The Sri Lankan situation

A friend forwarded to me an interesting article titled ‘Chinese billions in Sri Lanka fund battle against Tamil Tigers’ by Jeremy Page from TIMES ONLINE dated May 2, 2009.

You can read it at:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6207487.ece

Pandanus fascicularis: A tropical shrub of many uses

Have you seen this plant?

It is common along the coastal areas of India, and also in SE Asia. The botanical name is Pandanus fascicularis (syn. P. odoratissimus, nom. illeg). In English it is called screw pine or umbrella tree. Local names in India include Kewra, Kaitha, Ketaki, Kevadaa, Tale hoovu, Bonnong, Kia, Kaethakee, and Thazhai.

We have Pandanus fascicularis in abundance in Olavipe, my village in Kerala, India. In fact, all the photographs on this page are taken at Olavipe. The shrub grows wild, usually along the canal banks, by the lake shore and on the edges of the rice fields. It is an invasive shrub which spreads quite extensively unless controlled.

The blade like leaves are about a meter or longer and have spikes along the midriff and the edges. They used to have economic significance our area. Large mats which were mainly used for drying paddy were made from Pandanus leaves by a particular caste. They were sold at the church feasts just before the harvest. Now plastic sheets have replaced them.

But elsewhere, like the South Eastern countries, the leaves have an important part in the local cuisine. They are eaten raw, or cooked and also used as flavoring agent.

Other uses of the leaves include making of bags and decorative items. It is also said that good quality paper can be made from screw pine leaves.

An excellent perfume is made from the spadices of male screw pine flowers. These blossoms are beautiful. When they open the wet musk smell lingers in the area. The Ganjam District of Orissa is one of the places where Pandanus is cultivated commercially. There are about 130 distillation units producing aromatic oil in the area.

The entire plant is considered to have great medicinal value. The range of health problems treated with different parts of the shrub is amazing. Here are examples from a long list: leprosy and other skin diseases, antiseptic, brain problems, diabetes, ulcers and wounds, cardiac conditions.

A major benefit of planting Pandanus is that it offers protection against sea erosion. This aspect is often overlooked.

Pandanus fascicularis grows to a height 2 to 3 meters. The common method of propagation is by planting the offshoots. Seeds can also be germinated.

Pandanus fruit has great resemblance to pineapple. But I don’t think many people eat it.

Ends.

Click on photos to enlarge. Copyright reserved. Photo credits: Top: Karthiki. Second: TP. The rest taken by me.

Related posts:

A pineapple story, with photos

Medicinal Plants: Noni (Morinda citrifolia) planting for profit?

Ashtalakshmi Temple, Chennai

Goddess Mahalakshmi
Painting by Raja Ravi Varma.
Public Domain, from Wikimedia Commons.

Recently I went to lunch at a flat on Elliot’s Beach, Besant Nagar, Chennai. A soothing sea breeze was blowing in from the Bay of Bengal. I walked up to the balcony and looked out, and saw a stunning temple right on the beach.

The Ashtalakshmi Temple, I was told.

I was fascinated by the structure which highlighted several features of the Dravidian temple architecture. It is a comparatively new temple, built in 1976. Within the short span of three decades this shrine has become a tourist attraction in Chennai.

At that time, the Ashtalakshmi Temple was the only one to house Goddess Mahalakshmi’s eight manifestations – Adilakshmi (The First manifestation of Lakshmi), Dhanyalakshmi (Granary wealth), Dhairyalakshmi (Wealth of courage), Gajalakshmi (Elephants, symbols of wealth), Santanalakshmi (Wealth of continuity, progeny), Vijayalakshmi (Wealth of victory), Vidyalakshmi (Wealth of knowledge and education), and Dhanalakshmi (Monetary wealth). [Source: Wikipedia.]

Also worshipped here are Sri Hanuman, Sri Guruvayoorappan and Sri Ganesha. The Deepavali, Navaratri and Pongal festivals are celebrated with fervor

The Ashtalakshmi Temple has four levels on which the deities are installed. This is something rare.

Chennai Ashtalakshmi Temple’s claim to uniqueness as the lone location where all the eight forms of Goddess Mahalakshmi are displayed was lost in 1996. That year an Ashtalakshmi Temple was built in Hyderabad.

I was about to take some photos of the Ashtalakshmi Temple from the balcony when KO Isaac, President of the Madras Photographic Society, who was there with me offered to do that. Some of the pictures he captured on his camera are given below:

Click on photos to enlarge. Copyright Reserved.

Related post:

A Queen Visits Her Lord.

Also see about Star of Lakshmi at:

http://mathworld.wolfram.com/StarofLakshmi.html

Wildlife photos

Photos by KO Isaac.
Location: Kanha National Park, Madhya Pradesh, India.
Copyright Reserved. Click on photos to enlarge.

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Kerala Architecture: A heritage home undergoes repairs

Before concrete structures came into vogue, the roofs of Kerala houses were made with wood. In Malayalam it is known as melkoora or melkoodu. The amount of calculations that go into making a melkoodu is amazing. And each wooden piece that forms a part of it has to be precisely made.

Assembling – that is exactly what it is – all the beams and crossbeams and rafters and support items is a critical phase in the construction of a house. If there is even a minor mistake in the calculations or the dimensions of the made parts, the assembling would fail.

The wood that is normally used is old anjili (jungle jack tree). It is a hardy wood capable of withstanding the vicissitudes of time and weather. (A clarification seems necessary here. Anjili, though belonging to the same family, is different from jack fruit tree.) Nevertheless, it is safer to check the structure for possible damages. The common problem is rain water seeping in through the tiles on to the wood pieces that support them.

Currently we are undertaking repairs to the top roof of our ancestral house, Thekkanattu Parayil at Olavipe, Kerala, India. This is the second such venture in my memory.

In large houses, such repairs are done in parts: one area is finished and then the work moves to the next area. There is always an urgency to ensure that the job is completed before the southwest monsoon arrives in June.

My bother Jacob has pointed out an interesting aspect of this round of repairs to the house. The wood used is from an anjili which is estimated to be 120 years old. This means that when the house construction started in 1890, the tree would have been a tiny sapling!

Trees are vital and it is sad to cut them down. But it is also important to maintain homes, heritage or otherwise. Thachusastram (the Kerala science relating to construction) permits felling of old trees for meaningful purposes. Anyway, we have dozens of anjilis at various stages of growth on our lands and we take good care of them.

I am reproducing below some photos of the house. The last one offers a sight that is rare because very few houses with wood melkoodu are built these days.

South portion of the house. It is the top roof here that is undergoing repairs.
Photo: JJ Tharakan.

The specific part of the roof where the tiles have been removed for repairs.
Photo: JJ Tharakan.

Same portion at night.
This beautiful photo is by Dr. Sanjay Parva.

The roof as it looks without tiles, exposing the
wooden superstructure. Photo: TP.

All photos: Copyright Reserved. Click to enlarge.

Related posts:

Kerala Architecture - Olavipe Heritage Home

Kerala Architecture: Nalukettu, ettukettu, pathinarukettu

Photos: Flora along Chennai streets

Chenbakom against the backdrop of a coconut palm.

Pala flower

(Ezhilam Pala (Alstonia scholaris) ?

African tulip

?

Tender leaves on a mango tree before it flowers.

Related post:

Gulmohar: A beauty from Chennai

An elephant swims to Crow Island

History was made in Kakka Thuruth (literal translation: ‘Crow Island’) last week, in an unusual manner.

Now, Kakka Thuruth is a beautiful peanut-shaped island just north-west of Olavipe. It is about 16km south of Cochin as the crow flies. Almost all along the coastline of the isle are rice fields which are mostly used for shrimp filtering these days. The central portion consists of coconut groves.

The photo below by Karthiki, taken from the Olavipe ferry, shows Kakka Thuruth on the left:

At about 6.30 in the morning on April 9, the shrimp workers saw a strange movement in the lake on the western side of the island. As the bewildered people watched, a tusker emerged from the water and majestically climbed on to the outer bund.

That was Neelakandan, the first elephant to set foot on Kakka Thuruth.

He had been tied for the night in a plot near National Highway 47. Early morning, Neelakandan broke the shackle, ran south along the highway for a short distance, turned left to a by-road and reached the land’s end at Kakka Thuruth Ferry.

The water mass did not stop the elephant. He just got into the lake and swam across. Well, elephants (a full-grown bull weighs around 5 tons) are good swimmers.

There was a bit of panic in Kakka Thuruth initially because the mammoth creature had arrived without escort. But the distressed mahout and his assistant followed in a short while.

More drama was on. Police personnel from two stations rushed to the spot. On their heels came the Fire Force, and the Elephant Squad of the Veterinary Department.

Neelakandan suddenly decided to traverse the rice field and reach the coconut groves inland. He probably did not know that the water-locked area had a thick clay bed. And he got stuck in the mud.

The police, firemen and the local people tied ropes to the elephant and after a prolonged struggle managed to bring him on to solid ground again. Then water was pumped on to the animal for a while to wash away the slime coating he had acquired.

Attempts to make Neelakandan swim back to the mainland failed. Perhaps he was under trauma caused by the clay trap in the paddy field. And he stayed on, as an honoured guest of the people of Kakka Thuruth, who fed him and looked after him well.

Many persons from surrounding areas and tourists from Cochin, including foreigners, came to visit the hero of the story on the island in the sun.

It is said that the owner of Neelakandan delayed arranging a raft or barge hoping that he could save quite a bit of money if his elephant swam back. Finally, a barge was brought from Cochin on Monday the 13th to transport the jumbo across the waters.

But the drama did not end even with that.

Neelakandan refused to climb the steep ramp to the vessel. He would take a few steps up the incline and then reverse himself to land. After failed attempts, the mahout had a bright idea. He made the elephant turn right about and negotiate the ramp with his back to the barge. On reaching mainland also the same procedure was followed.

Perhaps Neelakandan did not wish to turn his back on the idyllic Kakka Thuruth and the people there.

Ends.

(Based on newspaper reports and eyewitness account over telephone.)

Click on photo to enlarge. Copyright reserved.