Good bye Andhra! Back to Tamil Nadu!

On sunday the 10th of July I left Tirupati. It was a very nice visit and I really had a great time! Then 2 of the room service destroyed it by running after me and demanding 100 Rupees... Kind of annoying and unnessecary. I had already paid Service Tax on the room itself and didn't recieve any room service. Pavan told me it's still courtesy to pay them, even if they didn't do anything, but stare at me.
I probably wouldn't have been so rough if they hadn't demanded an certain amount of money, but asked kindly for a tip, as others do. But demanding it made it that much worse in my eyes... Pavan slipped them a bill when I wasn't looking - he told me later, he paid them, so they would shut up and leave. I'm not that skilled in slipping people money, Pavan refused anything from me =(

Well that was the end for me with Andhra (for now?) and I left for Chennai. Udaya had invited me to lunch and again I was recieved really kindheartedly and we had a nice meal. Because he was exhausted (after 2 days of traveling) he called me a cab and I got a ride to the Koyambedu Bus Station (a really big one in the west of Chennai). The taxi was really fancy and big, apparently it belonged to the government!? (see picture)

After arriving in Tiruvannamalai I met with JP (the founder of Quo Vadis - the interfaith dialogue centre) and he introduced me to some of his friends. One is Amalie, a danish woman who had volunteered there 2 years ago and was now on a short India vacation. She showed me around the town and we had a nice time together =)
Because she had been living there for a few months she knew alot of nice spots to visit and the people living there.
One cool moment was the visit to a hut, where Sri Ramana lived (it is close to a cave, where he had lived for like 30 years!).
Sri Ramana was a Guru who has an Ashram dedicated to him in Tiruvannamalai. Alot of westerners come to this city to visit the ashram to meditate and achieve a new understanding of spirituality (or at least I think thats why they come here). The mountain Arunachala on which Sri Ramana had lived is sacred to Shiva believers (the temple in the city is also devoted to Shiva). When the full moon shines a big fire will be lit atop the mountain and thousands of pilgrims will climb up the hill or walk around the hill to praise and pray to the Shiva, here in his fire incarnation. Around the hill are several shrines devoted to him containing lingams, his symbol, and the pilgrims will pray at these, while walking around the hill (its about 14 km).

After visiting the Ashram, where alot of animals share the space with humans (monkeys and peacocks alike) and Quo Vadis we rented a scooter, an electric one with enough power for about 30 km. Silently we drifted off onto the street and decided to drive around the mountain. Selfies on a scooter are much harder to do than I (or Amalie) thought. Maybe a selfie-stick might actually have been handy in this situation, though with the traffic, it might also have been the end of my phone :D
The drive around the moutain was nice and calm, but once we entered the city again it was a totally different story! I hadn't thought about driving in indian traffic, but somehow managed. Almost being struck by cars, busses and other vehicles we survived and I think Amalie had more fun than I did...
Anyway, renting the scooter was a great Idea! We saved alot of money for autos and were able to see more of town I think, because we just drove around a bit.
We went to see the temple, luckily the temple elefant was back from his holiday (Amalie told me he was on an elefant retreat in Kerala) so he was able to bless us. Fotos were stricly forbidden. The blessing cost 10R, which the elefant was able to hold in his trunk, then gave us a small nudge on the head and secretly passed the money to the man sitting beside him - pretty awesome^^
Later be had a little battery-life left, so Amalie wanted to test the scooter, she had some fun and said it probably was the best 100R she had spent!
In total we were on the road aprox. 5 1/2 hours. Afraid the battery would die on us, we gave it back to the owner. No strings attached (luckily).

Unfortunately JP (Joshua Peter) wasn't in Tiruvannamalai during these days, so there wasn't any dialogue I could have witnessed, but I'll probably visit him, once he is there again and has some time, to spend with me and talk about his work in Quo Vadis.
For me it was time to go to Puducherry (Pondicherry) and visit another famous Ashram, the one Sri Aurobindo and "The Mother" founded.
I'm excited!

"On Duty - Govt. of India - Ministry of Defence" Nice Taxi :D

This mural was drawn by students from Hamburg, Germany! The fine "Christianaeum Gymnasium" has an exchange program with Tiruvannamalai!

The small well in "Quo Vadis" (probably birthplace of many mosquitos...)

Inside the "Red Hut" - the heart place of Quo Vadis, here prayers are held and people meet here for dialogues, if I'm not mistaken... A open hut with a few books

One of many christian pictures hanging around the lunch place - The pictures show Jesus and the stories of the bible in an indian style! (so no white Jesus etc!)

Amalie, a stranger and me - He and his daughter toke pictures of us, we just have a foto of him ;) (This was taken infront of the hut, where Sri Ramana meditated several years)

View over Tiruvannamalai from the mountain - you can see the BIG temple complex (the green square between all the buildings framed by the Gopurams)

Hanging out - indian style! This monkey was relaxing on the stairs infront of the Ashram library

Then as mentioned a pretty peacock!

And a girl for him

The monkeys were searching for food almost eveywhere. Or for water in this case - here the gardener had just watered the plant, so the monkey followed quickly!

Me on the electric scooter - That was a fun afternoon!

The scooter had Electric Hero written on the side, so we just called him our hero :D

The Temple of Tiruvannamalai, well on of the big Gopurams - They are currently renovating them all, so alot of construction noise can be heard