Happy Pongal from India! This blog is being submitted by Kate Stange. Our last few days at the school found us participating in several holiday festivities.. While at the school Sarah has been very kind to us, including us in several rituals and treating us as guests of honor. Pongal is a very large, three day festival that consists of various activities all celebrating the harvest.
Of the four big events that we experienced the first event was most colorful. The members of the school drew elaborate patterns on the ground with chalk, and each student or professor split up and helped fill them in with water and several colored salts. Everyone was in high spririts and we enjoyed the extra time with the teachers and other staff members. These designs commonly appear in from of homes throughout the festival, and we saw them all over the city.
The next event we attended was the inauguration of a meditation room in the school. The professors lit a special lamp during the ceremony complete with the cutting of a garland. Professor Ludy broke open a coconut on a rock on the first try and offered it in thanksgiving to one of the Hindu Gods. We were all very honored that we were asked to participate.
The third event was a ceremony that consisted of each member of the group blessing children. We were each given a handful of flowers and then placed these on the heads of the children. It was amazing that the parents felt honored to have us bless their children when they had just met us. After this we participated in a dance with several girls wearing beautiful sarees. They twirled around and many of them shimmered in the night. It was truly breathtaking.
The final event was a series of dances performed by the staff of the school.. The traditional India folk dances were amazing! They also did a fashion show and showed off their beautiful sarees. As part of this event the BVU group participated with the cultural exchange by performing an American Square Dance, singing the BVU School Song, and then singing the Indian National Anthem, all of which we learned and practiced on the roof of the school in the evenings! The entire crowd stood and joined in on the anthem and it was a wonderful shared experience. In the upcoming days we will be on the tour portion of our trip, starting in Hyderabad, but we have definitely been fortunate to have the wonderful experiences at Lebenshilfe School, and we will miss all of our new friends!
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