Climbing Chamundi Hill: 1,001 Steps With A Storyteller And A Reluctant Pilgrim

At the top of the 1,001 steps up Chamundi Hill, deep in India, lies a twelfth-century temple that houses a golden statue of Chamundi, the Hindu goddess worshipped by the Maharajas. A popular tourist and pilgrimage site, Chamundi Hill honors this consort of Shiva who saved the citizens of the city of Mysore from the monstrous rule of their mythical demon-king. In __Climbing Chamundi Hill__, Ariel Glucklich takes the reader on a mystical adventure to this enchanted place. A young American tourist goes out for a jog and rests at the base of some ancient stone steps to rub his aching feet. Seeing him take off his running shoes, a retired Indian librarian stops and asks him if he, too, is preparing to make the pilgrimage up Chamundi Hill -- a pilgrimage often made in bare feet. The old Indian offers to tell him some stories to pass the time -- mystical stories of gods and demons, holy men and courtesans, talking animals, and charming thieves. Thus begins an unexpected journey of spiritual enlightenment for narrator and reader alike. Many of these rich, colorful stories -- originally told in the ancient languages of India -- are translated here into English for the first time. Read about a common weaver who dyes his skin blue and disguises himself as the god Vishnu to win the hand of a princess; and the self-sacrificeof King Karan, who each morning allows himself to be fried in a vat of cooking oil and eatenby a Tantric sorcerer in exchange for a bucket of gold the king distributes to his grateful, but unsuspecting subjects. There are funny stories such as the merchant's love-struck son, Udhay, who is swindled by a wily dancer, and of his father's elaborate scam to recapture his fortune with a monkey that spits out pieces of gold. Delight in the Sanskrit tutor's faithful wife, Upakosha -- with coral lips and lotus-blue eyes -- and her clever capture of the four royal ministers who try to blackmail her for sexual favors while her husband is away on a pilgrimage in the Himalayas. The old Indian librarian relates these wonderful tales and, serving as guru, debates their spiritual meaning with his new American companion. From beginning to end, __Climbing Chamundi Hill__ is an enchanting guidebook to the difficult path of spiritual liberation, and a philosophical window into the meaning of life.

An American traveler in India chances upon an old storyteller, who joins him on his pilgrimage to the top of a holy hill and along the way shares the authentic flavor of India through stories of courtesans and kings, holy men and thieves, talking animals, and mythical lands. Many of them are translated here by Glucklich for the first time from the ancient Sanskrit.

The spiritual journey of a young American tourist to the twelfth-century temple of Chamundi is interwoven with retellings of thirty ancient Indian stories about the difficult path of enlightenment