The Koovagam Festival: A Celebration of Trans Identities and a Marriage to God

By Mark Jeffrey Scodellaro · @amarkonthemat

I’ve spent recent years writing about the ocean, about reefs bleaching, about sharks vanishing from waters that I now desperately swim through praying for a quick encounter, about ecosystems so old that their collapse seems almost impossible, but here we are. Conservation, to me, has always meant saltwater, sea creatures, and the lifesaving capabilities of the ocean. But standing in the scorching sun of Southern India, far from the open sea and even a hint of a breeze, I started to understand that the same erosion happens on land as well, except to ancient cultures. Ceremonies, identities, and histories, like reefs, can be killed, or worse, loved to death. They can be misunderstood and feared, or simply disappear if not protected with deep love and care. This story isn’t about the ocean, at least not directly. And yet, in every meaningful way, it is the same story. The same joy I feel each time I fall into salt water is the same as I feel standing here, at The Koovagam Festival, amongst thousands of opulently clad Hijra women. The same very real dread I feel at the thought of our oceans in decline rises again here, in the reality that this community still faces marginalization, segregation, and aggression across the globe.

Just as with ocean conservation, awareness is rarely neutral. The more something is seen, the more it is touched, shaped, and sometimes strained by the weight of attention. I’ve watched this happen before with Whale Shark encounters in places like Oslob, where wonder gave way to crowds, and presence began to alter the very behavior it sought to celebrate. Standing here in Tamil Nadu, making my way towards The Koovagam Festival, I had to include myself in that equation. I was aware that by witnessing, documenting, and eventually sharing, I might also be part of the pressure that changes what I’m trying to honor. And yet, there’s another current running just as strong: in a world where politics increasingly seek to erase or deny trans identities, visibility carries its own kind of protection. It reminds us that these lives, these often sacred roles, are not new, but deeply rooted in human history. Without that recognition, without people understanding how ancient and enduring this culture is, what disappears may not be spectacle, but authenticity itself. So the question lingers: does larger attention risk destroying something sacred, or is it the very thing that ensures it survives? Like any ecosystem (cultural or natural), it exists in that uneasy balance between being seen and being changed by those who so desperately want to bear it witness.

And so as I enter this ancient space, delicately, I arrive with the same care I carry with every plunge into the ocean, praying that my presence does no harm, that the gods grant me what I so desperately want to observe, that I take nothing away but my wonder, and leave without altering what was never mine to adjust.

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How I Found Out

It was a Wednesday, I believe, and I was sitting on my couch googling how the universe was created according to Hinduism (yes, I’m literally that level of hippie), when my Google spiral led me to a page containing descriptions of several festivals in India. I had heard about most of them but not this one in particular, called The Koovagam Festival. The very short paragraph explained how thousands of Hijra, or trans women, descend on this sleepy little town in Tamil Nadu called Koovagam for an 18-day festival. It sounded like exactly my kind of party.

Its beginnings start in The Mahabharata. The hero, Aravan, offered himself for human sacrifice to the goddess Kali, to assure a win for his family, the Pandavas, in this epic battle that was about to happen. However, before he was to die he asked for one thing: to be married. Not surprisingly, no woman wanted to marry him as she would be widowed the next day, so Lord Krishna took the form of Mohini, a beautiful woman, and married Aravan. They had one night together and the next day he died, and Mohini went into mourning. It’s quite the story really, and it seemed to resonate with the Hijra community (the whole transformation of Krishna and all), so for centuries they have gathered, symbolically married Aravan, only to be widowed the next day. However, other than a couple of other blurbs saying pretty much the same thing, I found very little information on it, but it looked chaotic and rather dramatic. I was so in.

The first task was pinning down the dates. The festival is tied to Chitra Pournami, a particular full moon in the Tamil calendar, which is wildly poetic, but has very little clarity. One source mentioned April 27–29, though even that felt uncertain. I searched in English, I tried in Tamil, and still nothing solid emerged. Eventually, I resorted to calling the temple itself. After twenty awkward minutes with three confused (and increasingly annoyed) staff members, one voice finally broke through the noise, shouting “27! 28! 29!” across the line. It wasn’t official, but it felt definitive enough.

I was off. I figured I’d spend a week in Pondicherry before the festival, partly on a whim, partly because I’d watched Life of Pi, read the book, loved both, and clearly decided that was enough justification to go. Oh, and good French wine.

The trip to Pondicherry was easy enough, scenic in that coastal kind of way. I’ll save Pondicherry for another story, but it absolutely lived up to the hype: sun-washed French colonial buildings opening into cozy cafés that catered to long, lazy lunches which bled into long, lazy dinners. I was very glad I came.

I decided to base myself in ‘Pondy,’ as the locals call it, even while visiting the festival. Technically, the city of Villupuram is closer, but according to Google Maps it would only add about forty minutes to the journey (so a little over an hour each way), a small price to pay, I thought, for returning each day to the sea and a little architectural romance.

Google Maps, as it turns out, is not a trustworthy advisor. Actually, it downright lied to my face.

On the first day of the festival, I set off early, buzzing with anticipation, climbing onto my motorcycle, a decision I made despite a sensationally operatic phone call with my mother. She didn’t so much advise against it as deliver a full cinematic monologue in which I died horribly, gruesomely. There were buses. There were trucks. There were imaginary headlines. At one point she began preparing my eulogy. By the end of the call, getting on that bike felt like a bold, final scene. However, after another quick conversation with my friend Stone, I was emboldened with enough confidence to give it a go. Indian roads are no joke, I’m not going to lie (my mother had good reason to worry), but the highways were nice and new, so it was definitely doable.

Two hours later, I arrived. Three hours later, I got home.

And just to add insult to injury, I was early.

Nothing. Well… actually, just the faintest hint of a festival. The real celebrations in Koovagam didn’t even begin until the afternoon of April 28, and I had shown up a full day early. Tragic, really. Deeply off-brand for this homosexual to arrive early to a party. But when they say trust the process, sometimes you should listen. As I wandered this tiny town, snapping the occasional photo and quietly questioning my life choices, I had a woman DM me (once again, slightly off-brand). She was a lovely Indian photographer who had come across one of my stories (in which I was, very delicately, complaining that nothing was happening) and decided to take matters into her own hands.

She sent me the full schedule, properly saving me from myself: @buddie_tripod, and yes, you should absolutely check her out.

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Day One: The Marriage Thread

On time, this time, I arrived at the first big day of The Koovagam Festival, and it had all the markings of something big about to happen. Thousands of Hijras milled around socializing, posing for photo ops, and most importantly, having their turmeric marriage thread (Manjal Kayiru in Tamil) tied about their necks by various temple priests, symbolizing their marriage to Aravan.

The energy was electric, and as the day went on (and the heat continued to rise, I may add), the crowd became huge. It was towards evening that I noticed a very large influx of what I assumed to be straight men. I became a little curious, as before, most of the crowd were Hijra, of course, some gay guys who took advantage of the safe space to live a little more openly, and I saw some very beautiful couples walking around holding hands, a privilege I’m sure was not as easily enjoyed outside of this festival. But what were all the dudes doing here? I assumed they were just festival goers from neighbouring villages here for the celebrations, and although I was partly correct, they had, in fact, come for another reason. More on that later.

But what mostly became apparent was that Koovagam became a kind of homecoming, a place where the Hijra were no longer pushed to the margins, but lifted back into their sacredness. Here, they are not questioned or diminished, but honored as the divine beings that they have always been. I was privileged to have witnessed it.

But it was getting late, and now I had to drive at night, which felt like a final farewell. Eighty-four near-death experiences later, with my mother’s “I told you so” echoing from the sky, I finally made it back in one piece.

And then… the unraveling.

Collapsed onto the bed. Shirt half off. A plate of dhal resting on my lap like a warm hug. The noise, the colour, the sheer human intensity of the festival still clung to me; it was vibrating under the skin. I could feel it slowly loosening its grip, allowing me to finally pass out.

Tomorrow, I was foretold, was going to be something else entirely: bigger, louder, and who knows what else. And if I was going to meet it properly, I needed to arrive not just early but ready.

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Day Two: The Chariot

I had been told to be there at six in the morning, a time I do not naturally associate with joy, devotion, or awareness. I compromised. A respectable six o’clock alarm, which translated into an arrival sometime around half past eight. Respectable.

And then I pulled up.

It was huge. Not huge: HUGE.

A massive, heaving crowd had somehow materialized overnight, swelling around a mountainous chariot where the idol of Aravan sat enthroned above a mountain of garlands. Priests and men perched upon this structure, catching armfuls of flowers thrown upward, adding them to the already absurd abundance. It was an eruption of devotion.

I felt a flicker of relief at being late. The center of that crowd looked… unforgiving. Also, practicalities: I have a small bladder, what if I had to pee?

An hour later, the entire mass shifted, and not politely.

The crowd moved like an ocean in a storm, with shocking human tides surging forward, then recoiling, waves crashing into one another as the chariot lurched into motion. Devotees hauled it through the narrow streets, and with every pull, the crowd fractured and reformed in complete chaos.

I did my best to remain upright (no small task) while still attempting to capture something of it through my lens. Heat penetrated every centimeter of my skin. Sweat poured. Explosions cracked through the air. Pyrotechnics flared. The air became smoke.

Bangles are broken, the sacred thread is cut, her husband is dead and she begins to mourn

India does nothing small. Nothing subtle. It was excessive, overwhelming, and exactly where I wanted to be.

Ahead of the chariot, the Hijra moved through the streets scattering colored powder across the ground, covering blocks of camphor before setting them alight. Flames roared to life in the middle of the road: not small, but massive burning offerings laid in the path Aravan would take.

The heat became almost unbearable. Fire next to us, the sun relentless above, bodies on all sides, and yet no one seemed to waver. No one stepped back. In fact, bodies dove into the fire to collect the now blessed camphor.

As the chariot pressed onward through thousands of people, the intensity began, slowly, to dissolve. The crowd thinned and the noise softened just a bit. I was drenched. Overstimulated. Slightly dazed and very dehydrated.

I stopped, sat, attempted something resembling hydration, and realized what came next.

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The Bangles

I had a vague sense of where it would take place and started walking, the heat now less aggressive, or maybe I just resigned myself to it.

(Have I mentioned it was hot?)

Somewhere along the way, two men on a motorcycle pulled up beside me, shouting over the noise that I looked lost.

Correct, sirs.

They allowed for no protest as they told me to get on. So I did. The three of us wiggled through the outskirts of the crowd until we reached a field where everything was about to change.

They were photographers too, and very generous ones. @aadhilsgallery and @suganxz._, again, check them out. They helped me find angles, helped me navigate truth, really much better than I could have on my own.

And then it began.

The Hijra gathered together as priests moved among them, carrying small, curved blades. One by one, they cut the turmeric threads from around their necks: the symbol of their marriage to Aravan. Then, with the blunt side of the blade, they shattered the stacks of glittering bangles that had adorned their wrists.

Their husband was dead, and they were widowed.

The ground became a cathedral of stained glass and broken color: cracked glass and splintered gold.

And then the sound, which echoed through trees and across rice fields: wailing, rising and falling through the crowds. Women collapsing into one another, clutching each other in support, sobbing, bodies folding to the earth as grief poured out in unfiltered waves. They whipped their hair through the air back and forth, others struck their hands on the ground. The mourning was theatrical, yes, but very real.

There were flickers of laughter too, moments where the intensity broke just enough to enjoy a giggle. But the weight of it held.

It was, a lot.

I moved through it quietly, camera in hand, capturing what I could, until something in me gave way and my energy dropped to zero. Not from fatigue entirely, but from the fullness of my senses. I could absolutely not absorb any more.

I had followed the arc from celebration to chaos, from devotion to grief. I had been carried along with them, transported into something far bigger than myself, and somewhere in that field (standing among shards of bangles, tears, and camera shutters) I realized I had received what I came for.

I stepped back, and then, quietly, made my way out.

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What I Came For

What’s the takeaway? What did I actually get?

One of my students asked me that when I got back to work. “Did you get what you came for?”

Yes. Probably far more than I expected.

But what was it?

Women have always carried me. I was raised by one, an unapologetically over-the-top mother who loved loudly, and aggressively. My aunts, my grandmothers, my cousins, all women with big hearts, big opinions, and big voices. I didn’t just grow up around strength, I was moulded by it.

And when I left home and chose my own family, it was the same story. Trans women, theys, thems, femme boys, all my family and moreso my teachers.

I suppose, in some way, I’ve always believed the feminine to be divine.

And here, at this festival, I watched a community I love return to that divinity (boldly) while the crowds cheered on. I know, I know, I’m being dramatic.

Blame my mother. It’s in the blood.

But truly, there was something profound in witnessing a community so often pushed to the margins be brought center stage and praised. I saw a sisterhood gather under extraordinary circumstances and move together through joy, chaos, devotion, and grief.

I witnessed a ritual that has existed for centuries, and I got to stand inside it. And trust me, that was more than enough. And like the oceans I so desperately want to protect, these powerful women are worth uplifting so they are no longer marginalized: because once something so sacred is lost, no current can bring it back.

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One Last Thing

Oh, and those straight boys I mentioned earlier?

Turns out, many of them weren’t just there for the cultural experience. On that first night, when all these women were, technically, newly married, well, if you had one night of marriage before widowhood, what would you do?

Exactly.

I left early, somewhat thankfully, but a friend of mine, a journalist based in India, stayed on and very dutifully reported back that things got (ahem) festive. Or should I say, consummate?

Let’s just say that particular detail didn’t quite make it onto the Wikipedia page.

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Mark Jeffrey Scodellaro is a writer and photographer documenting culture, conservation, and the communities that hold both together. Follow his work at @amarkonthemat.

With thanks to @buddie_tripod, @aadhilsgallery, @behal.ai and @suganxz._ for their generosity on the ground in Tamil Nadu.

 

 

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Koovagam Schedule (For People Who Like a Plan and want to avoid my Confusion)

 

Day 1 – Arrive Early (Too Early, Ideally)

If you’re anything like me, overly eager and suspiciously bad at Google calendars, you’ll arrive at The Koovagam Festival a full day before anything actually happens.

Now, on paper, this looks like a mistake.

And essentially it is 

But there is a silver lining.

If you get to the village around 13:00, you can catch the quieter side of the festival:

* preparations unfolding

* outfits being assembled

* the slow build before the chaos

It’s less about spectacle but more behind-the-scenes.  It’s also nice to talk with some residents and get the inside goods on what’s happening and where 

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Evening – Miss Koovagam Pageant (Where Things Actually Happen)

Redemption !

Around 18:00, head over to Villupuram for the Miss Koovagam pageant, held near the Villupuram New Bus Station.  You can’t miss it, the music alone will be noticeable 

And suddenly, we have a festival

* Big energy

* ⁠free hiv testing 

* ladies in Full glam walking like they know how

* Music and over the top performances

This is not subtle and this will be the moment where you realise:

The chaos was simply running late.

It’s absolutely worth checking out and get ready, you will make a lot of friends

Day 2 – The Slow Burn (and by burn I mean, yes it’s hot)

Return to Koovagam Festival around 13:00, feeling confident.

And technically… yes, the festival is happening.

But also… not really.

* People are there

* Things are set up

* There’s movement, noise, colour

And yet, somehow, nothing is quite happening. There’s a lot of milling about.  This is mostly the time when the Hijra arrive, start to see old friends and slowly make their way though the Temple 

It’s like arriving at a party where everyone is dressed, the music is on, but no one has decided to commit yet.

At this stage I began to suspect the festival and I were simply not aligned spiritually.

16:00 – Signs of Life

Around 16:00, things start to shift.

The crowd thickens.

And Energy builds

Finally you see it coming.

This is your cue:

* get hydrated for gods sake 

* dive in

* stop pretending you know what’s going on and just lean in

Because from here, it escalates.

19:00–20:00 – The Actual Festival Begins

And then, finally, we have arrived.

By 19:00 to 20:00, Koovagam becomes what you were expecting all along:

* loud

* alive with thousands of people 

* unapologetically loud and super fun 

The energy turns playful, and very naughty, people are there for a reason and they are ready to fulfil ahem that need 

And me?

Missed it.

I really had to get back as I was exhausted 

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Key Takeaway (Learn From My Mistakes)

If you take one thing from this:

* Do not judge the festival by the early afternoon

* Stay for the evening

 

Day 3 – Chaos, Devotion, and a Very Long Day

If Day 2 was a slow burn, Day 3 is everything, all at once, with pyrotechnics

Welcome to the main event of The Koovagam Festival.

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06:00 – If You Want the Chaos you’re gonna Earn It

If you want to be in it and not just watching, but fully immersed get there by 06:00 and you’ll have very good access to the charity of Aravan

This is when the crowds begin to form, and positioning matters.

I, naturally, arrived at 08:30.

Late by my own made up standards, but honestly? Perfect.

Close enough to feel everything but Far enough to avoid being emotionally and physically flattened.

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09:00–10:00 – The Chariot Moves

Sometime between 09:00 and 10:00, the chariot begins its journey through the village.

And this is where things shift from “festival” to something much bigger.

* Crowds surge

* Devotion intensifies

* The entire village seems to move as one the tide of people heaves and churns 

you’re carried along by it and become fully emerged 

At this point I stopped trying to navigate and accepted my new identity as part of the current.

⸻

13:00–14:00 – The Breaking of the Bangles

By early afternoon, around 13:00 to 14:00 (or honestly, a bit earlier if you want), you can move toward one of the most emotional rituals:

The breaking of the bangles.

This marks the transition — a shift from celebration to mourning in the story of Aravan

It’s intimate, powerful, and deeply human.  It takes place in a field slightly north west of the temple.  Easy enough to find if you ask people but it is about a 20 minute walk 

The same energy that carried the morning now begins to turn inward.

⸻

17:00 – White Saris, Collective Grief

By 17:00, the transformation is complete.

Where there was colour, there is now only white and where there was celebration, there is now dark mourning.

Women move through the village in white saris, embodying their loss.  It’s deeply beautiful 

And this is where it all lands

And it only took me three days to understand what was happening