ABODE OF THE GODDESS
IT BEGAN A DECADE AGO, our family’s love affair with Madurai. It was January 2011. My brother, Samir, and I had relocated to Chennai from the UK and wanted to discover Tamil Nadu. Madurai was foremost recommended to us. Taking mum along, we embarked. An eight-hour journey became stopped an dinner break and got waylaid after one too many vadais. The journey seemed endless. Then, it ended. At 2 am, with imprecations heaped on the driver and our resolve never to return to Madurai. Little did we realise that Madurai’s presiding deity, the beauteous Goddess Meenakshi, wields the might of destiny in her enigmatic smile. Or that there’s a story in every pillar of Madurai’s temples and every quivering petal of its jasmines that would keep luring us back.
Our first glimpse of Madurai was unforgettable. Hawkers selling onions, people standing around eating street food—at 2 am! Trudging through labyrinthine streets we
