I Went to Bed Smelling Like Dettol (standard:Creative non-fiction, 1038 words)
Author: Juggernaut	Added: Jul 22 2012	Views/Reads: 3235/1911	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Dettol is a strong chemical smelling universal antibacterial solution kept at every household. Juggernaut receives a whole body bath with Dettol from his mother to clense his body after he came in comtact with a vendor with a chronic infectious diesease

I Went to Bed Smelling Like Dettol 

Subba Rao 

Hindu deities depicting various incarnations of God were 

worshipped in fabulous temples; there are scores of Hindu deities of 

local faith in small towns and villages worshiped in open-air or in 

modest structures made up of steel, wood or concrete.  Nowhere in the 

history one can find the name of a sculptor that carved any deity in 

any temple; people don't want to believe that the deities were man- 

made, the deities were discovered accidentally hundreds to thousands of 

years ago in a cave or mountain top or deep well or at the bottom of a 

river, only installed later in intricately constructed fabulous 

temples.  For believers, a real God or Goddess after completing his or 

her duty on earth turned into a deity in either complete human, 

complete animal or half human and half animal form to be worshipped for 

thousands of years to come. 

A stone Deity of Goddess Kanaka Maha Lakshmi believed to be 

discovered over a hundred years ago in a deep well  was later installed 

on an open-air small rock podium in the center of a street in a 

residential area known for small-scale business community. The deity of 

the bust of Goddess Lakshmi was worshipped daily by the devotees 

pouring coconut water and cow's milk over the deity. This practice 

along with exposure to hot sun, wind and rain in open-air slowly eroded 

the facial features of the bust. Now, after a century of open-air 

worship, one can hardly identify the deity's facial features, and then 

the local government took over the management of the worship and built 

a shelter to protect the deity from the elements. 

While Goddess Lakshmi is worshipped worldwide among Hindu 

community, Goddess Kanaka Maha Lakshmi, a variant of Goddess Lakshmi is 

purely local; thousands of devotees travel hundreds of miles to visit 

the deity known for granting the wishes of her devotees in acquiring 

wealth and upward mobility in whatever field. For these reasons, 

Juggernaut's mother took her children often to worship the stone bust 

of Kanaka Maha Lakshmi.; not too far from temple was a 150 year old St. 

Ann cathedral perhaps the largest church in the city.  It is ironic 

that Muslims in the neighborhood also worship St. Ann as Hannah. 

Between the church bells ringing and religious songs from a loud 

speaker near the Lakshmi temple, life could be overwhelming for the 

local residents. The side-walks along the narrow streets around the 


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