MY TRIP TO MOOKABIKA TEMPLE

                                                                   Mangalore  City

                        My mother,sister and I entered the S1 coach of Malabar Express at 6 pm.The train was scheduled to leave from Thiruvananthapuram by 6.30 pm.We planned to go to Mangalore by train and travel  all the way from there to Kollur Mookambika Temple by bus.The soft and blue seats of the train looked very appealing.When we entered the train,there was pin drop silence.The train started to whistle at 6.30 pm.sharp.

                      The long metal coaches meandered and straightened its way past many stations and reached Ullal,a border between Karnataka and Kerala.I did not feel that I was entering an another state,but a place,which writes its language with more curves and loops than it is bound to be.It was almost 10am.when we reached Mangalore.

                         There were so many private buses outside the station.We entered an orange coloured bus with a board,which showed its destination as Kollur.The soft cushioned seats of the bus felt very relaxing.When the bus raced along the city,I noticed billboards of' 'Kalyan Jewellers',a clear indication of the extension of gold business by some keralites.One billboard had Amithab Bachan and Kannada superstar Puneeth Rajkumar.With a very dark face,Puneeth seemed like an unlikely hero.I wondered how he became a superstar.I asked my father.He told me this - ''His father Raj Kumar was a superstar.That gave him an opening.When Puneet's  and Shivaraj's (his brother and another superstar) films are released,a mafia blocks the release of all the other films.That made the people to watch whatever hell is offered to them.''Sounded very  logical to me.

                              We reached  Kollur by  2 pm.We prayed to our fill.A boy led us to the room we stayed.It was very cosy and comfortable.The curries with the food were filled with coriander leaves,but tasted good to me.There were so many cows roaming in the temple premises.We took some snaps in the mobile phone.

                            On our return trip,when the bus reached Udupi, three children entered  with begging bowls.They looked expectantly for  loaves of bread,which we had in our hands.We gave it all to them.