I am told that there is a festival in some part of India for every single day of the year. This was particularly evident and annoying after we left Madurai and arrived at our hotel in Cochin at 4:30am only to be greeted by non-stop fireworks for the next 8 hours as we tried to sleep. For the record, I hate fireworks! I digress. The reason why I am writing this post is because of Pongal, a festival celebrated in Tamil Nadu (the state Madurai is in).
Pongal is the rough equivalent of our Thanksgiving. It is a harvest festival. It is a way of celebrating the sun god. During Pongal they make a dessert called pongal made with sugar, butter, rice and coconut. It is a bit like a coconut rice pudding. On the morning of Pongal the women decorate their doorsteps with these beautiful chalk designs called rangoli.
Pongal is actually a multi-day festival but the eye hospital was only closed for one day. On that day we celebrated Pongal with Ted and “his kids.” Ted is an American, born to missionary parents who spent part of his childhood in Indian. As an adult he returned to Indian and started this program called S.E.E.D. (which stands for something, I can’t remember what) that supports children from the slums and allows them to go to college.
We went to some village outside of Madurai where the kids made a fire and cooked pongal. They served the pongal to us on banana leaves. We played games and ate lots of sugar cane…yum!
Pongal is the rough equivalent of our Thanksgiving. It is a harvest festival. It is a way of celebrating the sun god. During Pongal they make a dessert called pongal made with sugar, butter, rice and coconut. It is a bit like a coconut rice pudding. On the morning of Pongal the women decorate their doorsteps with these beautiful chalk designs called rangoli.
Pongal is actually a multi-day festival but the eye hospital was only closed for one day. On that day we celebrated Pongal with Ted and “his kids.” Ted is an American, born to missionary parents who spent part of his childhood in Indian. As an adult he returned to Indian and started this program called S.E.E.D. (which stands for something, I can’t remember what) that supports children from the slums and allows them to go to college.
We went to some village outside of Madurai where the kids made a fire and cooked pongal. They served the pongal to us on banana leaves. We played games and ate lots of sugar cane…yum!
*I will post pictures later. It takes forever to upload from these internet cafes. Boy do I miss high speed internet!!! I never thought I would say this but I actually miss Comcast!
3 comments:
Those are pretty! I've read your last few entries and will read the rest tomorrow during work. It looks as though you're having a wonderful "experience" - good for you! Stay safe and well and please bring me back some Indian fabric. Seriously - I'm not joking. Get me a scarf or shawl or something and I'll pay you back... you're going to Black Alumni weekend, right?
No problem! Though, reading that post now I realize that none of those events actually happened in the order in which I thought they would haha, but it all worked out and everything got done. It was a great trip, and it's nice to know that I hold the record in terms of graduation attendance. Go Team Yati!
PS-- your friend Tanyetta is hilarious!
Nice post.
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