Temple van Eindhoven

Eindhoven is perhaps not the most exciting place to live in the Netherlands but there certainly is a joy in finding the nooks and pockets in a foreign city to which you can associate yourself with. One such place that I recently visited was a temple, run by the Hindus from Suriname. Suriname is the smallest country in South America which was a Dutch colony until 1975. Being a plantation colony, people from parts of India in agreement with the British were taken to work as laborers. Following its independence though, several people migrated and made the Netherlands their home. So these people of Indian/South American origin have quite some presence here, one example being this temple (clik on the link below to reach the website) -

Mandir Triloki Dhaam

The temple located at Tongelresestraat 371, is open on Sunday's between 3:00pm and 5:00pm.

The entrance -


Swagatham (Welcome in Hindi) -



The temple from inside -

For the first time I heard a Hindu priest preach in Hindi and Dutch!! It felt slightly odd somehow, but I could imagine that the kids born here would understand that better. He picked out verses from the 'Ramayana' (one of the epics in the Indian mythology) and elaborated on them. The part was about Sita, lord Rama's wife being abducted by the evil Ravana. He described how hopeless Sita felt while she was in Ravana's power and then he suddenly said in Dutch - Sita thought Rama had gone on a 'vakantie' forgetting his beloved. heehee!! vacantie?? I had a silent laugh over his description. My tolerance though for such sermons are not too high! I put in all efforts to concentrate and not nod off..:D. After the sermon there were some bhajans (songs sung in praise of the lord). The temple organizers were warm and friendly and with warm 'prasad' (food offering) at the end, it over all felt pretty good.

Well, now I know what I would be doing on Sunday afternoons, I will just need to time it better! :)