Holi, A Festival of Color!

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This article on Holi is late, but you know what? My community’s celebration of the festival is too. But it's for good reason, you see, because the city I live in here in the States has a somewhat moody temperament with regards to the weather, and this was a particularly pissed off winter. So, while India celebrated the arrival of their spring a few weeks ago (March 27th), we here in colder areas wait for it to hit the 70s before we can lionize the festival of colors in honor of the arrival of spring.

In general, Holi is a gala time in. Celebrated in India and the diaspora, the religious festival of colors is literally that: About using waterguns and waterballoons to wet and color people- your friends, or on the street. It's about making rangoli (intricate designs with colored powder) on your doorstep. People either wear new white clothes and have them splashed with color all day long or wear faded clothes they don't mind getting dirty. To walk on the street means you're fair game; Don't risk it if you're not ready. There is a special Holi drink too, it's called bhang and it's made from milk, ghee (clarified butter), spices, and….cannabis. It's really popular too, rumor has it an adult neighbor once tried it before she was aware of its ingredients, and apparently, she had a good Holi.

For me, living in India, the celebration climaxed in middle school. That was when the war was still playful, but had just begun to get personal. We used eggs, water guns, powder, balloons, mud – I remember one of the biggest games I ever played was against my neighbors when I lived by the sea in Bombay. There, when I looked like a brown canvas that a child had used to throw globfulls of paint at, there was always the warm sea to lay in, reveling in the day's victories. That fat water balloon full of purple color I threw stealthily from afar at a neighbor boy. He was impressed, too. And not that new “safe” vegetable color either; the original kind, the one that lasted on your ears and neck for weeks to come.

As to the religious background of Holi; it's a Hindu festival, and in part, celebrates Prahlada's salvation. This I remember well, curling up to my grandmother in her small bedroom under the gentle creaking of her ceiling fan, and requesting her to tell it for the two hundredth time. It’s my favorite story from the Bhagvada Purana: the story of Prahlada. In a previous avatar, the Lord Vishnu killed a monster. His brother, Hiranyakashipu, wanted to avenge his death and so prays to Lord Brahma vehemently in order to be granted a boon that may help him in this goal. When Lord Brahma answers his prayer, Hiranyakashipu asks for immortality. Brahma says he cannot grant this, but that Hiranyakashipu can ask for a death bound by conditions, which he asks for. His conditions were that death cannot be from the hands of a creature living or dead made by Brahma and cannot be by animal or man, inside or outside, on earth or in space.

With that, Hiranyakashipu sets out to find Vishnu. But Hiranyakashipu's son, Prahlad, is a devout follower of Vishnu, and believes him to be the center of the universe. So Hiranyakashipu turns his attention to Prahlad and tries to kill his own son; each time though, Prahlad is protected by Vishnu in his new avatar Narsimah, who finally descends to finish Hiranyakashipu. Keeping with Brahma's boon, Narsimah appears in the form of a half-lion-half-man, in the threshold of the house (neither inside nor outside), places the monster on his knee (neither on earth nor in space) and eviscerates him with a nail.

Holi, then, is about Prahlada's deliverance. It’s a wonderful and glorious celebration and will always be a favorite of mine.

-Nikhita Venkateish is a proud jumbler and a student at the University of Virginia who will be graduating in 2013 with a B.A. in Biology and minor in Media Studies. She plans to work in the Media/Communications field and is currently looking for entry level positions in that field as well as in Advertising. You can contact her at nv5bs@virginia.edu and find her resume on LinkedIn at this link: http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=230685366&trk=tab_pro