Saturday, March 24, 2012

Holi Festival of Colors

Welcome spring! That's what we did today at the Holi Festival of Colors at the Sri Sri Radha Hindu temple in Spanish Fork.

The Holi festival is a Hindu tradition to celebrate spring and color in life. It is celebrated with music and chanting, throwing colorful chalk, and a bonfire (in which an effigy of the demoness from Hindu mythology is burned). It is a time for Hindus to feel brotherhood and celebrate life.

More information on Holi is found here on the temple's website at the top and bottom of the page (and there's always wikipedia).

Before the colors are thrown - nice and clean. You can see the temple in the background. We got there a minute too late for the "official" throwing, so we got to see the color fly into the air. Pretty crazy.
The festival in Spanish Fork is actually the largest one in the United States. Who'd have thought?
Some of the beautiful architecture behind Kyle. 
Dancing inside the temple. We all removed our shoes to show respect.
The whole bunch of us!
It was a fun way to spend the morning and learn a little something new about Hindu culture. We want to go back to the temple on a not so crazy day to learn more about their beliefs and culture. And the website says they have cooking classes ... I might just have to check that out.

Side note: I just started reading The Mahabharata, one of the two Hindu epics. It goes into all sorts of their mythology and so far it's been quite interesting. I'll have to do a book report later on.

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