Photo of the Week : Suvarnabhumi Airport, Bangkok, Thailand
This really beautiful and alluring sculpture is kept at the entry of Suvarnabhumi International Airpot in Bangkok. As you complete all of your immigration checks, you enter this large building with this sculpture of ' Samudhra Manthan' as known in India.
This scene of churning of milk ocean has the Vishnu avtara as a turtle who ease the process churning the ocean. The king of serpents, Naga Vasuki is curled around the mountain Mandara.
The demigods and demons were churning the water and incidentally they churned out a lot of good and bad things, which they divided amongst themselves as required. In the end the Amrita was churned out and the demigods tricked the demons to have it all, instead of dividing it as agreed.
I think, in those days the demigods and demons used to fight like small kids for immaterial needs. Needs which were so immaterial, sometimes even you would think even humans are better then them. So all these fights had nothing to do with humans but still they suffered. In the end the three mighty ones of Indian mythology Brahmaji, Vishnuji and Shivji sorted things out . The demigods and demons were compelled to follow the solution provided by any of the three. This incident was one such event where in the end when poison came out of the ocean, Lord Shiva drank all of the poison and sorted out the problem after the name Neelkantha became popular.
Well the above photograph was clicked by me at the airport, but I imagined the sculpture and the ambiance as shown in below photograph. I imagined the atmosphere at time of the real manthan. Those sleepless nights for thousand of years just for the nectar with dark skies and heavy rains would have made the scene as I have represented below.
The description of the same event goes like :
Scene of the Churning of The Milk Ocean
' The scene depicts the Vishnu Kurmavatara and the churning of the Milk Ocean. The king of serpents, Vasuki, is curled around the mountain Mandara. Vishnu, incarnated in the form of a giant turtle, supports the mountain on his back. Devas (demigods) ad Asuras (demons) pull on the naga's body to churn the water of the ocean for the thousand of years in order to produce the nectar of immortality, Amrita. From the churning, numerous opulent items were are produced, including Dhanvantari carryint the pot of Amrita. In the end, the cooperation between Devas and Asuras is shattered. The Devas, fulfilled their plan of acquiring all Amrita, disperse the Asuras out of Heaven to the Underworld. '
