A not so holy Holi!

Pooja, Manish, Chakori and I, after a colrful day!

The 20th was Holi, the Hindu festival of good vanquishing evil and the coming of spring. But of course it's not that boring:

Pooja told me that for Holi we were going to have a small party at the house. 20 to 30 people she told me, she made it sound almost mellow. So, the day before she had some people come and set up a big tent and brought 20 or so plastic chairs. We also rented a couple of speakers and set them up in the yard. The day before Holi Pooja's sister and her husband arrived to celebrate with us.
I woke up and everything began normally. We had breakfast together and everyone put on some old clothes. Manish gave me one of his old shirts to wear since I ahve only three. We ate breakfast and then around 8:30 we "Happy Holi'd" each other: We smeared scented colors on each others face. The colors represent different aspects of life and well, it means we all get healthy dosings of each. By putting the colors on each other we are wishing for those attributes to come in that persons life during the next year. After we preformed the Holi rites within the family it was time to do the family rounds. I live in a community of upper class Indians called Kewal Vihar, Manish's family all live in the community or on the street across the way. Really, every house on that street is family! Manish told me that's 105 people, it's a big family, needless to say I've forgotten all of their names and fall back on "uncle" and "aunt."
We went across the main road to the street that's all family and began the rounds of "Happy Holing" the whole extended family. Every house we went to it was the same ritual "HAPPY HOLI," we'd shout and then take turns smearing colors on everyone's faces and embrace. After that the hosts of house that we were visiting would offer us food to which everyone in our party would flat out refuse. Me being the double guest, guest of the guest, would have to eat something. I would try to get away with a grape or something small. By now I've figured out how to battle Indian hospitality, refuse everything at first otherwise they'll pile food on you like you won't believe. We went to all the houses repeating the same ritual. At this point Holi was pretty mellow. At one house Manish asked for beer and we drank up. Beer for breakfast! Then things began to get interesting because the cousins showed up, squirt guns and water balloons in hand. The fun began, we continued the rounds, but now the game became a little bit more savage. People on rooftops were shooting colored water from the Indian version of dipsticks. I duked it out with the cousins, buckets of water became the ultimate weapon. We finished "Happy Holing" the family and returned to the house. I was at the wet stage now.
Across the street lives another relative, we went there, it was a real party. There is a girls hostel next door to my house, the girls are from different parts of India living there and studying in Dehradun's many high schools. They were there, as well as more family. The speakers were on full blast from the house, they were dancing and cousins were running about dousing each other with water. As soon as I arrived Manish's aunt, who was an absolute doll when I met her, slowly got up out of her chair, gave me another dose of color along with a hug and proffered more food.
When I went and met her the first time she told me that I looked just like Jesus, when I had a beard I can kinda understand the resemblance, because of my blue eyes. She told me that she doesn't like meeting people anymore because she is always gets attached and gets sad when they leave. She used to be a teacher at one of the most prestigious schools here and has had many foreign friends. When I told her that Lassi is my favorite food she promised me that next time I come she'll make me a Lassi! She's a really sweet lady.
Holi started to get savage, I was getting attacked from all angles by the cousins so I took extreme measures, I wrenched a bucket from the hands of a cousin and put myself right in the middle of the water feature. A small pool with a waterfall. I doused everyone who came within bucket striking distance for about 5 minutes. The cousins were helpless with my superior firepower. I ruled the scene until another bucket was found and people got smart and started filling up at the other pond. I gave up my post in the pool and dumped a bucket of water on Manish's head.
It was dancing time! I danced with Chakori (Pooja's daughter), cousins and the hostel girls. All was great until and uncle came up behind me and grabbed me, this was the beginning of the end. Cousins started jumping on me, even as I wiggles and squirmed they pushed me into the lake of mud that the lawn had become. I held off the onslaught for a few moments, but in the end it's hard to beat 20 something happy Indians determined to shove you into the mud. I went face first, I tried to keep my head up but they splashed muddy water in my face an stood on my back... haha... not. I got up, grabbed my uncle and tossed him into the mud, and a cousin before and aunt told me to stop... doesn't seem fair does it? I took a bucket of water on the head to get the muck off, one of my earings were missing. I checked the muck with no avail, I still have one though :D I went back to my house and quickly made another out of bamboo, it was a good idea because now it's stained purple.
Back at the festivities the same uncle who tossed me into the muck handed me a glass of something. I get handed glasses of something all the time, you have to be careful with drinks here unless you like drinking odd, salty, different masala flavored drinks. I love the Indian spices, just not so much in water, it's a real aquired taste. For Holi they make a salty, masala flavored carrot drink that has herbs in it to aid in digestion. I knew it was safe though because I've gotten my colors down, it was flavored with makhania, a super yummy spice, and sweet. I drank it thinking to myself, finally something cold and refreshing, that didn't have carrots floating in it. I poured my second glass and was drinking it when a cousin ran over to me and said, "Stop! It's bhang!" Great, so the yummy drink has marijuana in it. Thanks for telling me uncle!
I hopped from one side of the street to the next, helping on our side and dancing at the other. At some point the party shifted and we got to bump our speakers full blast as everyone was dancing to bollywood hits.I had a dance off with Chakori to a song, she beat me with all music video moves. The hostel girls were all milling around the snack table not dancing, and having learned from the best, I walked over and yelled at the top of my lungs, "Kao, Kao, Pio, Pio!" Which is the the command, "eat, eat, drink, drink!" Needless to say, with one of the hosts bellowing at them they did just that. I went to Pooja and told her what I did, we laughed because I'm always making fun of her for telling me and everyone else to eat. I played Indian host to the best of my abilities!
There was still a party on the other side of the street I made the fatal mistake of going over, only to meet some more cousins who earlier had been so nice and formal with me, they decided that the perfect way to introduce me to holi was by taking mud and shoving it directly in my face and then throwing me into the mud puddle, and of course making sure that I stayed there for some time. I managed to get up with a smile on my face, "Don't worry, it's Holi," running through my head. I went to get them back and one by one drop them in the mud, but my aunt stopped me for a second time... really!?
At some point the party died, the girls went next door and all the family exited. Pooja, Manish, Chakori, my aunt and uncle, and I were left standing alone in the trashed yard. We quickly talked it out and decided that we weren't done, plans had changed, we had to party hop. A couple quick calls and we located where the party was! It was a block party! Manish and I walked and everyone else drove the distance, we arrived when they were exiting the car... The party was still going on but at this point almost every time someone got a bucket on their head someone else would shout, "Would you stop already!" The water and colors slowly wound down as people were getting hungry. Pooja signaled to me it was time to set up for lunch. I jogged back to the house with a cousin to help. We set everything up just in time for the hungry family to devour the monsterous pot of rice, some bright yellow and totally yummy Holi curry and Goat.
It was a feast, I ate tons while chatting with different people. I asked a family friend directly why they spoke in English rather than Hindi, she told me that English was no longer "English" and was a universal language, thus it binds nations and India together because not all Indians speak Hindi. She also told me that she personally spoke English around me so that I wouldn't feel left out! I asked her if we could speak in Hindi and we did. People slowly trickled away and a few latecomers arrived. Each time we repeated the "Happy Holi" with everyone who came. At about 3 PM our last guest left and everyone went upstairs to sleep I helped clean up a little bit and then went outside to sit.
Sitting, the first thing I noticed was how quiet everything was, I couldn't hear a single human sound. It was like the whole city was in the midst of a huge sigh of joy for a day spent to the fullest. It was the quietest I've ever heard India, really everything was silent. All the festivities had ended and everyone was home, sleeping off their bursting bellies and hangovers. It didn't take long for me to find out what made this day so special, everyone had a good time. Bar none everybody let go of their worries for a little while and just had a blast. I received more hugs in one day then I've gotten in all of India, I'm hug deficient. The barriers that exist between the sexes, ages and social positions were broken. India never ceases to amaze, I had a block party with my adopted family! All the formalities that we go through every time we've met before were thrown out the window, what I thought would be a relatively mild Holi turned out to be a full on block party that included the whole city! We stayed within our bubble of family and friends, but all over the same thing was happening. Woohoo! It was a day for the books!

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You can see all my pictures at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alexlandt/