Urli is a round flat bottomed vessel made in copper, bronze, stone or clay, usually in south India, and used for cooking or decorative purposes. One usually sees Urlis in small or medium sizes, rarely more than four feet in diameter. But this one took my breath away. I came upon it suddenly, and it was the only item in the temple courtyard at Punnathur Kotta. There seemed to have been an attempt to grow lilies or lotus blooms in it but it did not seem to have succeeded.
Punnathur Kotta is an elephant village, housing more than fifty elephants easily. It is located barely 3-5 kms near Guruvayoor, the well known temple to Shri Krishna, in Kerala. The elephants at Punnathur Kotta are regular participants of the temple festivals at Guruvayoor and Thrissur. This temple within the Kotta is almost like a museum but does not have anything remarkable for pilgrims or tourists to linger about and appreciate fully.
I took a series of photographs of this gigantic urli, and kept moving about to get a proper perspective behind the large vessel, to compose the picture. At that moment, I realised that I was the only person moving about this place, and all the other hundreds of pilgrims and tourists were happily moving about the elephants outside the temple. It was silent except for the sounds of trumpeting elephants and the calls of crows, mynas and babblers. Taking advantage, I sat there quietly for some time, just listening to the sounds coming in to the courtyard, with the silent urli as my only witness.
Punnathur Kotta is an elephant village, housing more than fifty elephants easily. It is located barely 3-5 kms near Guruvayoor, the well known temple to Shri Krishna, in Kerala. The elephants at Punnathur Kotta are regular participants of the temple festivals at Guruvayoor and Thrissur. This temple within the Kotta is almost like a museum but does not have anything remarkable for pilgrims or tourists to linger about and appreciate fully.
I took a series of photographs of this gigantic urli, and kept moving about to get a proper perspective behind the large vessel, to compose the picture. At that moment, I realised that I was the only person moving about this place, and all the other hundreds of pilgrims and tourists were happily moving about the elephants outside the temple. It was silent except for the sounds of trumpeting elephants and the calls of crows, mynas and babblers. Taking advantage, I sat there quietly for some time, just listening to the sounds coming in to the courtyard, with the silent urli as my only witness.
