Seventy-year-old R. Duraisamy goes through a last minute check on his kavadi decorated with peacock...

Seventy-year-old R. Duraisamy goes through a last minute check on his kavadi decorated with peacock feathers and picture of deities in Kuala Lumpur, January 20. Duraisamy will be carrying the kavadi during a Hindu celebration this Thursday. Almost a million Hindu devotees, some with finger-thick skewers stuck through their cheeks, others bearing massive wooden frames attached by metal stakes to their flesh, will make their annual pilgrimage to a temple in a mountain cave outside the Malaysian capital in a religious ritual of pain and penance that marks a century-old Hindu festival call Thaipusam.