There are two beliefs I found:
1. Krishna, known for his raas-leela, used to play pranks on gopikas (cow-herd girls) by spraying water and colour on them.
2. Another story says that we play colours because Krishna's mother decided to put colour on Radha's face when he complained about the contrast colour difference between his dark colour and Radha's fair colour.
Another main celebration during Holi is bonfire. Again there are two beliefs, I always associated the festival with the first one:
1. Lord Shiva was upset after Sati's death and gave up his worldy duties and went into deep meditation. All the other Gods got worried and got Kamadeva, god of love, to disturb Shiva's meditation so that he comes to normal and also can marry Goddess Parvati who was already meditating to marry Shiva. Kamadeva tried to distract Shiva's meditation and was eventually burnt down when Shiva opened his third eye. Rati, wife of Kamadeva, pleaded Shiva to bring back her husband to life. Shiva agreed to her request and revived Kamadeva but not in his physical form.
2. Hiranyakashipu wanted to kill his son, Bhaktha Prahlad as he was worshipping Lord Vishnu instead of Hiranyakashipu. He asked his sister, Holika who had the boon of immunity against fire, to burn Pralhad to ashes. But finally she herself got burnt into ashes and Prahlad was safe. The festival is named after her name, Holika.
I remember we used to steal wooden logs and coconut tree branches to set up the bonfire. We also used to collect wood by requesting from all the homes in the colony. We used to collect the wood in a secret place and then set up the kama dhahana (bonfire) on the festival day.
People also drink bhang, an alcoholic drink, during the festival. It is more prominent though in Northern India. But I remember one of friend drank bhang when we were in college and thought he was in a boat all day when actually he was in his bed. He was even rowing for some time of the day! (you know who you are if you are reading this).
Wish you all a very colourful Holi.
These are the pics of rainbow that I took using my mobile on my way to work.
3 comments:
Ha ha ha.. The bhang story was funny..
The funny story of bhang was indeed real. while eating it, I pretty much felt as if I did eat some chavanprash, but it had effect, hangover of which, lasted the whole week. I remember sitting in the class and having forgotten which was a previous period. I forgot about the stuff i did eat for lunch after 30 min. It was quite funny feeling, But not good feeling, when it lasts so long.
Yes, it is good fun for short time. There was someone else also who drang it along with you. I can't remember, was it Sandeep?
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