My knowledge and memories of Indian Festivals do not make a jam-packed tapestry. There are only a few images, some very patchy too. The white space is now getting some print slowly and steadily thanks to the community I now live in. Broadly speaking, it is a community that tries to embrace different cultures. And in it is also a large number of people who are trying to hold on to the customs and traditions they grew up with.
I see my fellow NRIs getting to know more about the traditions and practices of other religions and states of India. (Now if you are not Indian or not very familiar with the country, let me tell you is it more diverse than you can imagine.) I see a few people trying to rediscover their roots and working hard to incorporate new markings into their festival calendars.
Looking back, I'm thinking of how blessed I was to have grown up in an atmosphere that was put together by kids and later teenagers and young adults from different parts of India. And different belief systems too. I thought I had had quite a bit of exposure to the diversity of the country. And I'm not wrong. But even I am constantly learning about traditional practices of different parts of the land I hail from.
The year before last, was the first time I went to see some Gollu. It's funny (not the haha kind but the strange kind of funny) that this was my first time at it. I spent 20-something years in India but was seeing it for the first time at a (South) Indian friend's place in the US. Now before you draw up those judgments, let me tell you yeah-- I was born into a Hindu Family and all of that but where I come from, we don't celebrate a whole lot of festivals. And add to that, the fact that I spent a good part of my growing-up years in a boarding school up in the Nilgiris, I have a different kind of festival-memories.
We did celebrate a few festivals in school, but in a different way -- there was no Dandiya or Gollu for Navrathri. We did have 'Pooja Holidays' and that meant pure 'home-time' - the break from Boarding School. More about that in another post. Coming back to festivals. There were no Diyas for Diwali but celebrate it, we did.
While a few kids went home for the holiday if Diwali fell on a weekend or made a long weekend, the rest of us had a good school-Diwali, which was also fun. It was one of those days for what we called back then, 'our Home Dresses.' We wore our colourful dresses; it was a break from our school & boarding- uniforms. There were girls who had a new set of clothes saved for 'Diwali.' The rest of us were happy to get to just dress up and look forward to the festivities.
Our boarding-school festivity included special food for Diwali, starting with a Masala Dosa that was brought from 'outside' along with a box of 5-6 sweetmeats (with some edible silver on it all) for each of us. Oh yes. That happened. I can't quite recall what special lunches were like, for Diwali, but it was different from the other days. However, I do remember that another thing that made Diwali lunch (and Onam lunch, too) SPECIAL was the fact that it was one of those days that we got to put aside the cutlery and eat with our bare hands. Pure joy!
After an early dinner that was normal to that life, it would be 'cracker time' (not the eating kind, the lighting kind. :D). Firework time! Each of us got an age-appropriate share. While the first-standard kids got a few sparklers, kids a couple of years older than them got sparklers and Chakras and Shoelaces and older kids received a bigger stash with 'Flower Pots' and the seniors even had Rockets in their packages. The Bombs were for just for us to enjoy. There were a couple or more people who were entrusted with the duty of lighting those strings of firework.
At the end of the show, when the little kids were taken back to their dormitories, the older ones got to light up what was left, and then we had our own grand finale. That was about putting together all those boxes that the firework came in and lighting the heap to make a bonfire. And then we do a jig around it before we called it a day.
The morning-after :D was about walking into the corridors in front of the school and looking at a front compound, which was actually the basketball court, strewn with little red strips of paper and silver powder that would stay long after the paper-mess was removed (that before the school bell rang for morning assembly if it was a school-day). Along with that trash went another special day and we knew it be another year before we got our box of Peda-and-MysorePak-and-Badusha and those Crackers (the firework kind, remember. :) )
I see my fellow NRIs getting to know more about the traditions and practices of other religions and states of India. (Now if you are not Indian or not very familiar with the country, let me tell you is it more diverse than you can imagine.) I see a few people trying to rediscover their roots and working hard to incorporate new markings into their festival calendars.
Looking back, I'm thinking of how blessed I was to have grown up in an atmosphere that was put together by kids and later teenagers and young adults from different parts of India. And different belief systems too. I thought I had had quite a bit of exposure to the diversity of the country. And I'm not wrong. But even I am constantly learning about traditional practices of different parts of the land I hail from.
The year before last, was the first time I went to see some Gollu. It's funny (not the haha kind but the strange kind of funny) that this was my first time at it. I spent 20-something years in India but was seeing it for the first time at a (South) Indian friend's place in the US. Now before you draw up those judgments, let me tell you yeah-- I was born into a Hindu Family and all of that but where I come from, we don't celebrate a whole lot of festivals. And add to that, the fact that I spent a good part of my growing-up years in a boarding school up in the Nilgiris, I have a different kind of festival-memories.
We did celebrate a few festivals in school, but in a different way -- there was no Dandiya or Gollu for Navrathri. We did have 'Pooja Holidays' and that meant pure 'home-time' - the break from Boarding School. More about that in another post. Coming back to festivals. There were no Diyas for Diwali but celebrate it, we did.
While a few kids went home for the holiday if Diwali fell on a weekend or made a long weekend, the rest of us had a good school-Diwali, which was also fun. It was one of those days for what we called back then, 'our Home Dresses.' We wore our colourful dresses; it was a break from our school & boarding- uniforms. There were girls who had a new set of clothes saved for 'Diwali.' The rest of us were happy to get to just dress up and look forward to the festivities.
Our boarding-school festivity included special food for Diwali, starting with a Masala Dosa that was brought from 'outside' along with a box of 5-6 sweetmeats (with some edible silver on it all) for each of us. Oh yes. That happened. I can't quite recall what special lunches were like, for Diwali, but it was different from the other days. However, I do remember that another thing that made Diwali lunch (and Onam lunch, too) SPECIAL was the fact that it was one of those days that we got to put aside the cutlery and eat with our bare hands. Pure joy!
After an early dinner that was normal to that life, it would be 'cracker time' (not the eating kind, the lighting kind. :D). Firework time! Each of us got an age-appropriate share. While the first-standard kids got a few sparklers, kids a couple of years older than them got sparklers and Chakras and Shoelaces and older kids received a bigger stash with 'Flower Pots' and the seniors even had Rockets in their packages. The Bombs were for just for us to enjoy. There were a couple or more people who were entrusted with the duty of lighting those strings of firework.
At the end of the show, when the little kids were taken back to their dormitories, the older ones got to light up what was left, and then we had our own grand finale. That was about putting together all those boxes that the firework came in and lighting the heap to make a bonfire. And then we do a jig around it before we called it a day.
The morning-after :D was about walking into the corridors in front of the school and looking at a front compound, which was actually the basketball court, strewn with little red strips of paper and silver powder that would stay long after the paper-mess was removed (that before the school bell rang for morning assembly if it was a school-day). Along with that trash went another special day and we knew it be another year before we got our box of Peda-and-MysorePak-and-Badusha and those Crackers (the firework kind, remember. :) )
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