What do you get if you cross some spectacular limestone caves with over a million people in bright clothes, on a pilgrimage, piercing their flesh with hooks and spears? Thaipusam in Malaysia! This popular annual Hindu festival celebrated at Malaysia’s Batu Caves, near to capital Kuala Lumpur, has become a bit of a legend internationally. The event is, like many Hindu festivals, a riot of colour, with all the joyous atmosphere of singing, dancing and music that you’d expect. On top of this, Malaysia is a great place to be at this time of year – still lovely and hot but not too painfully humid. So if you find yourself hanging around South East Asia at the end of January, head on out to KL and join the 8 hour procession from the city centre out to the caves, and prepare to be dazzled.
The Batu Caves are worth a trip in themselves. The series of limestone caverns tower about 100m high above you, and bats lurk in the shadowy corners, occasionally swooping high above your head. Though they were known about by local Malaysian tribes for many hundreds of years, and were also brought to the general public’s attention by an Indian trader in the 1800s, they really only became famous about when American naturalist William Hornady “discovered” them in 1878. Since then, their popularity has soared, with both locals and tourists. In 1920, steps were built leading up into the caves – all 272 of them! It’s quite a hike up into the caves, and your path is infested with Macaque monkeys, which, although they have always dwelt in the caves, have arrived in droves when the word got out in the monkey community that loads of people - and all their food - were arriving at the caves en masse. Watch out for these cheeky little beggars, they can and will grab anything from you that looks unattended. As well as the monkeys, the caves are a popular hangout for Liphistiidae spiders, one of the world’s most primitive spiders, famous for... well, we’re not going to go into it, for the sake of all the arachnophobes out there, but we’ll just say one word: Fangs. Let’s leave it at that. But the crowning glory of the caves is the recent man-made addition: A 42.7m high golden statue – this is East Asia, after all – of Hindu God Lord Murugan, which took 3 years to build and was unveiled in 2006.
Thaipusam is celebrated throughout the Hindu world, on the full moon of the Tamil month Thai. In the Western calendar, this runs from January to February, so the exact date varies from year to year. The general idea is a celebration of both the birthday the Hindu god Murugan, and the gift from his Mother, Parvati, of a lance with which Murugan could slay the evil demon Soorapadman. The lance – otherwise known as the vel, is represented by small spears and hooks which many pilgrims attending the festival force through their flesh, and it is this self-punishment option that has made the festival so famous. The celebration centres around penitence and devotion, and the traditional method of atonement involves carrying a pot of milk. But a ritual of piercing the flesh with hooks, insertion of small spears through lips and cheeks and even self-flagellation has become popular with thousands of the devoted attendees. And here’s the truly amazing thing – there is a truly startling lack of blood, pain and resultant scars accompanying these acts. Some say that the pilgrims enter trances to control the pain, others say that the God gives strength to those who ask for it, to be able to handle it. The most extreme act of devotion seen at Thaipusam is the carrying and offering of a kavadi – a portable alter that is worn above and around the body, attached by 108 hooks that are pierced through the flesh of the chest and back. These are offered to Lord Murugan, often by those who have a special favour to ask. The fact that they are willing to show such devotion and love to their god stands them in good stead. Last year’s Thaipusam at the Batu Caves showed a few hundred kavadi-bearers.
So if you want bright colours, music, amazing feats of apparent mind over matter, an incredible combination of nature and man-made wonders and some participation of the local wildlife, then head to the Batu Caves on the 23rd of January (local bus or taxi, but remember to ask the taxis to wait for you, or you could even join the 8 hour procession from the city centre) and soak up some serious culture. A very different experience of a lifetime.