Linda and Mals Asian Adventure: Amritsar & the Golden Temple.

Amritsar: Yet another long journey, 15 and a half hours by overnight train. just 700km but at a snails pace. The accommodation in Amritsar was mostly in the scruffy category, the Lonely Planet recommendations were at best pretty dire. We eventually hunted down a place that was OK if not a tad NOISY. Anyway back to the serious stuff. Amritsar in in the North of India in the Punjab state and very close to the only official land boarder crossing with Pakistan. However it's main tourist and pilgrim draw is the fantastic Golden Temple. As its a Sikh temple there was as usual no fee to look around this awesome sight. Words do the place no justice so I will let my shamble of pictures make that attempt.

The Golden Temple at Amritsar The Golden Temple at Amritsar

The Golden Temple at Amritsar.

The Golden Temple

The Golden Temple.

As well as the famous Golden temple, Amritsar has a few other gems, not least is the quirky Mata temple which has tunnels and face cave entrances and a whole bunch of stuff inside !

The Mata Temple Amritsar Showing lines of Lingas.

Linda crawling into one of those caves.. Mata Temple...Does my bum look big in this cave ??

Mata Temple looks like some deity is doing a Hendrix..

Some deities which look a bit Voodoo to my thinking.

Mata Temple

Linda in a channel of water.. Mata Temple.

The Sri DurgianaTemple in Amritsar ( also known as the Silver temple) has a similar design to the golden temple but is of Hindu origin, it is also much less visited by tourists and as such was really peaceful. It is called the Silver temple due to its intricate Silver doors.

Sri DurgianaTemple

Sri DurgianaTemple ( Ganesh is showed here )

As you can see the resemblance to the Golden Temple is pretty obvious, the surrounding marble walkway and central aisle lead to the temple ( again just like the Golden Temple ) .

It also has some really great reflections.

Sri DurgianaTemple

Not as Golden as the golden temple but still highly impressive.

Sri DurgianaTemple

And now for something completely different, all the silly walks you can muster at the India Pakistan boarder closing ceremony at Attari ( each day at sunset ) very hard on the nationalist front but a good bit of pantomime. It attracts hundreds on either side of the boarder gate who chant wave flags in fervent competition. India won on this occasion but Pakistan won the flag waving.

Now lets not take this too seriously eh !

The first of many silly walks.. Take note Mr Cleese ..

And with a score draw on the cards the flags are lowered.

In 1919 a certain British General ordered his forces to open fire on a gathered crowd who were quietly protesting about a new British rule about imprisoning Indian citizens without trail if suspected of sedition. The outcome was ( figures vary wildly ) are anything from 750 - 2000 people being killed. This was the act that sparked a huge protest and world wide condemnation of General Dyers bloody act. Eventually this lead to Ghandi's response in increasing his nationwide program of civil disobedience. In remembrance of this act a small park area has been established with a huge central pillar. Some of the surrounding walls still show some of the many bullet holes from that day. Jallianwala Bagh.