The Pontoon Bridges That Carry Millions at Kumbh Mela
theatlantic.com
theatlantic.com
- The Kumbh Mela's periodicity of 12 years is based on Jupiter's period of revolution around the sun
- It's called Kumbha mela, because Kumbha is the name for Aquarius. Jupiter spends an Earth year in each Zodiac, and the year in which it is in Aquarius is the year of the Kumbh in Haridwar
- Apart from Haridwar, the Kumbh is also celebrated in Prayag (which is the festival this article is talking about), Ujjain, and Nasik. The years of these Kumbhs are offset from the one at Haridwar. In particular, the Kumbh at Prayag occurs when Jupiter is in Taurus (rather than Aquarius). So it should actually be called Vrishabha Mela...
- The Kumbh that's happening in 2019 at Prayag is actually called an Ardh Kumbha Mela, or Half-Kumbh. It occurs half-way between two full Kumbhs, i.e., 6 years after (or before) a Full-Kumbh.
- Prayag also hosts the Maha Kumbha mela, which occurs once in 12*12=144 years. The last Maha Kumbh happened in 2013.
- The article erroneously mentions that Prayag is the meeting point of 3 rivers - the Ganga, the Yamuna, and the (mythical) Saraswati. This is incorrect. The Saraswati was not mythical - there is evidence for a Sub-Himalayan Saraswati-like river flowing into the Arabian Sea until 10000 years ago through the Rann of Kutch (see https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-05745-8). Also, the Saraswati is not described as having a confluence with the Ganga/Yamuna at Prayag in the Rig Veda - this is a later legend which does not seem to have any basis.
The zodiacal sign is also associated with this story though probably both the Greeks and Indians got the zodiacal concept from the Babylonians and added their own interpretations afterwards.
Your point about the Saraswati is a bit nit picky. Yes there was a real Saraswati (that dried up by the end of the Vedic age) but the mystical Saraswati that flows at Prayag is not related to that
As for the Saraswati, you are mistaken. The sangam (confluence) at Prayag being referred to as "Triveni" (three rivers) is a recent invention (1860 or thereabouts) and is first referred to in written literature in 1873. And it is the same Saraswati river. See https://www.thehindu.com/features/metroplus/The-story-of-Tri...
To quote:
"...the word Triveni was used for the first time in 1873 to convey the confluence of Ganga, Yamuna and Saraswati in the six-volume Sanskrit work Abhidhan Vachaspatya of Taranath Tarkvachaspati, who was associated with Government Sanskrit College, Calcutta (now Kolkata). Otherwise, according to its etymology, it meant triple-braided. Whether it is Valmiki or Kalidasa, no Sanskrit poet has used the word Triveni to denote the confluence of rivers at Prayag (Allahabad). Whenever they referred to it, it was always as a confluence of two rivers Ganga and Yamuna."
You do realize that Allahabad (or Prayag) is in the opposite direction to the Arabian Sea, don't you?
> Also, the Saraswati is not described as having a confluence with the Ganga/Yamuna at Prayag in the Rig Veda - this is a later legend which does not seem to have any basis.
See https://www.thehindu.com/features/metroplus/The-story-of-Tri...
The article is wrong on two counts - (a) that the Saraswati is mythical, and (b) that Prayag is a confluence of 3 rivers - it is a confluence of 2 rivers, the Ganga and the Yamuna.
According to the Wikipedia page, at least, it appears in folklore. It is literally mythical. That word doesn't (only) mean fictitious.
But maybe I am romanticizing the event and actually its much less pleasant for foreigner.
It was the craziest event I’ve ever seen, and after 3 months in India I thought I’d seen some stuff.
Nope.
Naga baba’s, doing their tricks and proving their holiness (beating their penis and using them to pick up boulders).
Sat with the guy who’s been holding his arm up to god for, I don’t know 20+ years.
Anything extreme and devoted is considered holy. So this festival brings all those people together, to show in their own way, their devotion.
It’s so loud and chaotic, 24x7. It’s like Times Square meets a music festival, but in every direction, for as far as you can see.
It’s a whole temporary city constructed on the banks of the river, for this festival. Each guru / sect has their own campsite.
Any camp site will feed you, get you stoned, put you up for the night and send you on your way in the morning. (Or you can stay for the rest of your life).
I would recommend it for anyone. But if you get tired of a 3 day music festival... this is going to test you.
It’s everything I loved so much about India.
I would recommend starting your stay at one of the “foreigner” camps. These are usually the camps of leaders from that are based in, or have a major following from, a developed nation. (We stayed a Brazilian buba’s camp). It was a good base camp, to escape the festival when necessary.
From there you can explore as deep into the festival as you want. It goes for 2 months, so you’ve got plenty of time.
It can eventually become overwhelming and you’ll need somewhere to recharge.
The roadside was packed with pilgrims all the way. We drove for more than four hours past a continuous stream of pilgrims going home The article says 100m people. That's not a joke. If you want to visit one of these things you had better be the kind of person who enjoys company.
Also, 100M is almost 1/3rd the population of U.S., more than the entire population of Vietnam, almost the same at the entire population of Egypt, roughly 1/2 the population of Pakistan ...
Part of me says that labor is cheap enough relative to material so why don't they dot all their T's and cross all their I's with the design and construction.
I'll give them the benefit of the doubt since it's just a temporary structure.
Edit: It looks like the pontoons are actually sitting on the river bottom in a lot of places, so I guess that's why they need to be so strong.
I mean yeah, it probably is all overkill but I'm used to having to build things that have to withstand high dynamic loading so when it comes to mostly static objects I tend to over build things.
Shows you a comparison view, of just what a vast city is set up for the event.