Divali

Saturday was a public holiday – Divali, the Hindu festival of light. It’s a huge celebration here as there is a large Indian population and we joined a group going to the village of Felicity in the central plains area of the island to check it all out. It was great to have a break from the work and change of scene.

We were invited to a temple where we were treated to dancers and Tassa drummers. After a delicious meal served on banana leaves, we explored all the streets of the village. Bamboo is used to create arches and huge sculptures of Ganesh, cobras etc. They take gloopy mud and stick little clay oil lamps along the constructions to light them up. Bamboo arches across the roads, strung with lanterns, had oil lamps inside. Prayer flags and millions of lights adorn all the houses and gardens. The villagers were dressed up in glittering saris and elaborate brocade kurtas; they generously plied us bags of traditional sweets and other gifts as we walked past. Alarmingly there were firecrackers going off everywhere and home-constructed fireworks of bamboo and kerosene.