abroad, who spend lakhs of rupees just to
children will learn about it. Besides, it
come here to be with us for two or
gives us peace and fulfilment, especially
three days.”
as I have seen my mother doing these rituals regularly. We also get to
ARJUN DOGRA
“Celebrating a festival is the only way our
Shanthi Ramkumar is appreciative of her friend who hosts a pooja called Kedar
meet relatives.” Today, there are smaller families, and hence fewer relatives, who are all geographically distributed across the country and the world. Some families still make the effort to come together for a festival. Sahar S believes that the two Eids are occasions for people to come together. “My parents made sure we all got together on these two occasions, so that I established good relations with my cousins. Our family has grown to almost three hundred people. My daughter gets a chance to meet her first cousins, second cousins and third cousins. I appreciate
Gowri, usually on the evening of Deepavali. “She invites all her friends, along with their spouses, to visit her for at least ten minutes. If we time our arrival together, then in this small get-together, our respective husbands also get to meet and interact,” Shanthi says.
festivities and the child
Five year old Niya offers daily prayers with her mother
“Putting up the Christmas tree is a family activity”, says Raji Monisha Cherian.
wearing a sari they say that they want a
“Each one of us adds our own touch. The
pavadai set. They help with the setting up of kolu (the traditional doll exhibition at home). My older daughter gets very excited and keeps asking when each festival would come.
biggest association for my son Advait, is the gifts. Till he was seven years old, Advait believed in Santa Claus. It gave my
those people in our family who live
husband and me great pleasure in hiding
Sriya and Pranaya Srikanth
magically under the tree. When Advait
the gifts and making them appear was seven, he watched the movie, Polar
Express and got to know that Santa was a myth. Now he is fifteen, but when we meet Santa at Spencer Plaza and at the Church, he still takes great delight in shaking hands with him.”
Ishita Sharma says, “I have been married for twenty seven years. When it comes to Deepavali, we go to my in-laws’ house for lunch. Until seven years ago, when both my parents were alive, we used to have dinner at their place. From the time my daughters were in Class 9, it became an occasion for them to wear a sari and get a
Priya Srikanth says, “My girls are very
family picture taken. You never know who
traditional. The moment they see me
will not be there next year, especially when you have elderly people around.” For Nithya Madhavan, Navaratri is the
in the workplace
occasion when she can try out a new recipe for one sweet and one savoury. It is
Karthika Venkatraman works in an IT company and believes that thanks to the hours
also the time when she gets to dress her
they work, celebrating a festival has become optional. She says, “We are working on
daughter in traditional clothes against her
a project based in the UK and their festivals are different from ours. So, if it is not a
usual attire of jeans. “My mother-in-law
holiday in the UK, you may not get a day off here. I believe that even our festivals
gifted my daughter with a pavadai for
should be celebrated. The least that can be done is the ‘traditional’ day that we have
Deepavali. She wore it on that one day,
every year at office, be celebrated on a festival day.”
but the rest of the time, it is lying in the
Dona Konidena has more to say about her workplace in telecom some years ago, in
cupboard. I tell her that this is also our
India. “We would ask colleagues visiting Kerala to bring us gold bordered saris, for our office activity on Onam so we would be dressed appropriately. For Sankaranthi Pongal, we would fly kites and there would also be Rangoli drawing. I was in the Aahaar (food) committee and our responsibility was that during festivals like
dress and she should wear it occasionally, at least once in 2 months,” she says.
the nri factor
Baisakhi, there would have to be one Punjabi food speciality so that people know
Aparna Rao was in for a serious case of
about the food that is special in that particular community.”
culture shock when she moved to 8
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