ganpati festival in colony part II

Well, initial preparations were over, and the Ganpati idol arrived the next day. It was actually sponsored by one of the residents. A priest was invited to perform the installation and puja thereafter.

Everyday for the next 9 days pujas and aarthi was performed by the ladies predominently.11 am and 6 pm were the puja timings and strictly adheared to. There were enough volunteers for preparing 'prasad'. We had a taste of 'kesari' the most 'unifying' dish in India! Evening bhajan times had better turn out than the morning, obviously. Jai jagadeesahare was the common theme song.We had very good singers from Kolkatta, Bihar, Jharkhand, Karnataka, TamilNadu, Andhra,Punjab and almost every other state. Of course lots of jostling for 'state representations' had to happen! The religious fervour of the young ladies here is what appealed to me most. They took great pains to prepare for the puja deligently twice a day for all the days. A very devout elderly couple performed the lead role on every occasion. God bless them. The ' prasad time' at the end of the pooja was the great networking time. I for one was slowly able to connect their names, with the flat nos. Oh 'flat number"' is the equivalent of a 'employee id' here in the colony.Without that you are a nobody!. I took a note book and kept it near the prasad counter and requested the ladies to mark their flat nos, against their names.Some of them were very suspicious, I had to assuage them that it is meant for jogging my memory and will not be 'misused".Now I can connect faces with names and flat nos to about 15 ladies!

On saturday grand sports competitions were planned. Right from 10 am there was a steady stream of players making a beeline to the sports hall. TT had the maximum participation from the men and hence had to continue on Sunday also. Carrom and chess also had good participation from ladies and children. Invariably there were rescheduling and cancelling of nominations, as the residents came out with myriad excuses and entreaties for change in time and date. I heard from many a participant that they are taking up the sport which used to be their passion, after a very long gap. One could see the pleasure and anticipation in every one of them.

There was a dance programme by the small girls and they made a pretty picture with twirling umbrellas and glittering costumes and smiling faces.

While we were waiting for the girls to come on stage, there was a "commercial break" of lemon and spoon race. It was really hilarious and a tremendous 'ice breaker". There were several participants who were so keen on running and hitting the goal post, that they never saw their lemon falling off the instant they took their first surge forward. The mothers were very keen that their wards make a good show of themselves, so were giving them all precautions and procedures.The ladies event was also good fun, with most of them hitting the final line with their spoons and lemon intact. "Yes, women are quite balanced!"

This brought the curtain down as far as the activities were concerned and all eyes were on the 'visarjan'