Diwali

As we write this blog post tonight, it feels a bit like we live in a war zone. Fireworks have been exploding in the surrounding area nonstop for the last couple of hours. This is, of course, in celebration of the festival of diwali. This "Festival of Lights" is a Hindu occasion marked by decorating homes with lamps and candles, setting off fireworks, and distributing sweets and gifts. It is celebrated to mark the victory of good over evil and the end of spiritual darkness. Even though this is a Hindu festival, it has become something of a national holiday in India (much as Christmas has become secularized in the US). The first thing that we did for diwali was buy a new saree for our ayah. Here you can see Beth and Umilla with the saree and some bangles to match.

Last night we went into the bazaar to see a bit of what was going on. Last night was chhoti (small) Diwali, when the fireworks and mischief are not quite so bad. We saw lots of shops decorated with lights and flowers and selling metalware, clay lamps, and small banks.

This morning, the sixth grade students from Woodstock when down to the bazaar on a fieldtrip. Dave had a chance to go with them because he teachers sixth graders in the morning. The students had directions to practice their Hindi and ask questions about diwali to the shop keepers. Two of the most important shops during this season are the sweet shops and the fireworks.

Dave was able to resist the temptation to blow things up, but did partake of some sweets. The example below surprisingly had the consistency of fiberglass insulation and was not terribly tasty.

With our camera, Dave was able to get some video of the two biggest sweet shops in the bazaar. They are across the street from each other, but Dave mostly stayed near the laddus which were his favorites.

Since Woodstock is a Christian school, we did not give our students the day off today. To make that up to our Hindu pupils, the school provided a professional fireworks display this evening. Some of the kids did not think it was that great, but we both found it to be quite impressive.

The video that Beth took also turned our quite well.

We stayed out of the bazaar tonight because we were told that there are occasionally hooligans that throw firecrackers at people that look different or out of place. It has hard to look much more different than a tall American with an orange beard, so we tried to light our own fireworks at home after the school demonstration. Here, you can see Beth unsuccessfully trying to start a fancy sparkler that we bought in the bazaar. It never worked, but it was only 2 rupees, so it's not a big loss.

Finally, here is a nice example of the decorations that people place outside their homes. Most houses had strings of lights like Americans use at Christmas as well as oil lamps and candles. These were on the windowsill of our neighbor.

Remember this for next year...to see a nice cultural display, you can visit us during mid-October.

Dave and Beth