Day Two - Diwali!

So today is Diwali, which is the festival of lights. All the Hindu festivals/holidays have long and gorgeous back-stories behind them, and I thought I’d find out about Diwali’s and share it. Diwali comes from the story of Raam and his wife Sita. Raam is the eldest son of the eldest wife of the King of Iayodhya. When the King grew sick, he wanted to hand over control of the kingdom to Raam (as he was the eldest); however, Kekai (the King’s second wife) realised that the King would hand power over to Raam not her son. She asked the King to banish Raam and his wife to the forest for 14 years. The King had to comply because he was in Kekai’s debt. The King talked to Raam about it and Raam told his father to keep his promise and that he’d be ok in the forest with Sita. When Kekai told her son the good news, that he would become the crown prince, he rebelled and was very angry with her. He said that he would not rule in his own name but only in the name of Raam. The king of Lanka (now Sri Lanka) , Ravan, kidnapped Sita when Raam was out hunting for food. Raam raised a great army to get Sita back from Ravan. The day that Ravan was killed and Sita was saved is 20 days before Diwali, which is Desharah, the festival of the triumph of good over evil. On Diwali, the tealights are lit to signify the lights lit for Raam and Sita so they could find their way back to Iayodha.

The great thing about Hinduism that I'm noticing is that it's so open and welcoming to outsiders and they love to explain where the holidays and traditions come from. (Side note from Aditi: YEAAAAHHHH. But I am totally unreligious.)

This morning we went to 'DT MegaMall' (not so mega to be honest) to get some mendhi done. To get there we took an auto-rickshaw, which in all honestly was slightly terrifying. Sometimes the roads have lanes and sometimes they don't - not that that matters to the drivers. The auto, as it is known locally, was over-taking cars and turning corners like it was in a race. When the driver needed to turn a corner, he just simply drove out into the middle of the road and expected others to stop and move out of the way. It was an experience to say the least. Back to the mendhi. Mendhi is the Indian henna that is traditionally done for weddings. The women attending the wedding will often get mendhi on their hands and the bride will have it on her hands and feet, often all the way up her arms to the elbow. The mendhi cost us 600INR each which is about $10. These are the designs we got.

After we sat on tiny stools for about 45 minutes  to get our mendhi done, we had the pooja. We went back to where we were staying, got changed into our nice clothes, and the pooja began. Now, I have only ever experienced one pooja before this so I was a little anxious, because the other pooja I had been to was in honour of a group of people (me included) who helped the community to paint their school - it was a bit lengthy to put it lightly. But I put my inhibitions aside and sat down. Completely different from the previous pooja; this one involved CDs being swapped and YouTube being used to find the right prayer (in song form). We listened to 4 different prayers and the older ones sang along to it from a prayer book while I only managed to get the repeated lines that formed a sort of chorus in each prayer. In between prayers we were given some rice and spice mixture (tika) onto our foreheads to activate our thrid eyes (chakras); some prasad to drink which is an offering, always first offered to god, (unfortunately I haven't mastered the art of drinking from my hands so it went all over my lengha, which no one saw to my relief) (side note from Aditi: LOL FAIL AT LIFE); and some rice and a sugar block as an offering - this particular offering is only on Diwali (the rice tasted like popcorn which was a little strange in the circumstances). We were also given a blessing in the form of a string bracelet tied onto our wrists: left wrist for married/widowed women and right wrist for men and unmarried women (side note from Aditi: Because they're the SAME THING). Then there was a minute silence in which everyone said their prayers and that was the end of the pooja. (Side note from Aditi: except I may possibly have forgotten to pray... oops.)

After the pooja came the fireworks! Which, having lived in Dubai and gone to numerous Diwali parties, I am very familiar with; however I was not prepared for this Diwali's. The kids were running wild with 8 year-olds holding flames and lighting fireworks, which looked like erupting volcanoes of sparks. The adults were using empty wine bottles to set off the rockets which flew into the air...assuming they were pointed in the right direction, which didn't happen as often as I'd have liked. All in all, it was basically mayhem, which isn't always a bad thing.

We then came back to the apartment to have dinner. And called it a night. (Side note from Aditi: A NIGHT. See what I did there? Hahahahaha)