Holi- the most colorful festival that we celebrate in India. It is celebrated as a festival of love, frolic, happiness and of course colors !! The adults and children throw gulal on each other and the sky and the streets are full of colors. I am not a very big Holi fan- the after effects of Holi are so dreadful. But I wanted to go out and play this year- play it for the sake of Anvesha - get her exposed to our festivals as it brings a larger understanding of the culture she is a part of.
To start with I made some gujiyas at home followed by malpuas. This was my first attempt and wasn't so bad :) Traditionally in India there is Holika Dahan- where Holika is burnt and Prahlad is saved. Wish I could get Anvesha to see Holika Daahan as well, but that will be possible only in India.
I have been teaching colors to Anvesha and she has been following quite well ( proud me !!!). She can identify red, blue, pink, white, purple, green, yellow and last but not the least orange which apparently is her favorite color. With Holi around the corner, I had decided in my mind that this year whether its rain or shine- we will go out and play Holi- the festival of colors as it its rightly called. The weather Gods had been very kind and it was bright and sunny that day with temperatures hitting the 60s. The CRY foundation had organized the CRY Holi at Crossroads Park where over 3000 Indians had gathered. It was a huge crowd and Anvesha was overwhelmed to see so many colorful faces. I guess this was her first time she saw such a sight :) We were mesmerized too :)
I hand held Anvesha so that she could apply gulal on Prateek's face and after a while she got a hang of it. To my surprize, she was calm and did not panic when people applied gulal on her face. She was rather fascinated by all the vibrant colors, the singing and the dancing. This could be because we had planned our visit at a time when Anvesha would be awake and well fed- a lesson I have learnt over time. She is less likely to be fussy on meeting strangers if her basic needs are met.
So this is how we spent our Holi weekend, we surely missed family and it would have been a lot different for us, had we been in India- more colors, more fun, more mithais..... but we did our bit to create a mini India for Anvesha here. It was a whole new thing for her and she will probably appreciate it more next year :)
To start with I made some gujiyas at home followed by malpuas. This was my first attempt and wasn't so bad :) Traditionally in India there is Holika Dahan- where Holika is burnt and Prahlad is saved. Wish I could get Anvesha to see Holika Daahan as well, but that will be possible only in India.
I have been teaching colors to Anvesha and she has been following quite well ( proud me !!!). She can identify red, blue, pink, white, purple, green, yellow and last but not the least orange which apparently is her favorite color. With Holi around the corner, I had decided in my mind that this year whether its rain or shine- we will go out and play Holi- the festival of colors as it its rightly called. The weather Gods had been very kind and it was bright and sunny that day with temperatures hitting the 60s. The CRY foundation had organized the CRY Holi at Crossroads Park where over 3000 Indians had gathered. It was a huge crowd and Anvesha was overwhelmed to see so many colorful faces. I guess this was her first time she saw such a sight :) We were mesmerized too :)
I hand held Anvesha so that she could apply gulal on Prateek's face and after a while she got a hang of it. To my surprize, she was calm and did not panic when people applied gulal on her face. She was rather fascinated by all the vibrant colors, the singing and the dancing. This could be because we had planned our visit at a time when Anvesha would be awake and well fed- a lesson I have learnt over time. She is less likely to be fussy on meeting strangers if her basic needs are met.
So this is how we spent our Holi weekend, we surely missed family and it would have been a lot different for us, had we been in India- more colors, more fun, more mithais..... but we did our bit to create a mini India for Anvesha here. It was a whole new thing for her and she will probably appreciate it more next year :)
No comments:
Post a Comment