Getting cultural in Kandy

9-3-2 Wednesday 1st March

Today we are exploring Kandy and bound for Puja - The Offering Ceremony for the Holy Relic of The Sacred Tooth at The Temple of the Sacred Tooth of Buddha, the Sri Dalada Maligawa, at Kandy. Fast on the heals of our latest culture injection we followed this by a visit to the Hotel Suisse and finally the cultural show.

There was no rain on Wednesday morning after heavy storms late Tuesday and overnight. So first a lovely drive down the hill to Kandy from Ellerton - an elegant tea planters bungalow where we are staying. Now a small hotel, Ellerton is set up on the top a steep hill, in the tea country - however the road down the hill has in parts been swept away by the rain. At one of the particularly difficult junctions the locals helpfully stationed at a hut at the bottom of the hill rushed to give Sumith help and gesticulate directions to help avoid the perilous descent over a signifcant drop in the road surface. Sumith a calm cautious patient and very skilled driver, remains unruffled throughout whatever happens and we made it without any undue incident.

As ever my trusty trilby comes with me - in this image it's on the back shelf of the car.

Very exciting traffic & jams in Kandy.... Lots of big roundabouts and traffic junctions controlled like a military operation by policeman in khaki uniforms with white cotton sleeves, a whistle and a walkie talkie! Like all driving in Sri Lanka everything is conducted in dramatic style - a swift dash, swooping weave and so on, at times you need nerves of steel. The great skill is in the avoidance techniques employed, Sumith's style is one of calmness, assured safety, the poop of the horn, and giving way greafeully. It all seems to work even when you have a bus or lorry bearing down on you at great speed, the situation is resolved safely - fortunately the edges of the road are wide!

We arrive at The Temple of Tooth, a venerated relic of Buddha, and is kept on a gold lotus flower inside seven ever increasing in-size dagoba (stopa shaped) caskets, one inside another, behind a series of screens.

To get to the shrine itself you climb the stairs giving access to the upper floor of the ornate pagoda like building. Photography in the shrine and museum is not allowed, but apart from a tantalising glimpse it is hard to see very much in detail. As you do so, you pass those who queue patiently in line to offer flowers to buddha, those with offerings who queuing will get closer access to the shrine. The Sri Lankan blue or white lilies are typical offerings.

So we stand with many, in the large upper vestibule of shrine craning our necks for a shimmering glimpse through the recessed archways of the shrine and its mystical contents. You can only glimpse The Tooth wrapped for safety within its caskets and it is visible only displayed once every five years.

The British recognised the cultural significance attached to the Tooth and its necessity to maintain the stability of the state. They bought it back to Kandy in 1818, after it had endured centuries of migration around Kandy and India, and placed it for safekeeping in the shrine room, where it was guarded at night.

Just up a flight of stairs is the library housing a significant collection of religious books written in script on palm leaves. Paintings suspended in the New Shrine Room illustrate the history of the journeys, tribulations and "migrations of the Tooth" - over the centuries since Buddha died and the relic was rescued from his ashes.

The museum supports these historical saga paintings on the first floor of the museum with written documents, photographs of the destruction of the temple after the Tamil bomb in 1998, and on the second floor artefacts associated with the "processing" of the Tooth. I really enjoyed the flags, banners and decorative doors hanging here too.

Afterwards we visited The Hotel Suisse where Mountbatten was stationed in the WW2 and speculated that Simon's mothers unit worked on there on their code breaking tasks too. The staff gave us a tour, cool towels for our hands, and a welcome drink, proudly showing off the main rooms used by Mountbatten.

After lunch back at Ellerton in the pouring rain, we returned to Kandy for a cultural evening - and enjoyed a great show of acrobatics & gymnastics with loads of energy and drama, not to mention the dance music and sheer volume from from the drums!

Video

I will attach these when I am home - Google Blogger software is very trying!

We emerged outside to find it had at last stopped raining, to watch the fire eating and dancing over hot coals. Finally we were born back to Ellerton by the trusty Sumith.

Video