But Diwali is really about the light, not the sound. As Hinduism experts Julia Roberts and Barack Obama have pointed out, Diwali is, at its core, a celebration of the victory of light over darkness. In that spirit, I’m posting a few pictures from Diwali 2009. I was staying at a yoga ashram at the time, and the pictures are from a fire show put on by students there.

Actually, that’s not the whole story, ear-damage-wise. As Diwali approaches (Diwali being, ahem, another, even bigger festival, this one celebrating Ram’s return home from Ravan’s Lanka with wife Sita in tow), all the local kids are going wild with firecrackers. I’m pretty sure that kids all over the world and throughout history have enjoyed lighting things on fire and blowing things up. In my childhood, my moth-like attraction towards these activities was at least somewhat obstructed by stern adult disapproval. In India, no such barriers exist. Just today, I saw a mother eagerly applauding her young child as he lit a firecracker and threw it into the middle of our narrow lane.

Excuse me, back to Dussehra. It’s not just about exploding Ravans. In a manner typical of modern Hindu syncretism, Dussehra also marks the end of both the nine-day Navratri and the six-day Durga Puja, separate-but-linked celebrations of divine femininity. With all the testosterone in the air from the explosions and effigies, a bit of goddess worship is a welcome relief.

For me, celebrating Dussehra also meant experiencing, one again, the odd privilege of being a white guy in India. I’ve lived in India on and off for almost two years now, and sometimes I fool myself into thinking that I now fit in, but then I get reminders of my strange status here. This happened most strikingly when my parents were visiting back in 2008, and we were invited to a wedding in small-town Tamil Nadu. We did not know the bride and groom (we barely even knew our hosts in the town, but that’s another story), and yet – for reasons that are still unclear – we were made into the guests of honor, even being called up to cut the cake with the newly wed couple!

On Dussehra, I was out for a bike ride when I saw a huge Ravan effigy set up in a park. I stopped and asked a cop, in my best pidgin Hindi, when the burning would take place. The cop was one of several who were guarding a side gate to the park; the main entrance was through a large lot that had been converted into a festival fairground, complete with stage and many food stalls. After telling me that the burning would happen in about an hour, the cop asked if I would stay to see it.

“Sure,” I said, “But how do I get in? Do I have to go to that main entrance?”

“Well” – a glance at the gathering crowd at the side gate showed that the masses weren’t allow through here – “we could…”

After a brief talk with his superior, the cop ushered me through the side gate, into what was clearly a VIP area centered around the Ravan. A couple of people were setting up sound equipment, while well-heeled families sat in chairs set up in front of the effigy. Beyond the ropes, people milled around or sat down in the grass. I snapped a few photos, and realized there would be very few things to do for the next hour. When another cop told me that there would be a thirty-minute delay to the program, I decided to check out the fairground.

Here, it was much more packed and lively. I munched on some pani puri and aloo chaat and watched as kids dressed in ancient warrior costumes ran on and off the stage that had been set up.

Glancing at my watch, I decided to head into the park, this time through the main entrance. I joined the crowds, and realized I was now on the wrong side of the rope, if I wanted the prime view the VIP area afforded. As I walked away from the ropes, discouraged, one of the event organizers (I knew he was an event organizer because he had an important-looking badge) came up to me a gestured towards the VIP zone. I followed him, and he led me to the rope, lifted it up for me, and escorted me through. I couldn’t escape this special treatment even if I wanted to!

Ravan gets burned

The VIP area was filling up now, and I noticed that a couple other white folks had been herded in along with me. A makeshift podium had been set up, and community leaders were making speeches that, of course, I couldn’t understand. Then the costumed kids ran in and re-enacted the fight between Ram and Ravan, while the event organizers wandered around and gave flower garlands to special guests, myself included, of course.

But you already know the ending to this story: BANG!

, Ajmal Khan Road, Karol Bagh

Okay, folks, we’re back in business! The Commonwealth Games are over, the weather’s getting cooler, and the street vendors are returning to the city in droves. This means that the outdoor Monday markets or haats – which take advantage of the shuttered storefronts – are back in full swing, including the mother of all Monday markets: Karol Bagh.

If you are a Delhi-walla, or a very close reader of Lonely Planet India, you may be thinking: is Karol Bagh really off the tourist track? After all, the good ol’ LP identifies Karol Bagh as a prominent shopping area, describing it as a “middle-class market [that] sells competitively-priced consumer goods, from kidswear to kitchenware.” But it says that the market is open Tuesday through Sunday; it is pointing backpackers to the stores whose doors are most definitely shut on Mondays. So I maintain, accusations of hair-splitting be damned, that the Karol Bagh Monday market is indeed worthy of inclusion in this series.

When I first got off the Metro and started strolling down Ajmal Khan road, where the Monday market is centered, my first thought was, “Is this it? Is the haat really back?” It wasn’t packed, as I imagined it would be; really, it just seemed like a glorified version of my neighborhood Monday market, with its cheap plastic goods and clothes. But then I kept on walking – and walking, and walking – and I realized how enormous the market was, and what a wide variety of products were on offer. There were sandals:Jewelry:Shoes:Purses:(Slightly creepy) stuffed animals:Hats:Sari material:And white shirts, as modeled by their vendor. (I should add that this man posed for the picture, and approved of his stern expression when I showed him the shot.)Not pictured: suitcases, pirated DVDs and CDs, perfume, kurtas, winter coats, and much, much more.

And in additional to the roadside stalls, there were many roving salesmen, who would sidle up to me furtively, and say, in a mock-whisper, “Sunglasses? You want sunglasses?” When I said no, they would say, even more secretively, “Pen drive?” I never ascertained the reason for the salesmen’s hushed tones, but I suspect it may have something to do with the products’ not-entirely-white-market status.

How to get there: The market is just outside the Karol Bagh metro station; follow signs for Ajmal Khan road. If you’re technologically inclined, take a look at this map.

When to go: Monday (of course), pretty much all day.

Last minute clean-up before the Commonwealth Games

The Commonwealth Games are upon us. It should be a festive occasion, but instead Delhi seems oddly quiet. I live near one of the Games stadiums, and I’ve seen far more stern, gun-wielding policemen than enthusiastic athletes or fans. Street vendors and beggars have been kicked out of the city. Even stray dogs are being rounded up and carted away (to where and to what fate, I dare not ask). Delhi is trying its best to present a sanitized image of itself to the world, and, in the process, it’s losing its raucous charm.Foreign news groups aren’t fooled by this sleight-of-hand, but that’s largely because they are eagerly seeking whatever squalor they can find. While there are many valid criticisms of the Games – its environmental impact, its spiraling economic costs, its deleterious effect on Delhi’s citizens, especially the city’s poorest – most international news coverage prior to the Games focused instead on the “filthy” condition of Games’ facilities. “Oh, these developing countries,” was the tone of these media reports. “Can’t they do anything right?”

The pre-Games news coverage also played up the exoticism of the locale, with Reuters reporting on a snake found in the Commonwealth Games Village. To be fair, this story was not entirely a media creation; South Africa’s High Commissioner to India, apparently a master of hyperbole, called the snake – and the filth – “really a threat to the lives of our athletes.”

The well-staged opening ceremonies seem to have appeased the media gods. India is largely off the hook, as talk turns to medal counts and (non-Indian) doping scandals.

However, the condescension implicit in many articles on Delhi’s unhygienic conditions did make its way to the surface in an unbelievably immature TV segment. A New Zealand TV host – who has since been fired – giggles like a second-grader while repeating the Indian surname Dikshit, before saying, “And it’s so appropriate because she’s Indian.” Of course, the New York Times or the BBC would never make such insensitive and juvenile comments, but behind many of their stories lies the same sense of superiority.

It’s not all racism and superficiality from the media, though. I have to give props to my hometown newspaper, the Boston Globe, for publishing some stunning photos of the run-up to the Games. Yes, some stereotypes are there – the women in saris, the man on an elephant – but the photos also show both the grinding poverty and the flashy new appearance of the city. It’s the poverty that will live on long after the pomp of the Games has passed.

So back to the drawing board for Day 2 of our Week in Delhi.

In popular legend, Krishna is also known for his dalliances with women, which – to put it mildly – stray from the norms of brahmacharya. An academic article commenting on this proclivity uses the dry understatement typical of scholarly writing, alluding to “Krishna’s well-known conjugal pleasures with many women.” Of course, many Krishna devotees downplay these divine dalliances, or at least put a metaphorical and spiritual gloss on them.

Krishna is also known as the princely young god who offered advice, both military and spiritual, to Arjuna on the battlefield, as told in the Bhagavad Gita. (This is why the Hare Krishnas try to give you the Gita in airports.) It’s not just zealous Westerners who enjoy the Gita; it’s popular here in India too. The Gita has always been an important Indian text, but it became even more prominent during colonial times, when some Hindus – influenced by Western ideas of religion – starting emphasizing the importance of central religious texts.

Still, even with the popularity of the Gita here, Krishna is probably most celebrated not as the dispenser of cosmic wisdom, but as the god-child raised by foster parents in an idyllic pastoral setting. (Of course, as this childhood bleeds into young adulthood, his relationship with the gopis or milkmaids of the village become playful in a different way, wink wink, nudge nudge.) Since Krishna-the-child is so adored, his day of his birth is celebrated with great fervor.

- A article I wrote about the 2008 festival has finally found its way to online publication

- Some stunning pictures of the aftereffects of the festival are online here

Ganapati Bappa Moriya!

All-India Weather Report (Delhi on left)

From BBC’s Hindi website.

Many scholars, particularly Indian scholars, hate this picture of India. And with good reason. The British used the stereotype of the religious (and therefore quite irrational) Indian in order to justify colonial rule. The superstitious, God-obsessed natives clearly could not run an effective government, said the Brits; we’re doing them a service by running one for them. Of course, the British conveniently ignored or marginalized India’s rich scientific, philosophical and political traditions.

Nobel-Prize winning economist Amarya Sen argues that the modern-day Hindu right is embracing the same dubious stereotyping once employed by the British, again emphasizing the religion nature of the subcontinent. Sen fights back by bringing to light India’s long history of intellectual exchange and public debate. He is just one of many highly-respected thinkers to decry the stereotype of a Mystical India.

Mosque at Kovalam Beach (Kerala)

And yet for a casual traveler touring India, the stereotype is likely to be reinforced, and not just because tour companies have decided that “Mystical India” sells. Hindu temples (and, depending on the area, mosques or churches or synagogues) dot the landscape. Evening puja (worship), with the accompanying chanting and candle-lighting, is a common sight. Public buses have stickers of Hindu gods affixed over the windshield. India is surely not a one-dimensional country, and it does have vibrant argumentative traditions; but in the public space, religion is still omnipresent.

Vivekananda Memorial (Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu)

And now, with holiday season upon us once again, festival after festival brings religious celebration to the fore. I’m having a hard time keeping up with all the holidays. Just as I started writing my blog post about Krishna’s birthday (which will be up soon, I swear), I found myself joining in celebrations for Eid, the Muslim festival marking the end of Ramadan. And the first day of Eid also marked the beginning of Ganesh’s birthday festival. Although the Ganesh festivals aren’t as big in Delhi as they are in my old home base of Pune, I’ve already seen one huge Ganesh shrine erected in my neighborhood.

So, while, in my head, I know better, I continue to wander the streets and soak in India’s religious splendor.

Shuttered Storefronts

It’s about time I put up my Monday entry for the “Week in Delhi” project. This is proving to be easier said than done, because Delhi largely shuts down on Monday. Most of the markets are closed, as are other promising destinations like museums, libraries and monuments.

Many itinerant merchants take advantage of this lull and set up their mobile shops in front of the more permanent (but temporarily shuttered) ones. This happens all over Delhi, including in my neighborhood: when the Kamla Nagar market shuts down, the nearby Ghanta Ghar Monday Market springs to life. Here, a stone’s throw from my flat, I can find a wide variety of super-cheap clothes, from plain white T-shirts to garish bellbottoms. While I try to find a Monday event for the Week in Delhi (which will likely be one of the grander of the roadside Monday markets), enjoy these pictures from my neighborhood.