Ganesha (also Ganesh, Ganapati Tantra, Ekadanta or Vinayaka) is the deva with the elephant head in the pantheon of Hinduism. He is the god of knowledge and wisdom, removes obstacles and is the patron saint of travelers. His vahana, vehicle, is a mouse or rat called Mashika. The Hindus pray to Ganesha before they start something new, such as a new job or when they move.
Ganesha is the son of the god Shiva and the goddess Parvati, who together symbolize the unity of everything in the cosmogony of Hinduism. Shiva stands for the subjective conscious and Parvati for the energetic material. A statue of him is often placed at road junctions in India, so that he can help travelers when they have to make a choice and take a new path. Ganesha is always at the beginning of something, a first impulse.
