Couple of decades ago, I visited Chottanikkara temple in Kerala in the evening. This was my first visit to the temple. There are two temples - the upper and the lower, knows as Melkkavu and Kizhukkavu respectivel. The upper temple has,as presiding deity, Devi (Annapoorneswari) in full splendour, and represented as Saraswathy in the morning, Lakshmi in the noon and Durga in the evening. The Bhadrakaali at Kizhukkavu is believed to exorcise evil spirit from devotees, after conducting bhajanam.
I was tired after a few days on the road. After having had my darsanam in the more conventional upper temple, I moved to the lower temple. I have heard stories about the power of the bhadrakali, and of the many people, belived to be under the influence of evil spirits, who become violent on seeing the deity, unable to look at her directly. I have also heard of the tree in the Kizhukkavu, where the evil spirits are supposed to be parked, after being exorcised, using nails hammered into the tree (see image on the right). Though god fearing, I have been very rational those days, taking all these with a pinch of salt.While I was on the pathway to the kizhukkavu, there was a powercut. It was twilight outside. The sun had set, the sky was red and there was a surreal feeling. There was a crowd of about 100 in the kizhukkavu, with the sreekovil door closed for deeparadhana. There was pindrop silence. Everything normal, quiet and peaceful, but getting darker by the minute. Then the door opened showing the deity illuminated with hundreds of oil lamps. A magnificient sight. I closed my eyes, at peace with myself. Suddenly, I heard a scream to my left. A young lady of twenty something had started screaming and jumping. She had her hair down and was uncontrollable. My heart missed a couple of beats. Immediately, another commotion in my back as another lady, this time an older lady started gyrating, abusing the deity. To say I was disturbed is an understatement. I was scared out of my wits, for it was my first encounter with people supposedly afflicted by evil spirits. All my rationality vanished in thin air. I had always thought that most of the people like these fake a lot, but however skeptical I tried to be, I just couldnt believe that these two were faking, and years on I still dont. I watched, half scared, half curious at their actions. It went on for nearly half an hour and the energy levels were amazing. They were still on, with relatives unable to hold them back, when I left, shaken and very very disturbed.
I travelled overnight in a bus, physically and mentally fatigued. The event of the previous evening had taken its toll on me. I dozed off, and had strange dreams of evil spirits floating in my dreams, disturbing me further. I was woken up at 5 am by the conductor. I got down and made haste to my friends house, who had just got married, but I had not yet seen his wife. It was still reasonably dark when I pressed the bell, and was horrified at the apparition that opened the door. It was clad in a white dress, face red, hair in a bundle on top of the head, only the teeth and the whites of the eyes bright.
I almost had a heart attack. All the experience of the previous evening and the dreams of the night had suddenly come back to haunt me, or so it seemed. I couldnt answer her simple question as to who I was. I stood transfixed to the ground, mouth agape, pulse racing.
Fortunately, I could make out behind her the familiar face of my friend, who told the apparition who I was, and it withdrew flashing its teeth in a huge smile, making it more scary (something similar but thrice as scary as the image on the left. All pictures sourced from google images)
I blurted out. My friend was nonplussed for a moment, then threw his head back in laughter. Taking the bag from my hand, he put a comforting hand of my shoulder and said,
'That thing is my wife. She has applied red sandalwood as a facepack when she went to bed last night. I had always joked with her that all she had to do is to show her face in the event of a thief entering the house in the night, and looks like she managed to scare the living daylights out of you'
Though years have passed, the image of his wife as she was when she opened the door ( a pretty, beautiful, bubbly woman without facepack otherwise) still sends a shiver up my spine.
