Saturday, October 21, 2006

My Japan Deepavali [Diwali]

In spite of the entire Indian community celebrating Deepavali in various locations of India, Deepavali turns out be a dream for me today. I see no deepavali lights, no sound of crackers , no kids wearing new dresses, and no oil bath in the morning . As my family is about 8000 kms away, this day turns out to be a very stressful day to me in Japan.

As usual I see the arrays of tube lights on the ceiling here but I dont see any symptoms of Deepavali anywhere nearby. I searched my friend Google for any possible celebration of Deepavali with Indian friends,but no luck awaited me there. Those links which came as result of my Google search showed me some sites claiming that Deepavali is widely celebrated by Indian community in Japan. But the truth is directly opposite, and have found no one doing it here. These companies publish it for getting hits on search engine results and for getting more monetory benefits ,but it’s not the real message. They anyway need people to pass through their website to do some commercial transaction or at least to read those unfair truths.

With Deepavali falling on a Saturday, I decided to at least do some basics of Deepavali celebrations here myself. I took oil bath in the early morning and this made me a bit happy because I was the one who seen the deepavali first in the world this time, as I stay in the land of sunrise. Though I could have purchased some new dress to wear today, my mind was not in sync as I’m suffering this day without my kids .So didn’t buy new cloths. My soul urged me to go along with some “thavam” [A kind of prayer, keeping your eyes closed in a sitting position in the east direction and think of a god you like, probably you can say “OM” continuously inside your mind], so to get rid of my mental depression I was doing it for some time. Actually the word OM has real power [No religious tags, but the word scientifically], it gives an unwarranted peace to your mind while you were stressed. Most of the Hindu religious activities are proven with some kind of advantages with the human and his health. [Hey, Don't mistake me, I'm not a missionary. It's just what I felt can share here with you]

Later in this afternoon, I will cook some food in a traditional way but as I dont have any guest to honor I have decided to treat my roommate as my guest today. Just thinking of further activity, probably I will go out to look at the Tokyo tower and its illumination in this evening. That may compensate my mind's expectations of the luminous night sky of Deepavali day in India.
As many of us lived in a heavenly place called India, celebrating series of festival almost every month, we definitely miss those activities outside our country.
  • Our festivals bring us together closer making relationships more valuable
  • Our festivals make our day happy sharing those sweets and snacks
  • Our festivals make the kids learn another generation of our culture
  • Our festivals bring new ideas
  • Our festivals make poor people happy
  • Our festivals make human to know the Mother Nature

I think these are the things you won’t get outside our country and for any amount of money. These are the things which put a rhythm of life in your mind which no other country can give you or feel themselves. I hope to be enjoy next year's deepavali , for which the countdown has been already started in my internals and looking forward to a happy Deepavali with my family.

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