The Festival of Lights...

The Festival of Lights...

At the beginning of November, we celebrated Diwali, or the Festival of Lights. Now you're probably asking yourself what is Diwali? Or why do people celebrate Diwali? The answer to that is simple.

Diwali is a Hindu festival, and in a multicultural country like Canada it becomes one of utmost importance, especially to people who grew up celebrating the festival. It's essentially a five-day festival, but that's not the way I celebrated it. Of course, the prime reason for that is largely the fact that I'm not a Hindu, but as a child growing up in India, the lights fascinated me.

Typically, in the area I grew up, families lit their homes (hence the term "Festival of Lights") and exchanged sweets with one another. Diwali doesn't occur on a fixed day, just like most Indian festivals. In the Gregorian calendar, Diwali typically falls between mid-October and mid- November. Diwali is an official holiday in a number of Asian countries: India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Malaysia, Singapore as well as other countries like Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago as well as Suriname.

Diwali is by no means a public holiday in Canada, so if you're someone who celebrated the festival, you still had to go to school or to work that day, even if you didn't feel like it. You also saw how large department store flyers tend to advertise Diwali shopping and it's all part of multiculturalism.

So what do people do on Diwali in Canada? Many Canadians do celebrate the festival, which also attracts plenty of media and public attention. Various community groups, businesses, schools and associations celebrate Diwali each year, largely due to the number of employees that might celebrate the festival.

Victoria Park in London saw a near traditional celebration. Besides fireworks on November 17 (which happened to be the official date for the festival in 2012) the place saw Lakshmi puja, bhajans (Indian devotional songs), a quiz on Ramayan (one of the great epics on India), music, entertainment, dancing and celebration by Hindus and non-Hindus alike.

But now here comes my favourite part. What would I do on Diwali growing up? For me the festival largely involved buying tons of fireworks. Huge sales (or "melas," as we called it back home) would sprout up in numerous locations and they were always buzzing with life. Returning home with stacks of fireworks, it was time to move the vehicles into the garages, leaving plenty of space on the roads and on our driveways as we'd take turns, family and friends included, to light those fireworks, each of us full of such passion and enthusiasm. And when we were done burning about a thousand rupees' worth of crackers (About $17 to $19), we'd take turns scrubbing gunpowder and smoke off our skins before gleefully hogging sweets as if there were a shortage coming.

I miss that here, and I won't lie. I'm scared at times that lighting a firecracker would land me a ticket of some sort. The festival is monitored strictly for obvious reasons: the noise, the risk of fires and the very rare chance of a stray firework. But all that said and done, that won't stop me from heading out and picking up a few sweets, even if I have to eat them myself. I may not be celebrating the festival in the true sense, but look at it this way: the world is a global village, and if it's not me celebrating, then someone else definitely is.

Here's hoping everyone had a safe and happy Diwali.

Image Credit::http://www.stow.ac.uk/media/diwali.gif