November 2 - I never published this post but will now.

I am just back from a long business trip to Abu Dhabi. It was very much a last minute trip, which took me away from Delhi and India during the week of Diwali, the highest of Hindu holidays. I say, highest, but really just the most festive--the most commercial, too. Diwali celebrates the return to India of Lord Ram, who had vanquished a particularly difficult foe in Sri Lanka, the evil demon-king Ravan. Apparently, Ravan was evil but also quite brilliant and studied. In addition to having killed Ravan, Ram was in exile in a deep forest and his nighttime return at a new moon was heralded by his subjects with lighted rows (avali) of lamps (deepa), hence Deepvali or Diwali. The Sikhs, Jains, and Buddhists also attach their own mythology to the holiday, indicative of a multitude of cultural and religious influences in India and how easy they blend together and share their history.


Well whatever, my work in the Middle East didn't blend well with the celebrations. I listened to the fireworks through the phone, as Jennifer danced on the driveway to passing brass bands, gypsies, and revelers. The pall from fireworks settles over Delhi for days after the celebration, not helped by the inversion layer that settles over the city during the cooler autumn months.


Not unlike Christmas in the West, Diwali is now mostly a commercial festival. Gift giving is essential. Stores and melas (seasonal bazaars) are open early and late, selling lanterns, strings of lights, fruits and nuts, handicrafts, everything. Sweet shops with glass cases stacked with Indian sweets sell colorful boxes of assorted sweets. Appliance stores do very big business--selling fridges, stereos, phones, air conditioners, plasma TVs (or at least you would think it from the ads on television.