Like some other Tamil Hindu religious events throughout Asia, the annual festival known as Thaipusam - when pilgrims converge on the site from all over Sri Lanka, many of them making the pilgrimage on foot through the hills from Batticaloa on the east coast - seems to have a strong masochistic streak. Devout celebrants allow metal skewers to be driven through their cheeks and tongues, or haul heavy carts carrying symbols and images of the temple deities by cables attached to their backs and shoulders by steel hooks. Gory though it appears, it is well attested that the wounds caused by skewers and hooks bleed little - perhaps because large amounts of adrenaline are produced by the body - and heal very quickly. Fire-walking, when devotees walk across a bed of glowing coals, is another apparently painful activity from which participants seem to emerge unscathed.
Open all the time; and during puja (daily worship) at Maha Devala, at 04:30, 10:30, 18:30. The Kataragama Thaipusam Festival takes place annually over two weeks in July and August; dates can be obtained from our event calendar.
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