This blog post is going to be a little bit different. Hi, I’m back! School has been pretty hectic but I wanted to find time to just sit down drinking Chai and write a blog post. Since I haven’t traveled anywhere, I decided to write about a past event that took place September 19 – September 29. All of the pictures are not mine but taken by my parent’s friend who is quite literally a professional photographer. The pictures are a little blurry though because I sent these from my phone to my laptop.

What is Ganesha Chaturthi?

So basically Ganesha Chaturthi is a Hindu holiday that we Hindus celebrate to praise Lord Ganesha, the god of wisdom, beginnings, prosperity, and obstacles. We celebrate this week to earn his blessings of wisdom so we can apply them to our school and work. So why a ten day holiday? It’s believed on the first day that Lord Ganesha is visiting all of his devotees, therefore on day one we welcome him into our homes and Ganesha models are placed around the house, or public spaces. Day 2-9 are all about prayers, on these days I visited multiple peoples houses to do pooja (prayers). Many people are invited to these pooja sessions hosted in others houses. For the ones I attended, it was all hosted and attended by Marathi people (individuals residing from Maharashtra) that my parents are familiar with. Which is easier because we all speak the same language. Now the 10th day is super important, it’s the day we bid Lord Ganesha on his way by bringing him into large bodies of water to help him on his journey. Ganesha Chaturthi is just one of all the celebrations hosted for gods and goddesses. Some people might recognize the holiday Diwali, this day is celebrated to remember the story of the Ramayana where Lord Rama returned to his Kingdom after defeating a demon named Ravana. Diwali is coming up and I will make sure to blog my experience like I did for Ganesha Chaturthi.

How did my Ganesha go?

September 22 I headed over to the temple with my family, it was around afternoon. Since weekdays everyone has work and school and we can’t really skip that for a holiday not really celebrated in America, that’s why the weekend is when we did our aarti (type of pooja involving a lit candle) and pooja. There are three religious songs we sang for Ganesha and then afterwards gave our blessings and flowers to the god. Before singing the religious songs, two of the priests, or whoever volunteered will say all 100 names of Lord Ganesha through song. We do this to honor all of the aspects of the wise god.

The reason it looks so space themed is because India successfully sent Chandrayaan-3 to the moon! Since Lord Ganesha also known as Ganapati is the deity of wisdom, the priest wanted to share acknowledge the wisdom used to get the rover on the moon.

This is a photo of someone doing aarti, see the candle? In a circular motion we wave it around the one we are honoring, so aarti isn’t just for praying, but for functions as well. Such as weddings, welcoming someone home, and more. The light is supposed to get rid of the darkness as us followers become more engaged in this divine deity.

After we finish offering our flowers and giving respect to the supreme being, each individual gets something called prasad, which is food we offered to the deity. We also get something out of it too, we get to eat some of the prasad, normally consisting of Modak (which is one of Lord Ganeshas favorite food), and fruits.

Finally September 23, one of my favorite days personally. Yes we had to say goodbye to Ganesha on the 28, BUT since it’s part of the weekday we said goodbye a little earlier. It’s not my favorite day because we’re saying bye, but because of HOW we say goodbye. It’s a huge celebration of dancing, singing, drumming, and bathing our divine god. First thing, Lord Ganesha is carried outside where everyone is singing and dancing, there will also being people holding flags and jumping indicating the waving flag. There are even conch shells blown!

If you’re wondering why so many people are wearing red, it’s because Lord Ganesha’s favorite flower is the red hibiscus! Fun fact by the way.

Since we live in the Southeast and not even close to a large body of water, they set up a pool outside, but it was cool to see the immersion of Lord Ganesha in the water.

That is the end of this blog post, I hope you understand a little bit more of my religion and where I come from. My religion is important to me, it makes me realize that we have divinity in all of us and we use this divinity to connect and speak with the ones we look up too. Of course, I am all inclusive when it comes to religions, like in a book I read, religions are like fingers on a hand. Each finger is different but they’re all on the same hand, we’re all connected by what we believe in, be it Hinduism, atheism, Christianity, Islam, Judaism, etc. Thank you for reading and I’ll see soon!