Village Pongal

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This morning was a surprise late addition to our journey. The Madurai tourist board invites foreign and domestic tourists to a local village for a Pongal celebration. The village this year was Thenkarai. This is special for the village and they all were enjoying the event and wanting to meet all their guests. We were given flower garlands. Inside the temple there was a welcome from the village and dancing. The main dance was with a metal cooking vessel balanced on the head. There were also two horse dancers on stilts. There was an opportunity to taste Pongal and to watch it being cooked. It is like rice pudding, with less milk. The village temple is an old Chola temple with inscriptions using a very old Tamil script on the walls. There was more dancing and village games.These included a strength competigon huge stones and dropping them over your shoulder. More than I could lift at the gym! The last game involved the participants blindfolded and given a stick to strike an earthenware pot. I had a go and was fairly close, but I failed. A tall young Californian won. The village also provided a very enjoyable lunch. I particularly enjoyed the chance to try the sugar cane. This is the special Pongal sugar cane which is black. It had a very fresh taste, sweet, but quite different from refined sugar.

After lunch we continued the short journey to Cardamon House. From here we can see the mountains, but we haven't yet started to climb.

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