Thaipusam at Batu Caves - 1.5 Million People!
Thaipusam is a Hindu festival celebrated mostly by the Tamil community on the full moon in the Tamil month of Thai (Jan/Feb). Pusam refers to a star that is at its highest point during the festival. The festival commemorates both the birthday of Lord Murugan (also Subramaniam), the youngest son of Shiva and Parvati, and the occasion when Parvati gave Murugan a vel (lance) so he could vanquish the evil demon Soorapadman.
The biggest Thaipusam festivals in the world are in Malaysia and Singapore, most notably in Malaysia at Batu Caves, a place everyone that lives here should be familiar with.
This year there was 1.5 million people expected at Batu Caves, that's an experience everyone should feel I think. Plus the sights, sounds and smells of being up close with the people bearing Kavadi (burdens) and piercing themselves. At its simplest and most common as I noticed, the Kavadi may entail carrying a pot of milk, but mortification of the flesh by piercing the skin, tongue or cheeks with vel skewers is also common. The most spectacular practice is the vel kavadi, essentially a portable altar up to two meters tall, decorated with peacock feathers and attached to the devotee through 108 vels pierced into the skin on the chest and back.
Some info is from here: Thaipusam at Wikipedia
I also spotted The Snark there and a few other photogs I recognise.
I went very early to avoid the chaos that ensues around 7/8am, I arrived at the caves around 4am and found a pretty decent parking place nearby.
Then I headed inside..
I was shocked to find at 4am there were already droves of people, it was chaos!
The piercing and Kavadi had already started when I arrived and floods of people were making their pilgrimage up the 272 stairs of Batu Caves.
