Sri Azhagiya Singar Yanai vahanam 2018

Sri Thelliya Singar Aani Brahmothsavam  has commenced today at Thiruvallikkeni . Tuesday 18.6.2019 will be Yanai vahanam [astride Golden elephant]

Elephants always attract me.  An adult African elephant's trunk is about seven feet (two meters) long! It's actually an elongated nose and upper lip. Like most noses, trunks are for smelling. When an elephant drinks, it sucks as much as 2 gallons (7.5 liters) of water into its trunk at a time. Then it curls its trunk under, sticks the tip of its trunk into its mouth, and blows. Out comes the water, right down the elephant's throat.  An elephant's trunk is a fusion of its upper lip and its nose. Filled with more than 100,000 muscles, this huge appendage is both powerful and extremely dexterous. An elephant can use its trunk to rip a limb from a tree or to pick up a single blade of grass.

Because elephants typically eat up to 440 pounds of food a day, they have to be able to forage and eat small vegetation. Elephants can eat even small grains by forming a joint with their trunk to pile up grains. They crush the grains so hard that it molds into a form that they are then able to pick up and eat.  With such a big trunk, you might think an elephant has a great sense of smell, and you'd be right. Elephants have one of the most acute senses of smell among animals. According to LiveScience, "In a study of 13 mammals, African elephants were found to be superior sniffers, possessing the largest number of genes associated with smell — five times as many as humans and more than twice that of dogs."

Lucania was an ancient area of Southern Italy. It was the land of the Lucani, an Oscan people. It extended from the Tyrrhenian Sea to the Gulf of Taranto. ‘Luca bos’   :  Lūca (“a city in Etruria”) + bōs (“cow”), literally Lucanian cow to mean elephant because the Romans first saw elephants in Lucania as part of Pyrrhus of Epirus's arm.

At Thiruvallikkeni divyadesam, on day 6 evening, it is   ‘Yaanai vahanam’  for Sri Azhagiya Singar  ~ the one  at Thiruvallikkeni  is in sitting posture with  golden hue.

திருவல்லிக்கேணியில் சிறப்புற நடைபெறும் தெள்ளியசிங்கர் ப்ரம்மோத்சவத்தில் ஆறாம் நாள்  இரவு  கம்பீரமான  யானை வாகனம். திருவல்லிக்கேணி யானை வாஹனம் அமர்ந்த நிலையில், தங்க பூச்சுடன் ஜொலிக்கும். வாகனத்தின் மீது வெண்பட்டுடுத்தி, பெருமாள் பின்பு பட்டர் அமர்ந்து சாமரம் வீசி வருவது தனி சிறப்பு. யானை வாயில் வாழை மரங்கள் வைத்து, நிஜமான களிறு ஓடி வருவதைப் போல் இருக்கும்.   யானை வாகன புறப்பாட்டில் 'ஏசல்", "ஒய்யாளி"  என்று அழைக்கப்படும் சிறப்பு உண்டு. 

Here are some photos of the Yanai vahana  purappadu of Sri Thelliya Singar.   No confusion please.  The photos here are of 2018 Brahmothsavam and yanai vahanam 0n 28.6.2018, hitherto unposted and now posted as am free and not in a position to attend Sri Azhagiya Singar brahmothsavam 2019.

adiyen Srinivasadhasan
13^th June 2019.