Nilesh's Posterous

Garba and Dandiya Raas for Navratri @ Santa Clara Convention Center

This evening, I went to a Garba event in the South Bay at the Santa Clara Convention Center in celebration of Nav Ratri & Durga Pooja. One would never know you were in the USA at that event. There should have been well over 1500 Indians or so gathered at the event, everybody dressed up in their colorful traditional dresses and dancing Garba and Dandiya Raas. I tried Garba and it was pretty hard for me, but Dandiya Raas wasn't that bad and I managed it not too badly. Always great to go to these cultural events and immerse oneself in them. 

Sri Sathya Sai Baba Center, San Telmo, Argentina

I was walking by in the San Telmo neighborhood of Buenos Aires when I stumbled upon a sign for a Sri Sathya Sai Baba Center. Looked their schedule of events, and same as in Maurtius, they had the Sunday Kirtan. I decided to attend and it was a good expenrience that I enjoyed a lot. They had the same setting as how we do it in Mauritius and the same structure of how the kirtan goes. Only difference was that some Kirtans were in Spanish, which was pretty nice and the other difference is that they had no harmonium and they played the guitar instead.

Maha Shivaratri

Maha Shivaratri is one of the most auspicious Hindu Festivals in Mauritius. Lord Shiva is the main god in most temples in Mauritius and ShivaRatri literally means (the night of Shiva). There is a Shivaratri every month, but Maha Shivaratri is the most auspicious one literally translate to 'The Great Night of Shiva'. On the night of Maha Shivaratri
of Maha Shivaratri, there's all night long prayers and water from the Ganges is poured in the Shiva Lingums. In Mauritius, we have a sacred lake caled Grand Bassin, which is supposed to have been filled by the first Indian immigrants with holy water from the Ganges. So, for Maha Shivaratri, we all usually go on a walking pilgrimage to Grand Bassin to collect the sacred water from the lake for the prayers on the night of Maha Shivaratri.

Here's an article that talks more about how we celebrate Maha Shivaratri in Mauritius.

http://pages.intnet.mu/fullspot/Events/Mahashiv.htm

I've attached some pictures of the Giant Shiva Statue we have in Mauritius. The status is 108 feet tall (sacred number in Hinduism) and is always almost covered in fog during the Maha Shivaratree festival. The first picture is actually how it looks like in fog, I've just added some blue light to accentuate the profile and shadows.

BTW.. on this pious occasion of Maha Shivatree, I decided to make a hindu prayer iphone application. It's still in the proess of app store aproval, but check it out at http://ipuja.weboot.com/ for an early preview.

Thaipusam Cavadee in Mauritius

Yesterday was Thaipusam Cavadee in Mauritius. I was there last year while the festival happens. I thought I'd post some pictures I took there last year.

It is a very auspicious religious festival celebrated in Mauritius and other parts of the world as well, by mostly the Tamil community, but lately, more and more people of different faith and religions in Mauritius, as it brings salvation to many. The festival celebrates the birthday of Lord Muruga (son of Shiva) the Tamil God of War.

Devotees and pilgrims for the procession, have to fast for weeks in advance to cleanse their bodies and mind and also pray a lot before the actual day of cavadee. On the day of cavadee, they have body piercings and carry altars made specially for that occasion to temples and rivers. I've copied an extract of what Wikipedia says about the piercings.

"The simplest kavadi is a semi circular decorated canopy supported by a wooden rod that is carried on the shoulders, to the temple. In addition, some have a small spear through their tongue, or a spear through the cheeks. The spear pierced through his tongue or cheeks reminds him constantly of Lord Murugan. It also prevents him from speaking and gives great power of endurance. Other types of kavadi involve hooks stuck into the back and either pulled by another walking behind or being hung from a decorated bullock cart or more recently a tractor, with the point of incisions of the hooks varying the level of pain. The greater the pain the more god-earned merit."

Divali Dandiya dance in the mission

First time I did dandiya today. It's not hard snd easy to learn. Had
lots of fun doing dandiya dance. Happy divali all !!

Divali, Festival of Lights (part 2)

Apart from sharing sweets and cakes to loved ones, for Divali, we also light up our houses to welcome goddess Laxmi.

Even though we are not celebrating this year, we did some prayers to Goddess Laxmi (picture 2) and put some earth lamps (picture 1) in every room in the house.

Quoted from wikipedia about significance of the lights - "Festival of Lights," where the lights or lamps signify victory of good over the evil within every human being."

Last year, my dad had decorated our house a lot with many decorations, the most he had ever done on the house. I've attached some pictures of my house (picture 3 and 4) decorated for Divali the year before.

Divali, Festival of Lights : Sharing of Sweets (part 1)

Divali (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diwali) is celebrated today in Mauritius and everybody cooks sweets and cakes that they share with all family, friends and neighbors. This year, I am not celebrating as it has not yet been 1 year since my father's passing away and we mourn for 1 year.

But we did get a fair share of sweets from family and friends and neighbors. I have not celebrated divali for a while in Mauritius and biggest change I see are that the cakes are very much more elaborate than they used to be and also people have started to use fancy decorated boxes to put the cakes in rather the little plastic or paper bags, we used to use when I was a kid. I've taken snaps of a couple of the boxes. They have very nice designs.

One thing that has not changed though is the traditional 'gato patate'. Its a cake made of sweet potatoes, flour, sugar and grated coconut filling and has been a traditional cake to cook for Divali. Mostly everybody had a 'gato patate' in their sweet bag.

For my Mauritian friends who are not in Mauritius at this time of the year, I've taken some pictures of what you are missing :)

I over indulged on the sweets today. Tomorrow diet starts :)