Three rupees journey

I recently went to the Karaneeswarar temple in Saidapet, in the inner prakara the idols of the 63 nayanmars were kept and one of the nayanmar read as "Thiruvarur Pirandhar" i was telling my friend any one who is born in Thiruvarur is considered as the nayanmar. Suddenly one person entered and told us that "any one born in Thiruvarur, any one dies in Kasi they will attain mukthi but if a person simply thinks about Thiruvannamalai he is liberated - "Thiruvannmalaiyai Ninaithale Mukthi" and told this and went past. This provoked me to visit Thiruvannamalai we charted the plan within the temple itself and myself along with two of my friends made the plan to visit the very next day.

It was a call from Ramana and Arunachaleswara, as I was planning to visit Thiruvannamalai for quite some time and it was not materialised. Ramana once told his mother while she was pursuading ramana to return home "In accordance with the prarabdha of each, the One whose function it is to ordain makes each to act. What will not happen will never happen, whatever effort one may put forth. And what will happen will not fail to happen, however much one may seek to prevent it. This is certain. The part of wisdom therefore is to stay quiet."

We started our journey the next day i.e. on 24th May 2009 at around 7 a.m. from Koyambedu Bus Stand(Chennai) and reached Thiruvannamalai by 11 a.m. We straight away went to the Ramanashram and were greeted by the peacocks lou lou and peacocks were plenty in the ashram. First we went to Sri Mathrubootheswar temple where bhagavans mother's samathi is there. Then we mediated at Bhagavan's Samadhi where we could able to experience the divine presence of Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi.

We started trekking Thiruvannamalai where bhagavan lived major period of his life. At 12 p.m. we didnt imagine the climate to be pretty cool, may be his divine will HE has arranged to visit his place with better weather conditions?!!. The sound from the ether was pronouncing the vedic syllable "OM". The trekking way was mix of greeneries, cool breeze and awesome sight of the Temple. One can have a birds-eye view of the eight Gopurams in one shot.

At the Hill we visited two important place where Bhagavan had spent considerable portion of his life. First we went to "Skandashram Cave" where Bhagavan lived from 1916 to 1922. Bhagavan's mother attained mukthi at this place on May 19th, 1922. Bhagavan did not publicly acknowledge any living person as liberated other than his mother at death.

Then we went to "Virupaksha Cave" where Baghavan lived from 1899 to 1916. It was a cave with a small entrance and when we went inside we were feeling very hot inside. We were wondering How Bhagavan spent years to gether in such conditions? - That is Bhagavan who was meditating on the Self without even conscious of it. Such was his state of mind which was above everything on the earth. After that we climbed down to the Ramanashram and bought few books and CDs. The stall is a must visit place of the ashram and even a small beginning will take near to him.

We then went to a Restuarant and had our Brunch and then went to see the Lord who attracted Ramana. When "Venkatraman" (the original name of Ramana) entered first time inside the Arunachaleswara temple nobody, not even the priest was there. He entered the Sanctum Sanctorum he cried "I have come to Thee at Thy behest. Thy will be done" and embraced the linga in ecstasy. The burning sensation within ramana merged in Arunachaleshwara. Ramana never returned from Thiruvannamali since he first visited on September 1st, 1896. Many people witnessed a light merging with the Sacred Hill Arunachaleshwara on 14th April, 1950 at 8:47 pm.

Ramana took three rupees from his brother and started the Journey to Arunachala. If that three rupees was not there we wouldn't have got Ramana, I pray my obeisances to the three rupees which made Bagavan to reach Thiruvannamalai. We finished our darshan of Arunachaleshwara and Abhithakuchalambal and retured to Chennai by 11 pm.

It was our memorable day in our life which we like to cherish for our remining life.