Diwali or Deepavali is a Hindu Festival of Lights.
It is the largest and most important holiday of the year and signifies the spiritual victory of good over evil, light over darkness, and knowledge over ignorance.
Celebrations span five days.
Generally, the first day is for cleaning the home or business, and shopping for gold or silver. The second day is for decorating the home with lights, diyas, or lamps, and rangoli, or floral patterns.
The third day is the main day of Diwali, during which families get together for puja (prayer), feasts and visiting, and the evening is capped off with incredible displays of fireworks and fire crackers.
The fourth day is the start of the new year, during which friends and family exchange gifts and sweets, and the fifth day is for brothers to visit their sisters’ families for a delicious meal.
These are some general followings for Diwali festivities, but it is important to keep in mind that different regions, cultures and families have their own traditions and variations of how they celebrate, going back many generations.
Also of note is that Diwali is celebrated in many other countries.
As I have mentioned previously, Gwen and I both have a strong desire to learn and understand as much of Indian culture as we can while we are living here. So in preparation for Diwali, we spent a lot of time talking with friends, shopkeepers and many passersby who had initiated a conversation about my leg.
This was when we started to realize there are many individual customs and beliefs that families follow during the five-day celebration.
Armed with our new-found knowledge, we headed for the store to purchase and prepare for our own Diwali. We bought Christmas lights to decorate our balcony, diyas, which are small clay vessels for holding either candles or oil for burning, a 40-pack of tea lights and several bags of colourful powder for making the rangoli in front of our door. We purchased new kurtas for each of us to wear, as part of the third-day tradition is to wear something new.
We were very fortunate in that we have good friends in our tower who are Hindu, and they invited us to partake in much of the festivities with them, including a luncheon feast on day three.
Another friend we met one day because she and I were comparing our injuries (she broke her collarbone and was pinned back together and still in a sling) invited us for dinner and then some “crackers” as they call them here. A few thousand rupees later and we were set to begin celebrating our first Diwali.
On day one, we were informed, only one candle is lit in honour of one of the gods. I had previously received a clay Ganesh for my birthday, so we decided that would be the centrepiece for our display.
On day two, we spent the afternoon with friends in the building, stringing together garlands of fresh yellow and gold flowers. These are available for purchase from hundreds of vendors along the roadway, either in bulk or pre-strung.
Our friend Celine’s in-laws had come to town to celebrate Diwali and they brought flowers fresh from the fields. Sitting in a large circle on the floor with legs crossed in a bow tie, the group strung together the decorative garlands while talking about the history of Diwali and its traditions.
Gwen made three beautiful garlands to decorate our front door, although you could tell hers from the rest. But since I watched all of this from the couch, I will leave it at that.
That evening, we added 10 more candles to our shrine for a total of 11 as is the custom on day two.
Day three, we were out the door early for some last-minute items needed for our two mealtime invitations. We stopped at one of the hundreds of firecracker shops that popped up along the road like dandelions in the spring.
It still amazes me what will constitute a shop during these events. Some two-inch tree stalks, a tarp, table and a dirty old carpet and you have a roadside display.
The fireworks were stacked to the rafters – well they would have been had this place had rafters – and up on the table barefoot was a young man grabbing down the boxes as the multitude of buyers was hollering out their requests.
For a mere 800 rupees, or roughly $14, we left with a bag that would have set us back $200 Canadian easy.
Then it was time for a quick roadside Chai, a couple bottles of wine and back home to prepare for our lunch date.
This meal was prepared by our friend’s mother and, as Gwen put it numerous times, “this is the best chicken I have ever eaten.” We shared a delicious meal with friends and new acquaintances, and again learned so much more about the history of the gods and their customs.
One such custom during Diwali is to give furniture to family. Just before lunch was served, a new sofa and coffee table arrived for Celine and Vikky from his parents.
We had a brief spell at home where we made an attempt to create a rangoli. This is a design created on the floor either inside or outside your door.
We watched them being done on YouTube and it looked pretty straight forward – not so much. The first design was swept away with the broom and a simpler technique was used for the second attempt. It was not fancy but certainly colourful.
We completed our third-day shrine by adding more candles until we reached 21 lights for our Ganesh.
Next it was off to another dinner invitation where we saw a beautiful rangoli made entirely of flowers that took up most of the lobby entrance to the tower. Our friend Monika and her daughter, Maanya, served us a fantastic vegetarian meal.
A little more wine, some delicious creamed desert and then off for the highlight of the day, the fireworks.
This is a contentious issue in India and grows more so each year. Delhi has banned the use of fireworks within the city because of the air pollution it creates.
Lanco Hills complex has banned them from inside the compound but allows people to set them off just outside the security gate on the entrance road. We headed down there with Monika and Maanya, not really knowing what to expect.
In Canada, with the exception of one crazy New Years Eve party (remember Gayle M.?), we have only experienced fireworks from well planned, completely safe and professional displays.
When we reached the security gate, it was immediately obvious that this was none of these. There were about 70 people in various group sizes setting off every style of fireworks and fire crackers in the most random and helter-skelter fashion.
The roadway was littered with shrapnel that made it look like a bomb had gone off in a paper factory. Children were lighting fuses on displays right beside someone else with roman candles and spinners and bottle rockets were going off everywhere. Just to make it a little riskier, all of this was taking place right beside a large hedge that separates the two driveways as well as several large trees.
I know I was a pretty slow moving target, but three times I was hit with flying debris. Twice falling from the sky and once something came from the pavement and struck me on the side.
Gwen lit our stash up quickly and we were ready to get out of there.
Day four is spent visiting with family and friends and giving gifts. We spent most of the day at home as I needed to reduce the swelling in my leg, but for dinner we were off to the subdivision of Gachibowli to have dinner at a road-side food truck operated by the new friend we had made the previous day at lunch.
We were treated to some delicious food and a beer, and we sat outside on a some old concrete culverts and visited for several hours.
This was our first Diwali in India and we are already looking forward to being a part of next year’s celebrations.