For a long time had been dreaming of going to Puri - Konark and some other places in Orissa.
There are several reasons for this , first I have heard that the beaches in Puri are awesome and then that’s the only beach in India where you can see both sunrise and sunset.
Apart from this I have heard about a village called Raghurajpur which has some ancinet art forms of India , the only place which still teaches on Gurukul system. Then there is Sun temple in Konark and several other temples , also Chilka lake is there which can offer awesome birds for photography.I had earier planned for this trip but it got cancelled cause I was unable to get the tickets to the place.
This diwali I had a long leave and I was planning to goto Ranchi for 2 whole weeks, and then I thought why not take a new path , i.e go via
Bhubaneshwar . And this is how I came up with the plan of visiting Orissa and those places . I took a train to Bhuvaneshwar from Bangalore and reached there at around 12'o clock at night, actually the train was supposed to reach by 6 in the evening but it got delayed by 4 hours , so I had to bring in a change to my plan also . Initially I had planneed of going to Puri directly but now I had to wait till morning for the bus, moreover a friend had told that he would come to pick me up at the station but he too ditched me , I tried calling him up but he wouldn't pick up the call .I thought of going out and getting a holetl for the night , some people in the train had told me nearby places would have some hotels and I can reach there in an auto , I got an auto but the streets were poorly lit and he was talking me into dark streets, I had a sudden fear if he tries to rob me , but luckily the fellow was good, only difficult thing was finding a hotel at night but he helped me , we went to 4 -5 places and finally I got a hotel to spned the night and it was not costly too.
Lying alone at the night , I started planning for the coming days, I had 2 days i my hand and a lot of places in my list . The places consisted of :
1) Puri
2)Raghurajpur
3)Chilka Lake
4)Bhubaneshwar
And I didnt want to miss any of these .
So I thought of strating from puri . That was it , lights off and I am off for the day too, journey begins the next day.
Day 1: The journey starts
Bhubaneshwar to Puri:
I got up as early as 6 in the morning as I wanted to see so many places in the day and also I didn’t want to miss the sunset in Puri. Puri is only 60Kms from Bhubaneshwar but then I was travelling in the local bus, which took its own time and I was able to reach there only by 8.30Am.
As soon as I got down I tried gathering info about how to go to Raghurajpur as this place is nearest to Puri, it’s almost 20Kms from Puri but unfortunately no buses go to that place or at least I was not able to find any info regarding this. Finally I got an auto who helped me in finding a good hotel and then he took me to Raghurajpur.
Raghurajpur :
This is one of the places in India which still preserves and teaches the ancient art forms , and I guess this is the only place where still gurukul system of teaching remains alive.
There are basically two famous art forms for which this village is famous. These are:
1) Patchitra :
In this art form drawings are made on a cloth and then they are filled up with natural colors, it is said that if you cover these with glass these would last for centuries.
2) Engravings on palm leaves:
In this art form the artists engraves on palm leaves using a iron pencil and then fills up the engravings with black ink to created the drawings after this he fills these with natural colors, I was told that the colors are so good that you can even wash the drawing and still the colors would be intact.
In this village all the families are engaged in this art form and this is their source of income, this is the only place in Orissa where I found really nice and naïve people, no doubt these people were in a very poor state.
These art forms can’t be explained in writing, I have provided some pictures which can explain these art forms.
