Thursday, March 4, 2010

The Gift of Ganesh

I received this very lovely, but confounding brass ganesh thing from my aunt who recently returned from India. I say “thing” because I don’t know what it’s called. A central Ganesh, the Hindu diety who is the Remover of Obstacles, is sitting in the center of six pods, which are also adorned with Ganesh figures.
The center Ganesh unscrews …

and the pod lids can now be opened to reveal little wells filled with intensely vibrant colored powder.




While trying to learn more about these powders, I discovered that just this past Monday was Holi, which means Festival of Colors. It’s the Hindu holiday of Spring and celebrated in India with the boisterous communal application of all kinds of color (powder, paint, colored water). There are lots of images out there of the festivities. Below is a small sampling of the many photos of Holi at boston.com.





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