The festive atmosphere

One of the bitter part of  celebrating  festivals (like Dashain) in a foreign country is that you don’t have any holiday atmosphere to go along with your rituals. As soon as you get out of your or your friend/relative’s house, it is business as usual. There is no festive environment, forget the holidays; it is like celebrating the festival in isolation and in patches. If I have to remember Dashain in Nepal at this moment, I would say: rituals for ghatasthapana, flying kites, fifteen days or month-long holiday, empty streets of Kathmandu, good food, my parents always buying the exact same cloths for me and my brother, fulpati rituals, astami, nawami, tika and blessing from elders, etc. Things that we took for granted or overlooked in Nepal are sorely missed here; the religious and cultural significance of a certain festivities is not complete without the festive atmosphere that precedes them.

As I mentioned in one of my previous post, we not only celebrate our own festivals here but are also culturally involved in the local festivals. We do get holidays for those, but the festive atmosphere encourages us to enjoy the culture even more. For example in Christmas, for weeks, there would be lighting and christmas carol everywhere you go, people everywhere seem happy and cheerful.  Regardless of your religion, creed, or faith; I believe all the religious holidays are meant to be celebrated among families and friends. People everywhere sparing some time to get together and have fun. I tend to celebrate them all, as a means of getting together with friends and family, even if that’s not always economically viable

Merry christmas to all of you.

Following are the few pictures I took around my neighborhood (you can click on them to enlarge).