I spent an hour or so here today - and was made most welcome.
It was a real challenge to get the lighting right inside the temple.
Bright light streamed in from a hole in the roof while the inside of the temple was dark.
There was an enourmous amount of smoke in the temple from burnin incense.
The smoke made some interesting shafts of light.
I set the camera to take a few bracketed shots at different exposures and will use some HDR techniques
to bring out the full effects once I get back home.
Interesting shafts of light filter through the smoke filled temple as the drummer pounds out a motivating beat.
At the front of the temple a man pulls a rope to ring a set of small bells.
In the opposite corner of the temple another man pulls on a rope to ring the larger "Church" bells located in a tower outside the temple.
This man plays a flute and sits directly opposite the drummer.
Looks like he has the flute wired up to a speaker system.
It was a bit difficult to photograph the worshippers without getting in their way -
So I resorted to using their reflections in a large mirror on the wall.
This is what the worshippers were watching.
Priests or elders were burning something inside one of the shrines.
This woman sat on the ground close to the shrine where the priests were conducting the ceremony.
After makijng a donation to the temple the old man that showed me around th temple put a mark of blessing on my forehead.
The process went like this:
1 - A stripe of white powder,
2- A stripe of the yellow paste over the top of the white powder
3- A small dob of red powder.
Unfortunatly because of the heat this special marking started to run down my face carried by my sweat.
After 10 minutes I looked like I had been hit in the face with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
This is the old man that showed me around the temple.
He introduced each diety in turn but I didn't understand a single word.
This gentleman watched over my shoes while I was in the temple.
He has a small shop where he sells small earthernware (terracotta) bowls. He's actually holding one in his hands.
The bowls are used to hold oil for the temple ceremonies and cost 3 Ruppies = $US 0.03 each.
I paid him a small fee for watching over my shoes and he gave me an oil bowl as a momento.
As I walked back to the car he ran up behind me and offered his business card and asked if I could please send him a copy of the photo.
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