Madurai is as mad as you will get! The famous Sri Meenakshi Temple is the biggest we have seen so far, stretching for miles in the city centre, and bustling with pilgrims, beggars, and underemployed rickshaw drivers.
We arrived a hour before the temple opened, and therefore were easy prey for all the touts looking to get you in their emporiums!
Charlie then got caught short, and rushed off to try and find a hotel withh a loo, leaving me with a smooth talking tailor. Then the heavens opend and Charlie got a free shower, even though our upmarket hotel advertised hot water between 5-9am!!!
I found the temple complex too crowded and garish, people streaming in from 4 entrances north south east west, and we were in jostling crowds within 5 minutes of opening, very different to some odf the peaceful temples we have already visited.
Later we went to the Gandhi museum. Here in 1921, Gandhi decided to wear nothing but a khadi and tailors’ shops are everywhere in the town.
It was very thought provoking to read the history of the English involvement in India from the Indian point of view. The museum didn't pull any punches when describing some of the exploits of the British while they had taken power.
