Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Dipawali Then, Dipawali Now.

As a kid I loved 'Dipawali'. A festival on which we were pulled out of our beds at 5 am in the morning, our mother used to apply warm oil on our scalp ... give us a relaxing shikakai bath and feed us lots of delicious food. Dipawali meant oil bath, wearing new frocks and bursting sparklers and crackers. How I loved lights, lamps on our compound wall in Hunsur (near Mysore) and Shimoga.

I still remember how myself and sister Teju used to freak out with very sight of seeing lots of paper scrap in front of our house ... for us, it meant others are seeing how many crackers we have burnt. If we were disappointed, we would actually roll news paper, cut them and throw them in front of our house. As I remember those moments, I instantly get a smile on my face.

When we were in Tumkur ... we would wait for Seema (who was studying MBBS then ... staying in a hostel) ... as only she could get Rs 100 from Daddy for our crackers shopping. We would get handful for each of us, how can I forget how we used to sun dry them on terrace so that it results with effect.

Ofcourse we would suffer seeing our dogs (Tiggy and Twinky) suffer ... our cats would get so scared too. But then somehow I still loved Dipawali.

Today ... Dipawali means nothing but a few SMS wishes, couple of new sarees, trip to sacred land of Mantralaya and a holiday at home listening to unwanted sound of crackers and cribbing about air pollution.

How strange! A girl who once dreamt of buying 'only crackers' for her entire salary or atleast for Rs. 1000 does not even buy a sparkler for Rs. 100. Do we really change so much? Or is it a sign of growing up? Or is it our care and concern for animals?

Lots of difference between my Dipawali then and my Dipawali now ...