Travel

Fall / Winter Break 2019 - 2020
21 November 2019 - 4 January 2020

“What was accomplished with the Kailasa temple
more than 1,200 years ago couldn't be done today.”
Mattopia Jones

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Ellora Caves, Maharashtra, India: circa 550 – 950 A.D.

Ellora represents a unique trifecta with temples built by followers of Jain, Hindu and Buddhist traditions.

Kailasa is the featured attraction at the Ellora Caves. Everybody goes there — and not just becasue it’s (hardly coincidentally) closest to the grounds entrance. It's a key stop for busloads of school kids, which can’t help but detract from the peaceful environment it once afforded worshipers.

Kailasa was a marvel of Hindu architecture and construction back in the 8th Century and it still qualifies as a modern marvel today. Stop and think about what the religious heritage represents. Peace. Ahimsa. And yet this miraculous construction represents a level of smarts and technical savvy that flies right past such a humble lifestyle. It is the kind of place that makes one wonder if those whack-a-doodles on Ancient Aliens might be on to something.

In 2011, U2 released a documentary about the making of Achtung Baby! That awesome album totally reinvented and reinvigorated the band. The documentary was called From the Sky Down, taken from a phrase Bono used in describing what it was like creating the album. It was like building a house from the sky down, he commented.

Loosely speaking, that's as close as modern civilization has gotten to what was built at Ellora more than a millennium ago. The craftsmen built a magnificent, intricately detailed temple in the side of a mountain — and they built it from the top down. It is absolutely fascinating.

Even while Matty was there, an Indian civil engineer (with a perfect British accent) confirmed Kailasa could not be built today, even with all the latest and greatest in software and hardware. And to think, just down the road, back at Matty's base camp in Aurangabad, there's a “Smart City” project underway right in the thick of the Wild Wild East.

Speaking with another visitor, Matty got goosebumps while hearing stories about not only Kailasa, but other temples scattered all over India. It’s the stuff of an Indiana Jones adventure. Truly. Even now, Matty appears giddy as a schoolboy as he recounts some of the tales he heard. That includes one phenomemal story about British forces during World War II dismantling a floating orb that was creating interference with radio communications. That wasn’t at Ellora; Matty’s promised us he’ll dig through his sloppy (self-described) Mattskrit notes and identify the location.

Fantastic stuff.

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