Clover leaf flyover chennai.

 Take this stretch on way back from office. It's an amazing butterfly bridge. Take two loops. 

Indias largest clover leaf bridge. 

We approach take the rare left loop go on to rare right loop and return towards home cross three more bridges from Anna University to kathipara and another at adyar bakery to forrtis malar hospital then immediately take the third bridge over adyar river. 

More than

 I learnt this from my grandson the youngest fellow in our family. Amazing told me three facts of which this was interesting.

on average, women tend to have more taste buds than men, particularly more of the taste-bud-containing structures called fungiform papillae on the tongue.

But there are important qualifications:

Women are somewhat more likely to be “supertasters”—people who perceive certain tastes, especially bitterness, much more intensely.

This is partly influenced by genetics, particularly variations in taste-receptor genes.

The difference isn't absolute. Some men have very high taste sensitivity and some women have relatively low sensitivity.

Taste is also strongly affected by smell, so what we call “taste” is actually a combination of taste and olfaction.

Taste sensitivity can change with age, illness, medications and other factors.

So the popular statement “girls have more taste buds than boys” has some scientific basis, but it is an average difference rather than a rule.

And there is a fascinating consequence: supertaster children may find vegetables such as broccoli, bitter gourd or certain greens much more bitter than other people do.

Quack fact.

 Not quite “quack” like a duck! 

But queen bees do make a distinctive sound. It is called “tooting.” A queen bee can produce a high-pitched toot-toot sound, especially when there are other queens in the hive.

There is an even more fascinating part:

Virgin queen: produces a clear “tooting” sound.

Queens still inside their sealed cells: can respond with a muffled “quacking” or “quacking/ piping” sound, often described as quacking.

The sounds help queens communicate with and compete against one another.

So your question is actually surprisingly close to the truth: queen bees can “quack”! 

Thanks to little fellow today I learnt three new facts. The worst part is he gave me three facts not even half an hour ago. I am growing old quickly now and have forgotten what the third was. 

Homa.

Sudarśana Homa → auspicious purification/protection → wedding/upakarma-type ceremony

In many Sri Vaishnava families, a family undertaking a Sudarśana Homa before an important samskāra is understood not merely as "doing a homam," but as creating an auspicious ritual setting and seeking the Lord's protection before the major event.

The ratha procession adds another fascinating dimension. The temple chariot is itself a moving sacred structure: the deity who normally resides within the temple comes outward among the people. So we have:

the kuṇḍa — sacred space constructed according to measure

the ratha — sacred space set into motion

the temple — sacred space permanently established

No of bricks is specific for the conduction of the Homa. Their arrangements and other details are religiously followed to the T.

 

Ratha

 https://photos.app.goo.gl/dyq2K8YZ3njhoQ5e8

“A Turn to Pull the Lord”

These photograph especially dear to us. My husband and I had the privilege of taking our turn to pull the Lord's chariot around the inner precincts of the temple. The chariot makes three rounds, and members of our family take turns performing this service.

For a few moments, the rope is in our hands—and the Lord allows us the extraordinary privilege of leading Him.

What greater honour can a devotee ask for? 2009

We are not merely watching the procession—we are part of the procession, actually entrusted with leading the Lord's chariot.

And  that members of the family take turns pulling the Lord's chariot for three rounds around the inner prakāram is beautiful. It transforms the photograph from a temple photograph into a family memory of service.

There is something deeply moving about the symbolism too. You are not pulling the Lord because He needs to be moved. He allows Himself to be pulled by His devotees. The Lord who is the master of the universe permits a devotee to hold the rope and say, in effect, “Come with us.”

The three rounds also give the occasion a sense of completeness—the Lord being taken around His own sacred space, with the family participating in turns.

What is especially striking is that it shows the entire sacred setting, not merely the vehicle:

The richly decorated golden processional structure carrying the utsava deities.

The deities are beautifully adorned with flowers and vastrams.

The silver horses at the front make the symbolism of movement especially clear.

The decorated temple pillars and the priest performing the service place the scene unmistakably within a traditional temple environment.

Yes it is the Padmanabha Swamy temple. The wedding too was performed in the adjacent hall. Evening reception was at a five star restaurant. The five day wedding was a grand affair with every member of the family incharge of the various functions. We had the eldest son of the family explaining the rituals as they were being conducted. Host of friends and relatives from various states in India had come some attending a South Indian wedding for the first time. The guests were accommodated in the various clubs or guest houses paying guest accommodation and transport was provided  we also had a bus load of trips to mahabalipuram in the first few days and after the wedding taxi was provided for people who wanted to visit Tirumala Tirupati devasthanams. We had special darshan tickets booked and our friends from Calcutta Delhi Pune Bombay etc were very happy at the engagements and entertainment provided. As the wedding was fixed a year and half earlier we were able to organize the above. The five days was covered beautifully without any hitch. A great portion of the credit goes to the cousin's who undertook the various tasks assigned to them so beautifully. Literature of the functions of the wedding was provided in colourful booklet for those interested. The take away was a beautiful Krishna portrait in tanjore style painting tailor made for the families. For us the experience was a very pleasant and blessed occasion. The family gathering was also as per ritual all cousin's and aunts uncles got a set of clothes. At the pre wedding function. The reception in Taj was a very well attended affair. The hotel too cooperated fully for the overflow of guests and managed the extra people beautifully. One of my daughters friend a guju turned up with seven or more of her cousins for the reception. What was the effect was we were blessed by all the people who came. Taj had a special corner adjacent room for people who came with wedding gifts to take it back on their return for we had clearly mentioned no wedding gifts.  Some were unhappy but we could not help. The full three hours we had a stream of guests walking in to bless the newly married. A fond memory for me especially i have taken a full liberty to record it  here. I shall try and upload the five day videos here some time God willing.

Most importantly, the devotees are standing before the procession with folded hands. The photograph therefore captures the relationsrhip between the Lord, the temple, and the people, rather than simply an ornate object.

And there is an interesting connection with our earlier observation about Sudarshana Homa. Both photographs show something that is easy to miss when we look at a ritual only as a ceremony: the elaborate physical arrangements are themselves part of a carefully transmitted tradition—the form of the altar, the prescribed materials and numbers in a homa, the structure of a procession, the adornment of the deity, and the way devotees participate.

“Why does the deity who lives in the sanctum come out in procession?”

That opens up the beautiful idea of utsava—the Lord leaving His inner abode and coming among His devotees, so that those who cannot enter the sanctum, or cannot approach Him easily, can nevertheless have His darshan.

This photograph would make that idea very tangible.

Dyna.

 LORD RĀMA'S DYNASTY

A lineage that stretches across the ages

Lord Rāma belonged to the Sūryavaṁśa, the Solar Dynasty, traditionally traced back to Vivasvān, the Sun-god.

The Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Ninth Canto, preserves a remarkable genealogy of this dynasty. Generation after generation, kings appear, rule, disappear and give way to the next — until, many generations later, we reach Daśaratha and Lord Rāmacandra.

What is striking is not merely the number of names.

It is the extraordinary sense of continuity across time.

From Vivasvān to Manu, from Ikṣvāku through generations of kings, through Sagara, Bhagīratha, Raghu and Daśaratha, the lineage eventually reaches Rāma.

And even after Rāma, it does not end.

His son Kuśa continues the line, followed by generations of kings extending far beyond the Ramayana age.

Among these names is Maru, the 81st king in this list. Tradition says that Maru attained perfection through yoga and remains at Kalāpa, awaiting the end of Kali-yuga, when he will restore the Solar Dynasty.

Thus the genealogy becomes more than a record of kings.

It becomes a meditation on time itself.

Kings come and go. Kingdoms rise and fall. Yet a lineage continues, carrying memory from one generation to another.

And at one point in that long stream of names appears the name that has remained alive for thousands of years:

Śrī Rāmacandra.

SPIRITUALITY IN SHORT – 2

LORD RĀMA'S DYNASTY

1. Vivasvān, the sun-god

2. Śrāddhadeva, the current Manu

3. Ikṣvāku

4. Vikukṣi

5. Kakutstha

6. Anenā

7. Pṛthu

8. Viśvagandhi

9. Candra

10. Yuvanāśva

11. Śrāvasta

12. Bṛhadaśva

13. Kuvalayāśva

14. Dṛḍhāśva

15. Haryaśva

16. Nikumbha

17. Bahulāśva

18. Kṛśāśva

19. Senajit

20. Yuvanāśva

21. Māndhātā

22. Purukutsa

23. Trasaddasyu

24. Anaraṇya

25. Haryaśva

26. Prāruṇa

27. Tribandhana

28. Triśaṅku

29. Hariścandra

30. Rohita

31. Harita

32. Campa

33. Sudeva

34. Vijaya

35. Bharuka

36. Vṛka

37. Bāhuka

38. Sagara

39. Asamañjasa

40. Aṁśumān

41. Dilīpa

42. Bhagīratha

43. Śruta

44. Nābha

45. Sindhudvīpa

46. Ayutāyu

47. Ṛtūparṇa

48. Sarvakāma

49. Sudāsa

50. Saudāsa

51. Aśmaka

52. Bālika

53. Daśaratha

54. Aiḍaviḍi

55. Viśvasaha

56. Khaṭvāṅga

57. Dīrghabāhu

58. Raghu

59. Aja

60. Daśaratha

61. Lord Rāmacandra

62. Kuśa

63. Atithi

64. Niṣadha

65. Nabha

66. Puṇḍarīka

67. Kṣemadhanvā

68. Devānīka

69. Anīha

70. Pāriyātra

71. Balasthala

72. Vajranābha

73. Sagaṇa

74. Vidhṛti

75. Hiraṇyanābha

76. Puṣpa

77. Dhruvasandhi

78. Sudarśana

79. Agnivarṇa

80. Śīghra

81. Maru

82. Prasuśruta

83. Sandhi

84. Amarṣaṇa

85. Mahasvān

86. Viśvabāhu

87. Prasenajit

88. Takṣaka

89. Bṛhadbala

90. Bṛhadraṇa

91. Ūrukriya

92. Vatsavṛddha

93. Prativyoma

94. Bhānu

95. Divāka

96. Sahadeva

97. Bṛhadaśva

98. Bhānumān

99. Pratīkāśva

100. Supratīka

101. Marudeva

102. Sunakṣatra

103. Puṣkara

104. Antarikṣa

105. Sutapā

106. Amitrajit

107. Bṛhadrāja

108. Barhi

109. Kṛtañjaya

110. Raṇañjaya

111. Sañjaya

112. Śākya

113. Śuddhoda

114. Lāṅgala

115. Prasenajit

116. Kṣudraka

117. Raṇaka

118. Suratha

119. Sumitra

Note 1: The 81st king, Maru, attained full perfection in the practice of yoga, and he still lives in the village of Kalāpa. At the end of this Age of Kali, he will revive the dynasty of the sun-god.

Note 2: In many instances, there are multiple sons for each king, which are not mentioned here.

Note 3: To know the glories of these great kings of Lord Rāma's dynasty, please read Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, 9th canto.

A dynasty is not merely a list of ancestors. It is a river of time.

One generation enters.

One generation leaves.

The river continues.

And somewhere along that vast river came Rāma.

Yet Rāma's greatness is not that he was merely another king in the lineage.

He became the name by which the lineage itself is remembered.

Vedic altra the how

 How a Vedic Altar Led to One of the World’s Great Geometric Discoveries

Long before mathematics entered the classroom, it was already being practised on the ground.

A few wooden pegs.

A length of rope.

A carefully measured space.

And a sacred purpose.

In ancient India, the construction of a Vedic fire altar was not something that could simply be improvised. Its shape, dimensions and orientation were prescribed. The altar had to be constructed accurately because the geometry itself was part of the ritual.

And so, surprisingly, religious ritual became one of the settings in which sophisticated geometry developed.

The manuals that preserved these methods came to be known as the Śulba Sūtras. The Sanskrit word śulba is associated with the measuring cord or rope used in these constructions. The texts give practical instructions for drawing lines, constructing squares and rectangles, transforming one geometric figure into another, and establishing precise right angles. 

Among these texts is the Baudhāyana Śulba Sūtra, generally dated by modern scholars to around 800 BCE, although the dating of the Śulba literature is not certain. 

And there, hidden inside instructions for altar construction, is a remarkable geometric relationship.

The rope across the rectangle

Baudhāyana states, in essence:

The square on the diagonal of a rectangle is equal in area to the squares on its length and breadth.

Today we write it simply:

a² + b² = c²

It is the relationship that schoolchildren throughout the world know as the Pythagorean theorem.

The astonishing part is not merely the formula. It is where we find it.

It was not presented as an abstract mathematical theorem in a geometry textbook.

It appears as a practical rule for construction.

The ancient builder had a rope. The rope could be stretched between two points. If the dimensions were chosen correctly, it could establish a perfect right angle. The Śulba tradition even gives examples corresponding to what we now call Pythagorean triples, such as 3-4-5 and 5-12-13. 

Imagine the scene.

A bare stretch of earth.

Four points marked out.

A cord pulled taut.

A line drawn from one corner to another.

What looks like a simple act of measurement is actually an encounter with geometry.

The altar was the problem. Mathematics was the answer.

This is perhaps the most beautiful part of the story.

The ancient Indian mathematician did not necessarily begin by asking:

“What mathematical theorem can I discover?”

The question was much more practical:

“How do I construct this sacred shape accurately?”

Once the problem was posed, measurement led to geometry. Geometry led to relationships between lengths and areas. And those relationships could be expressed as rules.

The sacred requirement had unintentionally created a mathematical laboratory.

The Śulba Sūtras contain other remarkable geometric procedures as well, including methods for constructing squares equivalent in area to rectangles and for working with diagonals. Baudhāyana also gives an approximation for √2 that is remarkably accurate for its time. 

But was it really “Pythagoras's theorem”?

Here we need to be careful.

The relationship was known before Pythagoras, and the Baudhāyana Śulba Sūtra contains an explicit statement equivalent to the theorem. Pythagoras himself lived centuries later, around the sixth century BCE. 

But it would be misleading to say that Baudhāyana invented the theorem and that Pythagoras merely copied him.

The same mathematical relationship was known in other ancient cultures too; Babylonian mathematics contains evidence of knowledge of Pythagorean triples centuries earlier. We have no evidence establishing that Pythagoras learned the rule from India.

So the more historically accurate statement is also more interesting:

Ancient Indian Śulba texts preserve one of the earliest known explicit geometric statements equivalent to the Pythagorean theorem.

From sacred space to universal mathematics

There is something deeply Indian about the setting in which this knowledge survived.

The purpose was not initially to conquer mathematics.

It was to build correctly.

The purpose was not to separate science from spirituality.

It was to fulfil a sacred order.

Yet the moment human beings began asking how a diagonal relates to two sides, the answer ceased to belong to one altar, one ritual or even one civilisation.

It became universal.

A² + B² = C² works whether the triangle is drawn on a Vedic altar, scratched into Mesopotamian clay, demonstrated in a Greek school, used by an architect, or taught to a child thousands of years later.

Perhaps that is one of the great wonders of mathematics:

A question born from a particular human need can reveal a truth that belongs to everyone.

And so, somewhere in ancient India, a measuring cord stretched across the earth.

It was being used to construct a place of worship.

But along that cord, humanity was also discovering something about the geometry of the world.

**The altar was sacred.

The measurement was practical.

But the truth it revealed was universal.**