Happy Vinayaka Chavithi

Idol Immersion at Ulsoor Lake
Happy Ganesh Chaturthi as everyone calls it. Or happy Vinayaka Chavithi as it is called in Telugu.

Vinayaka Chavithi evokes so many sweet memories from the childhood. Although growing up in a land (West Bengal) where Ganesh Chaturthi was not a big occasion, we still used to celebrate it in a sweet little way at home. The night before, we would go with dad to shop for sticks, colored paper, and other decorative items to create the mini pandal at home. There would be four sticks standing upright in four Amul Spray tins with soil in them. The sticks would be decorated with colored paper around them . Four more sticks would be tied horizontally around the four vertical ones, covered with horizontal paper and that would create a little pandal. We would hang fruits vertically from the top. Little Ganesha would sit on a small box that would be decorated with colored shining paper.

Simple Puja at Home
On the morning of the puja, we siblings would wake up early in the morning and get ready for the puja. The puja would involve hym chanting and then recital of the story that dad would do. We would sit around dad and listen to the story sometimes intently and sometimes falling asleep. The puja would continue for around an hour. In the meantime, my mother would make some delicious Ganesh Chaturthi special items.

I do not know what to call them in english. In telugu, we would call them Buttalu, Jilludi Kayilu and Und Rallu. All of them would be made of rice flour. B would be nicely packed in Jackfruit leaves and baked. J would have delicious coconut in them. It is said U is lord Ganesha's favorite item .

As a tradition, after having puja at home and enjoying delicious food, in the early evening we would hop to different families celebrating puja to enjoy prasadam.

In the evening we used to go to community celebration by Andhra Samiti of Durgapur. That was real fun event. It used to be a platform to meet friends and play around, then enjoy food and come back home with parents. Yeah I know that food was really important part of this festival.

Many times we tend to associate too much religion with this but I believe that more than religion or anything it has to do a lot with memories, nostalgia, a sense of good feeling and peace. And where we get these, why not celebrate them in zest and have a good peace of mind?

This year, I and my wife celebrated it in a small way at our home. Brought back lots of memories. It was raining heavily this time in Bangalore. Many areas of Bangalore were almost flooded out. We had to do the shopping while getting drenched in the raining. The Madivala market was crowded with people shopping in rain. It was some fun and painful too.

The challenge was while coming back. We started walking in completely opposite direction hoping to get an auto. Someone finally pointed out to me that I was going 180 degrees opposite. Again started walking in the reverse direction hoping to get an auto. It was just impossible to get an auto guy to drive to Koramangala.