VIGNETTES
Glorious traditions
RUPA GOPAL
|
Madurai ... . It is a town with a unique pulsating vibrancy of its own, totally alive day and night.
|
CORRIDOR OF HISTORY: The splendour of the Tirumalai Nayak Mahal. PHOTO: K. GANESAN
MADURAI — a magical name spelling an extraordinary sweetness, a huge town/city steeped in antiquity, in religion, in art, architecture and music, in a cuisine honed delectable with time, and permanently redolent with the essence of fresh jasmine — truly, a place like no other. It's a town with a unique pulsating vibrancy of its own, totally alive day and night, as if life were centred on a Lido. This is a place where gods walked, lived and ruled, as documented in history.
The Meenakshi temple is of course largely the focal point of Madurai — a magnetic force drawing every denizen and visitor. Year-long festivals thrill the town, culminating in the celestial Meenakshi-Sundareshwarar wedding, conducted over a week, devoutly enacting all the legends associated with it. The Vaigai too plays a prominent role in the affairs, flooding to prevent Vishnu reaching the wedding venue in time, as happened in the timeless past. The city's historical part is brought alive in son-et-lumiere show at the Tirumalai Nayak Mahal, every evening.
Capital of the Pandya Kingdom, Madurai today has a hugely planned layout — however, centuries of dust is determined to make its presence felt, and the noise is nothing short of cacophony. If you can drive in Madurai's mad traffic, it would be logical to assume that one can drive anywhere in the world. A horse-drawn tonga keeps stately pace with the latest Mercedes, jostled by cycles and bikes. Loaded open carrier vehicles add to the colourful vista of a city eternally on the go, tethered down firmly by the eternal soaring presence of the temple towers, beautifully lit at night.
Textile centre
Madurai has long been an excellent producer of quality textiles — towels, made-ups etc., both in the handloom and powerloom sectors. The Sellur area is throbbing with the constant clack of flying shuttles on giant looms, weaving beach magic — huge colourful terry towels in special designs for sun worshippers to laze on, on hot beaches in sunny Spain, or the Carribbean. Kitchen towels, pot boilers, aprons, napkins, etc. are produced in lakhs, in constant demand, despite threats from Chinese production. This is a huge money-spinning export industry in the town, a giant foreign exchange earner for the country. Thousands of girls and women are employed gainfully in the weaving, finishing and packing of the products. T.M. Handlooms is an old established firm, set up by the late T.Marimuthu, one of the doyens of this industry here. Today, his three sons run the flourishing firm, with a turnover of about Rs. 12 crores per annum, exporting to the United Kingdom and Europe. Groups of cheerful girls carrying heavy bundles of yarn and cloth move from one building to another, and vehicles are constantly at the ready, to transport the finished goods. Earlier years used to see hand-drawn carts piled high with the goods moving around the city, on their way to exotic destinations abroad, from these simple beginnings.
Another aspect of the teeming handloom industry here is the cotton Sungudi sari, a spin-off from the sizeable Saurashtra community settled here, bringing their expertise in Bandhini to the South. The Madurai Sungudi sari, with its jari border has long been a staple buy of the tourist here. The milling visiting foreigners find the cotton cool, and make them into comfy dresses. Much of this product is now powerloom woven, due to a paucity of labour.
One of the most lovely aspects of Madurai is the malli, or the peerless jasmine — simply everywhere. Every corner has a man or woman tying the flowers in thick strings. Almost every girl buys these flowers to wear in her hair every day. Indeed, it seems to be a most charmingly integral part of one's look. Jasmine export worldwide is another big money spinner here, from this unusual city. Flowers are flown to reach places by mid-day, everyday. The fields at nearby Silkvaripetti come alive before the first pale rays of dawn, bustling with flower pickers, trained staff weighing the harvest, and packing it for transport, all on the spot. Never has the soil provided so pleasurable an employment.
Food — Madurai is glorious in this field too. Vegetarian food is of a very high order, with even small eateries taking a fierce pride in serving the best, straight off the stove. Dosais and idlis are formidably legendary, while pooris and parathas, panihaarams and a variety of rice dishes abound. Small places thrill eaters with nool parathas and kothu parathas served round the clock. This is washed down next door with a glass of piping hot masala milk — a speciality of the city, with its rich milk made richer by constantly simmering the milk to a thick consistency, serving it with a topping of nuts, the whole spiced deliciously with cardamom and saffron. Actually, a meal by itself, but then Madurai can make easy gluttons of one and all.
Non-vegetarian good is a never ending titillation — fish, mutton, chicken, a variety of biriyanis, all with a fiery South Indian spicy tang. Fresh fish comes in daily from nearby Tuticorin and Thanjavur, and also from the Vaigai. Butcher shops abound, displaying freshly cut meat, readily snapped up.
The Taj, situated beautifully atop a small hill, and located in the old colonial Madura Coats bungalow, and the Pandyan have long given class cuisine to the gourmand here. The Park and Germanus have jumped into the fray now, ever conscious of the increasing foreign tourist arrival here.
The old mann paanai soru is now quite obsolete in the city, giving way to the use of cooking gas. The distinctive earthy flavour of the food is now lost, to be perhaps sourced only in a few remote villages. The large number of Saurashtrans have established bhojanalayas, serving hot rotis with rapid fire speed, along with Gujarati and Rajasthani side dishes, quite the need of the milling North Indian pilgrims.
Mango country
Being so close to mango country of nearby Rajapalayam, Madurai automatically gets first choice of the king of fruits — Banganapalli, Malgoa, Pithar, Sindura, Kutras and the humble Kilimookku. Both for pickle, as raw mango, and as sweet ripe fruit, the mango seems to certainly favour Madurai. Exotic fruit from the cool hills too can be freely bought — pear, chikoo, mangosteen, plums, apples, etc.
A mention must be made of the jigar thanda — a unique Madurai cool dream — a mix of ice cream, milk and many other delights, a sort of falooda that is quite the rage, and enjoyed at any time of the day. The name of this dish means "to cool the heart", or that which pleasures the heart. Truly, it is named well.
With a huge number of movie halls, Madurai beckons late night movie goers to a long night out — a movie is inevitably followed by splurging on the plentiful choice of food available. This is a city that rarely sleeps, that never seems to rest in its quest for pleasure, in its endeavour at enterprise, in its inherent divinity. And if one were to pall of Madurai, one could easily head for the Kodai hills, into the hot plains of artistic Chettinad, or into the green hinterland of Courtallam, all holidays worthy of the effort.
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Magazine
