Annanad (please zoom out on the map to the right to see the location) is a village 2 km west from NH-47 (Salem-Kanyakumari National Highway) at Muringoor, south of Chalakudy in central Kerala. Sri Dharmasastha is the diety at the Veluppilly temple , and as with every Kerala temple, here too an annual temple festival is celebrated with traditional fervour. This year, the D-day falls on 23 Feb - the day of 'Uthram' star of the Kumbham lunar month (Feb-Mar). As I look forward to attending the festival after a very long wait, I hear a nostalgic localite trying to put into words childhood impressions of his village's grand day. "A micro-miniature version of the Trissur Pooram festival", he tries to explain. "Those days (in the 70's and 80's), there were huge trees in the space in front of the temple, including a (jokingly christened) 'Almaa' (a banyan and a mango tree with intertwined branches), and another 'Maaplaa' (a mango tree and a j...
