From The Peopling of New York City
When I ventured to the Ganesha Hindu Temple in Flushing, Queens, I was not quite sure as to what I would encounter. The trek to the temple alone was foreign enough, as I had never traveled to that part of Queens. When we finally reached the temple, the outside of the temple was a large imposing granite structure and just seemed surreal to me in this fairly residential neighborhood.
Before walking into the temple, we had to walk through an open-air walkway that was lined with numerous statues of the Hindu gods and remove our shoes. That in itself was a strange experience for me since most of the religious exposure that I’ve had in my life has been with the catholic church. The inside of the temple was bustling with Hindu followers praying to their various gods. Each corner of the temple was adorned with a shrine to one of the different major gods in their own “house”. The air was adrift with the sounds of the Hindu priests who were doing the religious chants for the temple goers praying to each god. As one of the members of the temple was kind enough to inform us, each of the gods has varying forms and names, approximately one hundred and eight names each. During the day, when people come to pray to certain gods, it is the priests’ job, to recite the names in an unbroken series in the ancient language of Sanskrit, which is used in religious ceremonies.
As one of my Hindu classmates was kind enough to tell me, there was also a platform with ten smaller statues on it, which represented the nine planets and the sun. Coming from a monotheistic upbringing, this temple filled with the statues of many gods and their worshippers was a new experience for me. Another thing that I was not expecting upon our entry into the temple was the openness that we experienced from the temple goers and the staff. As our friend also informed us of the fact that Hinduism is an extremely open religion that is more the tolerant of visitors who may or may not be interested in the religion. He treated us as though we were friends and was very willing to teach us about the different facets of the Hindu religion. This contrasts with my former religious experiences in Catholicism because I am almost positive that if a classroom full of people wandered into a Sunday mass that they would not be that welcome. Also, unlike any of the religions that I’m familiar with, Hinduism is a very decorative religion. The interior of the temple was extremely colorful, thanks in part to the colorful flower necklaces around each of the gods’ necks and the offerings that surrounded them.
The temple, although exotic and new, shared many similarities with the religion that I am used to such as the fact that priests run the religious ceremonies for the most part and guide the followers in how to worship their gods. Also, at the entrance to the main temple, religious offerings to the gods were being sold along with a type of religious food for the followers to eat. The temple was also adorned with innumerable stone carvings in the stone around each of the “houses” of the gods. Like the altar of a Christian church, each of the houses of the gods was a sacred place that priests were only allowed to touch.
Our class trip to the Ganesha Hindu temple in Flushing, Queens was very informative and eye opening to the culture of many South Asian immigrants. The vast differences between this culture and any that I am accustomed to are definitely a topic to think about over the course of this class. This knowledge will allow me to see the South Asian neighborhood that we have to study in a new light.