God among the Single-Family Detached - Livermore, CA
“Thoonilum Irrupaar, Thurumbilum Irrupaar” – “He is in a formidable pillar, and he is in a speck of rust”…proclaims Hiranyakashipu’s son Prahlada in answer to his raging dad’s rhetorical question on Vishnu’s omnipresence. When the confounded Hiranyakashipu smashes the pillar with his mace, the lion-head, human-bodied, hyper-avatar of Narasimha (think the exact opposite of the somber lion-bodied, human-headed Egyptian sphinx) materializes from the broken pillar to devour the evil king in the a twilight zone of time and place - when it is neither day or night, on a threshold that is neither inside or outside. Should the Narasimha avatar recur in the twentieth century North America, Prahlada might have added, “He resides in anonymous residential suburbs and forgettable business parks.”
The spire of Livermore Shiva-Vishnu temple in San Francisco Bay Area rises in the middle of an affluent single family suburb. Supersized detached homes of 4500 SF with two car garages and gable roofs. He who needs to seek His blessings will have to seek the services of his/her personal automobile and brave the five-lane I-580 traffic. The Indian-American deity is yet to become transit-friendly. His subjects can be assured, however, that there will be a surface parking spot waiting. “Car Pooja Parking Only,” proclaims a sign to mark the designated 10’x 18’ space where the newly minted Japanese chariots will be blessed with the holy water.
The Shiva Vishnu temple in Mira Mesa in San Diego is the antithesis to the Livermore temple, located in a non-descript business park. Navigating through the anonymous office park, you finally come to the building with the “Shiva-Vishnu temple” sign prominently displayed above “Mark Naylor & Co. Inc.” Climbing up the steps, you enter a hallway with a bulletin board. There is a picture of the elephant-headed remover of all obstacles, next to the sign for men’s restroom. Walking past the hallway, you enter the sanctum sanctorum. A multi-ton statue of Venkateshwara splendidly adorned in traditional regalia underneath the sordid Styrofoam false ceilings. The idol faces a secondary entrance—a 6’ wide glass door protected by roller shutters that lead to the service alley filled with recycle bins empty cardboard boxes.
The more temples I visit, I cannot help but notice the pastiche of architectural specifications. Stucco buildings with plaster-of-paris ornamentation, surrounded by an island of parking, a faithful replica of traditional gopuram with fake materiality rising from a rectangular cake of a wood framed building. The polished granite floors reflect the fluorescent light fixtures that punctuate perspectival lines of styrofoam false ceiling panels.
The temples in Ashland, Malibu, and Pittsburgh are no different from the one in Livermore, both in terms of their desperate attempts for an architectural identity, as well as in the uncanny homogeneity of their upper middle-class immigrant flock in their Toyotas and Hondas, punctuated with the occasional Lexus or Mercedes. Whenever I visit these temples – which is not very often –my agnostic self, tinctured with a generous dose of architectural snobbery, makes me wonder if the architectural manifestations of Hindu religious identity can ever be expressed with minimalism and structural integrity. While the cracked plaster-of-paris ornamentation in Malibu makes me wince, I can’t help but be moved by acts of faith in a room next to a service alley in a business park. Surely, someday, as some of those drivers of Hondas and Toyotas migrate to Lexus and Mercedes, the Shiva Vishnu Temple in the San Diego business park will also move to a sprawling suburban tract. Of course, there will be plaster-of-paris on the menu. Too bad Prahlada may then have to avoid mentioning business parks when trying to convince his dad.
