DIWALI-Hard work and then rest
The house calls for a good cleaning. Apart from wrapping gifts for friends and relatives,there are delicious sweets and spicy snacks that we make at home. मटरी, बेसन के सेव and बेसन के लाडू are all time favourites. Adding to the list is one of my favourite from my mum’s kitchen that is made of gram flour and rice flour and it is always yum. I wait for every Diwali as if this time around only I make this snack. Actually the more I make,the more I have to consume this fried snack also. So what about my healthy lifestyle?
Moving ahead,there is shopping for new clothes for kids. Rest of the time we keep juggling ourselves between making snacks at home and shopping outside.
And then comes the big day DIWALI. The day starts with making beautiful rangolis and wishing all relatives on phone. Yes its WhatsApp era but we still prefer to wish personally on phone like the older days. This time my 8-year-old daughter took the responsibility of making rangolis so that I can relax a little and finish up my kitchen chores. The dinner menu for the day is no less. It is a full fleshed meal with पूरी,पनीर,आलू and seasonal favourite घोबी.
In the evening,now is the time for puja and lighting दिया. Firing crackers had also been a major activity of the day but due to so much pollution it had been causing year after year, it has been minimised to just 1 or 2.
And the day ends with some gambling among the family members that’s considered auspicious.
Post midnight, while retiring to bed, the body aches so badly and the senses stop reacting to high volume crackers outside. The day ends and the muscles relax as if one big fat Indian wedding has been finished. The pressures and the deadlines are the same. Coming to an end, it’s favourable to take a spiritual dip in the Ganges thanking the God that all the responsibilities for the year have been properly finished and we look forward to yet another prosperous year.
