of one’s lineage. Many of the temples will host festivals, some modest, some
quite elaborate indeed.
One of the most colorful of these festivals of Southeast Asia is Tai Pu ̄ cam
held in January–February. While it occurs at a number of Hindu shrines
throughout Malaysia and Singapore, nowhere is it more popular or dramatic
than in the Kuala Lumpur area. The festival appears to have been brought
to Malaysia by the Chettiars who were worshipers of the Tamil god Murukan
as he is enshrined at Pal ̄
̄
ani, where the Chettiars traded in the seventeenth
century and were given a special role in the festival. However, for at least the
last century, other Indian groups have participated in the festival to the point
that it has become virtually the “national” festival of Malaysian Indians.
On Tai Pu ̄ cam day, the icons of Murukan
̄
and his consorts, which had
been paraded from Kuala Lumpur some 12 km away, have been set up near
a limestone bluff known as Batu Caves; within the cave itself, svayambhu(self-
manifest) representations of Murukan
̄
are the center of devotion this day.
People come bringing gifts of various kinds – pots of milk, ka ̄vat.is(shoulder
poles bearing peacock feathers or other paraphernalia), and other offerings.
Most have taken a vow that they will come to Batu Caves in exchange for a
favor the deity has granted. All will climb over 300 steps to the shrine in the
cave on the side of the bluff.
The most dramatic of the pilgrims (some several hundred in any given
year) are those who go into a trance and subject their bodies to various forms
of “sacred wounding,” especially piercing the cheeks or tongue with a lance
(the symbol of the deity) or placing hooks throughout the body. It is believed
by such pilgrims that they are receiving the grace (arul.) of the divine while
fulfilling a vow. Many other Hindus, especially those who are Anglicized and
upper class, tend to view such activity as an aberration of Hinduism and seek
to reduce or eliminate the practice. Yet Batu Caves attracts several hundred
thousand pilgrims on Tai Pu ̄ cam day acting out their sense of what it means
to be Indian Malaysian, Tamil, and/or Hindu – through pilgrimage, taking
of vows, dars ́an(viewing the deity), and, occasionally, undergoing more
extreme forms of devotion.^11
The westward impetus
Early contacts
Contacts between India and the Mediterranean world were numerous in
ancient times. Since 975 BCEwhen the Phoenicians traded with Western
India, contacts increased between the two arenas. The Persian empire served
228 India’s Global Reach