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From Caru dasa
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The Krishna Temple at 8628 S State St in Spanish Fork invites everyone to come celebrate Deewali on Sat. Nov 2 from 6 pm: classical and folk dancing, live music, drama, ceremony of lights, huge vegetarian feast, and offering of respects to a live cow.
The Indian New Year is traditionally heralded with the Festival of Lights (Deepa means "lights"). Households put lamps in every window, and temples brightly illuminate altars to bring in the best for the upcoming year. Also, the date of the festival coincides with the return of the avatar of God, Sri Rama, to His ancestral kingdom after an exile of 14 years and many adventures. All the citizens welcomed Ramas return home by brightening up the entire city of Ayodhya and setting off fireworks.
The New Year occurs during the lull between fall harvests and the onset of the monsoons. Thus it is a time of thanksgiving, and that corollary festival is called Anna Kuta (literally, "Heaps of Food"). Lord Krishna inaugurated this festival by inspiring the inhabitants of His village (Vrndavan) to worship the cows on this one day per year and to prepare a huge celebratory feast consisting of no less than 108 preparations.
Observing the above traditions, the schedule of events for this dual celebration is as follows:
6:00 pm Fire Sacrifice: grains, seeds, etc from the creation of the Lord are offered back to Him through the medium of fire. Very colorful.
6:30 pm Govardhan Puja: Krishna once lifted a mountain named Govardhan and used it as an umbrella to protect His devotees from a devastating rainfall sent by Indra the king of heaven. This pastime is commemorated by circumambulating a large hill made from a sweet called halava and decorated with other sweets, savories, plastic cows, jelly-bean rocks, broccoli-spear trees, green-coconut grass, etc.
7:00 pm Comedy: Count Dracula Gets the Straight Sauce
7:15 pm Classical Indian dance performance (Oddissi) by Saranya Mukhadhyay and Mollika Roy, premier students of the Nandita Behara School of Dance of Los Angeles, California.
7:45 pm Anna Kuta & Arotik Ceremony: Lights in the temple room are turned down and the altar area is opened dramatically to the sounds of conch shells being blown and gongs sounding, to reveal a food extravaganza of 108 preparations offered to the Deities. The whole show is illuminated by flashing colored lights and dozens of votive candles.
8:00 pm Worship of a live cow with flower garlands and sweets: Indian culture is that instead of killing the cows for 700 lbs. of their meat, they are respected for producing an average of 90,000 lbs. of nutritional wholesome milk in a lifetime. And because we all drink the milk of a cow in our infancy, the cow is regarded as a sort of mother.
8:20 pm Ras Garba: Indian Folk Dancing (easy for anybody to learn in minutes)
8:30 pm Huge Vegetarian Feast served downstairs while dancing goes on upstairs. $5.00 donation per plate. Samosa, pakora, rasgula, saag paneer, puri, sandesh, halava, papadam, khir, matar paneer, alou gobi sabji, kofta, malpura, gulabjamun, and on and on. Bring a preparation if you can to augment the feast.
© CHAKRA 12 October 2002
