Pongol

This is Tamil New Year. It seems to be a major festival that involves the gods as well as cow racing. First the gods.
As we wandered into the village with our bikes, on a back road, we found  a very small temple - about the size of a small backyard shed. In it was a priest engaging in a purification ceremony. This involves beating the drum, passing the purification smoke around the statute of the god and of himself. Then he offers a purification blessing to those around. As I write this, I have a black smudge in the middle of my forehead from being purified. At my age, anything that offer me some purity for my sins should be welcomed.

The purification is done at a couple of temples. The main one also has loud music blaring while at the others, firecrackers are set off time and again.

The cows are brought out with various decorations - their horns are coloured, their backs may have coloured powder sprinkled on them and they have things like bananas strung from horn to horn. A sort of offering I gather.

In the village, the women have done elaborate chalk powder drawings on the streets in front of their homes. They are elaborate patterns that are done in detail. The woman bends down and draws these with her hand dropping various colours onto the pavement. They are beautiful, colourful and completely impermanent.

As the morning comes to a close, the cow racing begins. They charge through the crowd heading from the main road back into the village. The paces go from thundering down the road to needing constant coaxing to move at all. To call it a race is a misnomer. I only saw the one injury which is a boy who fell and was dragged a few feet by the cow. Injuries appeared to be superficial.

As all this goes on, the main road is at a virtual standstill. That does not deter the honking which there appears to be a cultural belief will cause the traffic to magically move. It does not but the honking carries on. There were numerous police officers in brown khaki crisp uniforms around who would wave a stick now and again at the traffic - not absolutely no benefit at all.

The morning concluded with us going to one of the Auroville eateries for Indian lunch of Thali. Sadly no masala chai.

The crowds here are not as inetnse as the major cities but you do get to a point where solitude and silence is needed. Thus, I am writing this in the quiet courtyard at our guest house.

India is a country that fills your senses. There is always something going on around you and there are times when it is hard to take it all in. Everwhere you look there is something that touches you - the people, the scenery, the colours, the smells, the contradictions, the garbage, the poverty, the richness. It never lets up.