The most spectacular temple festival, Thrissur Pooram, began here Wednesday morning. More than 500 foreign tourists have arrived to watch the festivities. The Thrissur Pooram, celebrated in the Malayalam month of Medom (April-May), is a grand assembly of gods and goddesses from various villages and towns in and around Thrissur town.

The deities from these temples make their annual visit on caparisoned elephants and accompanied by grand ensembles, to pay obeisance to the deity of Vadakkunathan temple.

The festivities Wednesday began with the arrival of cherupooram (processions) from the various temples. The festival lasts 36 hours from the arrival of the procession of Kanimangalam Sastha temple.
Thousands of people congregate at Thrissur town as processions accompanied by temple orchestra and caparisoned elephants arrive.
During the pooram, the temples of Parammekkavu and Thiruvambady compete in various festivities. They vie with each other with variety and richness of the percussion ensembles and the adornments and parasols on the elephants.

"More than 500 foreign tourists are here for the pooram this time. We have made special arrangements for them to witness the Kudamattom (display of ornamental parasols) that will take place in the evening. A special stage is erected for tourists who do not want to mingle in and move with the crowd," Jackson Chacko, the information officer for Thrissur district tourism promotion council, said.

One of the major attractions of the festivities is the temple orchestra attended by hundreds of artists with traditional instruments.

Kudamattom, the competitive display of parasols by the competing temples, on 30 elephants with elaborate decorations arrayed in two lines facing each other is the grandest spectacle of pooram. This is to start at 5.30 p.m. Wednesday. The famed display of fireworks will be held at 3 a.m. Thursday.

The pooram will come to a close tomorrow afternoon.

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