "I already wear one set of dead leather (meaning the body), what ist he problem with another?"
But my pal was a real hard core Shivaite sadhu, he just kept leaping up up up like a fricking mountain goat in his barefeet, and I somehow kept following. The Mountain was baptizing me by pure fire that shot pain through my whole body on every step.
Fortunately schooled by Systema training hardships to keep smiling no matter what I was able to muster some cheer for this shot of me, about one-third of the way up the Mountain:
Bit of a grimace but hey that's just normal me, ahahaha. However I was beginning to feel like that famous Lafcadio Hearn Japanese Buddhist ghost story....
So on and on we (me) struggled upward, upward, upward. With shoes this would be a climb only for very fit people, but not especialy dangerous nor requiring rock climbing gear. Have you done the Na-Pali trail in Kuai, that full hike? From cardio point of view its kind of like that, but without the rivers pouring across the trail...
But from podiatric point of view... ARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHH pure HELL....
Anyway I somehow made it with him up to the crest line, where we rested and meditated. But by then darkness had fallen and I had to face doing the whole thing in reverse, with no flashlight, no shoes, in the dark.
Somehow made it back down, actually via an alternate downward path that ends in the Temple instead of the Ashram. Equally horrific on my feet. Honestly reflecting back I don't even know how that was possible, in the dark, when I couldn't see any of my foot placements.
You may ask: what exactly is the significance of all this? You might well ask that about anything, but I'll tell you: the Mountain was testing me, asking for a bit of earnest money so to speak. Oh since you mention money - the sadhu never asked for any and categorically refused when I wanted to pay for his meal. Not a cent changed hands. He said that would be niyama.
Fun times.
Through all this - the initial morning connection, at the Ashram, at the Temple. on the Outer Circuit and on the Inner Path climb - the Mountain as Shiva Shakti continued to pour itself into the heart center without any break. What it boils down to is one full day in the embrace of Lord Shiva.
[To be continued...]
