How much do I know ?

I decided to make my yearly pilgrimage to Tirupati rather in the early part of the year. Every time I go there the only take away is the number of people coming to the temple town is increasing by the day and there are always lot of first timers. Even though I have been to the temple lot of times surprisingly - I hardly knew anything about origin of the god except that he is the reincarnation of lord Vishnu. I was wondering how the faith can be so blind. There are thousands of deities in India and seems improbable all folks who go there to pray have all the idea. Every nook and corner has a temple and the presiding deity particularly in southern part of the country is different in each of them.Anyways since all the origins are based on mythology - nearly impossible to corroborated, there will hardly be any methods to verify the authenticity of the origins.

Now I am enlightened ! The source of information - what else but Wikipedia ! . Though the official site has information but - kind of too technical for me to understand. Hardly any good Indian sites to give a brief and concise description - Pointers are welcome. What about the other gods ! - Looks like need to go on a net pilgrimage on at least which I kind of believe - last heard that there are 3.6 billion Hindu gods. Times are challenging and no wonder the visitors are increasing as probably temples provide with some sort of solace to over come the constant mindless tribulations. Balaji is a great bestower of Boons