by Haojie Xu
Diwali is the festival Hinduism celebrates yearly in the autumn. Diwali is celebrated in the honor of the goddess of wealth and the light in defeating the darkness. Just like other events, I wanted to get to know different cultures in the world and traditions practiced by different people. Thus, I went to this seminar to see what it was about and how was it different than the celebrations from other countries, religions.
When I arrived at the CUB, there was a LONG line waiting to get checked in. Even though it was raining that night, it did not move the people’s enthusiasm at all. The smell of food filled the whole building. I knew this was going to be good. As I walked into the room and tried to get seated, I noticed there were a lot of decorative lights around. They were all over the place: on the wall, hanging from the ceiling, colorful, and lively. Many beautiful Rangoli designs were printed on table cloth, and on people’s clothes. Speaking of clothing, Hinduism’s traditional textiles, designs, and layering were just fabulous and elegant. It was very expressive and showed holiday spirit, very different from the clothes worn on Christmas or in Chinese New Year.
A delicious feast is a must have for celebrations. Diwali is no exception. Traditional Indian food were prepared and served during the event. Indian food uses a lot of garlic, onions, cinnamon, turmeric, and many more condiments. Mixing these ingredients together with meats and vegetables at right proportion, delicious meal is made. I really liked to eat the rice topped with curry chicken. As we ate, we watched hosts introduced what Diwali is about and very entertaining shows performed by students. I also helped photographing and video filming some of the dances performed on Diwali and they were very different from the ones I have seen. Students were so into it that they gathered in the middle of the dance floor and group danced. Dancers showed off their rhythmic dance moves and holiday spirit. I was at first overwhelmed a little bit but quickly became part of the joy.
Festival celebrations are so different from one another across different cultures, varying
from food, clothes, tradition, and theme. But at the meantime, they are so similar because people
are celebrating for simple stuff that everyone values the most, happiness, family, and health.
Whatever events come next will probably be same, but I’ll be surely attending every single one
of them.