I started the morning with a heritage walk of Malleswara with Tanya. Malleswara is a neighborhood in Bangalore that once was where all the Brahmins lived. The first thing our guide pointed out was these very pretty murals painted in the alleyways. Apparently the alleyways were where all the trash and refuse was dumped but in the pandemic, the city made an effort to clean them up. Both murals depicted the girls with their heads turned backwards as to note the back entrance of the house and the idea that the people who were in the back of the house were not worthy enough to see the woman’s faces. I loved to see the murals as it made the ordinary walls more interesting to look at.
The next stop on the tour I was particularly excited about - the temple of Sri Kadu Mallikarjuna Swami Gudi. I had seen photos online of the Hindu temples and loved the vividness of the architecture. This particular temple was very colorful with many deities depicted. I loved the mountain temple structure which they call the shikhara. We got to go inside this temple after we removed our shoes. Inside, there was almost a museum with several statues and sculptures on display in one of the rooms. Inside of the main temple there was a huge bull or nandi sculpture that people came to worship. On the way out I even saw two big bulls!
Right next to the first temple we visited, there were several other temples including one that was completely covered in gold and one called Sri Dakshinamukha Nandi Tirtha Kalyaani Ksthetra. The guide told us that initially the land was going to be sold off to build apartments when the local village encouraged the owner to investigate the land. A bit of digging was done to excavate a bull in which water flowed from its mouth to a pool below. The land was then seized by the government for protection and a temple was built around it. Today the water still flows out from the bulls mouth into a pond that is apparently 30 feet deep. There were tons of little cute turtles in the pond that are considered an invasive species given that they have no natural predators in the pond. I don’t think I had ever been that close to a turtle before!
Following the turtle temple, we walked to a flower market! The whole street was lined with vendors selling red, yellow, orange, and white marigolds. In each of their stalls, people were seated on the floor stringing the flowers into garlands. The whole market was definitely something out of a movie. It was so pretty! I loved the colors and how many flowers there were. It was an ideal location given that most people buy the flowers and take to the temples which were right there.
The last temple we visited was Sri Venugopala Krishna Swami Devasthanam which was built almost like a little village with several skiharas present. I thoroughly enjoyed this heritage walk and the history of the town as well.
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