jenny b

India is a land of extremes. It’s showy and it’s kaleidoscopic. So it comes as no surprise that the celebration of holidays here is full on. Holi is a perfect example – a full moon festival of spring characterized by spiritual bonfires and throwing of colorful of paint and water. It’s a day where you start out looking like this:

And end up looking more like this:

Honestly, I was apprehensive about participating in the day; uncertain of how crazy and out of control the celebration was going to be. But Arjun convinced me that it was all good fun. And that the meat of it would be over quickly – the “playing” with water and toxic paint would only last a few short late morning hours and the rest of the day was just about chilling out, peacefully. Ok then. I’m in!

I threw my camera in a plastic bag and we headed out into the unknown – Arjun with a smile of familiar anticipation and Wendy and I with nervous chuckles and a few shakey ‘here we go’s.

What we found was quite a surprise. The city was shut down. Dead. Virtually every shop was closed and there was no traffic in the streets, save for a few motorbike passersby. The people we met along the way were friendly and jovial – inviting us to enjoy homemade sweets, after christening us with gentle paint streaks on our faces with friendly blessings of “Happy Holi!” Even the kids we encountered were pretty tame. No one threw water balloons at us. We were not pummeled with unwanted bombs of paint. It was actualy quite civil. And lovely.

We happily made our way over to Vidya Bhawan, a Seva volunteer dormitory not far from our house. What we found there was much more of what I was expecting – but more fun that I had anticipated. We romped around with Seva staff and other volunteers – painting faces, throwing paint and water, and dancing around like a bunch of wild monkeys. Great fun!

After several dousings of water, everyone retreated to the sun to warm up and laugh at themselves.

Quickly tired out, the three of us musketeers decided to pack it up and head home to get cleaned up. We were still pleasantly surprised to see how quiet the city was and ran into more celebratory folks along the way.

Just barely an hour after heading out, and 120 photos later, we were safe and sound at home, eager to see if we were going to be multi-colored for the rest of the week. After a good twenty minutes of good ‘ol fashioned elbow grease and exfoliating soap, I was amazed to come out of the shower mostly paint-free. He wasn’t kidding. Short, sweet and a colorfully good time. Happy Holi!