Dussehra in Nainital

Travel journal October 27, 2006:

Because of scheduling conflicts with one of our professors, Rajesh-ji, my study abroad program has class from Tuesday to Saturday, leaving Sunday and Monday as our weekend. Monday, October 2nd was our first weekend since classes had begun a week before. This day also happens to be Mahatma Gandhi's birthday and this year also the day of the Dussehra festival. Although we weren't exactly sure what to expect, all 18 students boarded a three hour public bus to Nainital for many people's first exposure to a foreign religious festival.

The public bus that runs between the end of the rail line in Haldwani and towns farther north of us stops at a point a half hour walk from the place we stay, Sonapani. Arriving at 7AM, wefound the bus already seemingly full with locals heading in our direction. However, I knew better than to think a bus in India is ever full and encouraged everyone to pile in and fit wherever they could. Many people got seats right away and a few female students were able to sit because local men impressively gave up their seats. However, like similar bus rides I took in the Kathmandu valley, I ended up standing the entire three hour ride.

I wouldn't really mind, and indeed I didn't really mind this time either, except that the roof of the bus was unusually low, even for other buses I've taken, and I was forced to lean and cock my head at a sharp angle while holding myself up with the bars running overhead while attempting, and not that successfully, to prevent my head from banging against those same bars as we traveled the bumpy mountain road.

The one benefit was that when the bus stopped for half an hour in one small village- I found out later that the driver had stopped for chai- I was able to get out and stretch out my neck and legs.

Upon arrival in Bhowali- the end of the line for the bus- we engineered a shared taxi for the remaining 10 km to Nainital. Because I much prefer traveling alone than in a group, when the group stopped for lunch soon after our arrival in Nainital, I waved goodbye and kept moving.

For a few hours I wandered the city alone, passing through the bazaar, sitting lakeside, and venturing up the hills away from the city. I stopped at a quiet restaurant and ate a few samosas- fried dough stuffed with potatoes and spices- and continued on.

Eventually I ended up sitting on concrete bleachers overlooking a large flat dirt field where earlier I'd seen a soccer math finishing and now I watched the set up for the nights festivities.

While I sat, I began to write and finished my entry on my time at Royal Chitwan in Nepal. As I wrote, a small boy, not more than five, kept eyeing me from his mother's side 10 feet away. Over time he summoned up the courage to approach me, and I shook his hand and asked him name in Hindi. Over the next hour he ran back and forth between his mother and me, sometimes speaking to me, sometimes just eyeing me briefly before his courage failed him and he hurriedly returned to the safety of his mother's arms.

When I finished my entry, I heard the unmistakeable sound of a parade behind me coming up on the raod and I left my seat to investigate. A marching band escorted a singer with a microphone on a long cord connected to a lead car clad with many large speakers. Behind followed more trucks with images of deities decorated ceremoniously and pushed by faithful devotees.

The procession continued with trucks containing people in lavish costumes of gods and mythological characters sometimes smiling and sometimes looking bored. Men with ceramic pots filled with burning incense danced in between cars and the streets were lined with Indian and foreign tourst onlookers.

I looked across the parade to see my roommate Nate with our friends Adam and Brittany looking back at me smiling. They crossed the road at a break in the procession and we agreed to walk down to the other side of the lake and maybe take a boat back up for the festival. As we walked, a man playing an instrument in the band motioned for me to join him in the parade and for a few minutes I walked in the middle of the band, near the singer with the long corded mic, while my friends took pictures and laughed at me.

After some time on the far side of the lake, and some more samosas, the four of us walked back to lakeside and negotiated a fair price for a lake crossing in a large rowboat complete with a rower. Nate and I got comfy in the loveseat on one end while Adam and Brittany sat across planks in the middle.

The driver was impressed with Nate's Hindi, and I took advantage of the opportunity to practice the few Hindi words and phrases he had taught me. It is always nice to surprise a local with your knowledge of, or at least effort to learn, their language and customs. It is also nice to shake up the stereotype of an American tourist.

It was getting dark by the time we reached the north side of the lake and after we purchased more fried food, we made our way to the concrete bandstand where I had sat earlier. The seats filled up quickly while we sat and waited and we passed the time telling jokes and spotting our other friends in the crowd and down on the field below.

When a firework went off signaling the beginning of the fesitval, we couldn't see it in the sky above because we sat under a large tree. Quickly deciding to move down into the crowd on the field, we fought our way to the left of the stage and in fron ot the giant paper and wood effigies of the demon king Ravana, which are burned after some colorful acting out of parts of the Hindi holy book, the Ramayan.

Soon the theater begun, but we couldn't see it because we stood to teh side of the stage set up on the field, and the actors waiting their turns lined up on that side, blocking our view of the drama being played out in front of them.

Right before the re-enactment began I noticed a photographer on stage taking many photos of the white faces standing out above the crowd. I decided to wave to the camera to let him know I saw him photographing me so blatantly, and a group of local high school guys next to me began laughing along with me. I grabbed the nearest one, threw my arm around him and together we waved to the photographer. This caused the eruption of a great cheer from his eight or so buddies and my cheering section was formed.

For the next hour, I was their leader and on my cue, we would all shout loudly "yaaaheeeeey!" over the crowd. I demonstrated my power to Nate a few feet away and he was impressed. At one point I spotted a group of our friends sitting together in the stands, 50 yards and 1000 people away, and in response to their waves towards me, I pointed them out to my cheer section and we gave my friends an extra loud cheer while jumping and waving wildly. The students in the stands seemed surprised at my response and all laughed shaking their hands in disbelief of my power.

Soon the theater was over and the real show begun. The two huge effigies were lit one by one, and fire seemed to rise right up into the night sky, the flames tickling the moon. The fireworks began at the same time and the juxtaposition of two 50 foot tall burning images of demons with the grace and excitment of colorful fireworks painted a surreal scene on the black night canvas.

The fires lit up the field and for the first time I was aware that tens of thousands of people were present, on all sides of the inferno and lining the streets above the field opposite us. As the walls of orange and yellow slowly shrank, more fireworks were set off from nearby and burning shrapnel, either from the explosives or from the crumbling effigies, sprang into the air and hurled into the crowd as hundreds of people screamed and dodged out of the way. This was followed by more cheering from myself and my friendly cheer section because we were glad to be unharmed.

When the mammoth wooden structures were reduced to smoldering piles of charred demonic flesh, music floated up from somewhere nearby. Drums beat a catchy rhythm and in my euphoric state after witnessing such a spectacle, I wanted to dance. I yelled to my cheerleaders, "We dance?!" and they seemed enthusiastic about the idea. However, when I cleared some room and took the lead throwing my lanky boidy about uninhibited, my adolescent followers lost their boldness and looked uncomfortable with the prospect of letting loose.

I gave up on them after a few attmepts to get them moving, and after taking a few pictures with them doing what they do best- cheering loudly wiht arms stretched into the air, I said goodbye.

As a group we walked to dinner and were taken home afterward by prearranged taxis, since it was late and the last bus had long sice left on the winding mountain roads towards our home.

The next day, in the Kumoan daily newspaper, there was a picture of Peter, Lindsey and Lisa from our program. Underneath was the caption "Foreign tourists in Nainital for Dussehra." There were actually few other foreign tourists present that night- most of the crowd was Indian tourists- and I really enjoyed the atmosphere of being one of only a few white faces out of so many people gathered to celebrate and cheer on the symbolic destruction of evil and the celebration of life.