Category Archives: Rituals, festivals, holidays

Holi Festival

Text: 

When I visited India with my family, I got to experience a Holi celebration, which is a Hindu festival for the coming of spring. It starts by lighting a bonfire on the night before Holi, which for us was just a relaxing time with our family in the area. The next day, everyone is celebrating in the streets, throwing colored powder and water everywhere and all over each other.

“Is there a main activity for the holiday?”

“It’s kind of like this massive color party. There’s music playing, people are singing and dancing, and cooking/sharing traditional Indian foods.”

Context:

My informant is a classmate at USC. While he grew up in the United States, his parents are from India, and has experienced the celebration of Holi when visiting India with his parents. He says that even though he didn’t grow up there, the celebration festiveness of everyone makes him feel like part of the community. 

Analysis: 

My informant’s experience of Holi highlights the meaning and importance of the celebration for my informant’s family and the Hindu culture. Despite growing up in America, the celebration made my informant feel at home with a community he did not grow up with. This highlights the Holi celebration as a time for leaving behind personal differences, and celebrating a festive time with those around you. Additionally, being covered in colored powder and splashed with water would normally be uncomfortable, but the fact this is embraced during Holi shows it is a time for the release of negative emotions and inhibitions. This ability to bring people together and cause them to let go of their worries shows a strong value  of community, and focusing on relationships with those around you despite any challenges.

Birthday Cake for Breakfast

Text: 

“My family has a tradition where on everyone’s birthday, we eat cake for breakfast. The idea is that if you wake up on your birthday and go about your day without eating cake, you could get hit by a bus and you wouldn’t have eaten cake on your birthday. Then, you eat the cake for breakfast every day until it’s finished”

“Does anyone else you know follow the same tradition?”

“There are a few families that do. I remember when I was a kid I thought everyone did it, but later realized it was more of a special tradition to my family.”

Context: 

My informant is a classmate of mine, who says her family has been doing this tradition for as long as she can remember for each member of her family. She says the tradition adds a humorous and fun start to the day, and that her family likes it because it begins the birthday celebrations immediately at the start of your day. Additionally, because it is more of a rare tradition, she added that eating cake on her birthday makes the celebration feel more personalized to her family. 

Analysis:

My informant’s tradition of eating cake for breakfast on your birthday highlights a humorous point of view to life’s unpredictability. The tradition seems to be based on the recognition that your health and family are not guaranteed in life, and places high importance on celebrating moments of joy when they are available, instead of taking them for granted. Additionally, the part of the tradition where their family continues to eat cake for breakfast until it is finished, extends the celebration of the person beyond just one day, emphasizing the appreciation of the person and the celebration of birthdays itself. The tradition not only strengthens bonds within the family, but ensures the wisdom of not taking life’s moments for granted is playfully passed down. 

Christmas Advent Calendar

Text: 

“My family has a tradition where at the start of the month of december, we hang up an advent calendar. It was a physical calendar you would hang up on the wall, and each date on the calendar leading up to Christmas would have a little door that you could put treats inside. My mom would hang it up and fill each door with chocolate, or sometimes a small toy. Then, every morning my siblings and I would rush downstairs to see what was behind that day’s door. 

“Does your family still hang up the calendar every year?”

“Yeah we do, as my siblings and I got older it’s definitely not as exciting to grab the candy or toy every morning, but it’s a thing we’ve always done and it’s become more of just a special decoration for our family.”

Context: 

My informant is a friend of mine who grew up in a family that cherished christmas traditions. While he is 20 years old now and says the excitement of the calendar has faded, he says the calendar is a crucial part of his family’s christmas celebration, and that when he has a family of his own he will be doing the same for his kids. 

Analysis: 

The advent calendar is more than just a decoration or a way to give out treats to young family members. The opening of each door on the new day provides a symbolic countdown that heightens the anticipation and excitement for when Christmas finally comes, providing an aspect of daily ritual within the festive season leading up to the holiday. It’s quite interesting how the appeal of the calendar to my informant changes from being the excitement of getting a treat each day to a symbol of their family bond and celebration. This change signifies a maturing view of the holiday season, from a child’s excitement for new toys and no school to an appreciation of being together and being able to celebrate with one’s family. This also highlights why customs are passed through generations, as even though my informant doesn’t get the same excitement from the calendar as he did as a child, the impact it made on his view of Christmas makes him want to pass it on to his kids as well.

Mangalsutra Necklace

Text: 

“This is a known Hindu wedding tradition and one that my family follows as well. During the wedding, we have a tradition where the groom ties a necklace called the Mangalsutra around the bride’s neck. The Mangalsutra is a special necklace that has different designs but is generally made of black and gold beads that are uniquely decorated on the necklace.” 

“What is the significance of the necklace?”

“It represents the grooms commitment to the marriage, and shows that as long as the necklace is worn, the bond between the bride and the groom will stay strong”

Context: 

“My informant is a classmate of mine who grew up in the United States, but has Hindu parents from India. He says that when he gets married, he intends to carry the tradition and give his wife a Mangalsutra necklace. He says that his parents have a very strong bond, and that to him, the Mangalsutra represents the bond between his parents that he would want to have with his wife someday. 

Analysis: 

The tradition of the Mangalsutra is very similar to the prominent marriage tradition of exchanging wedding rings between the bride and groom. Because of this, the Mangalsutra necklace not only symbolizes the commitment and connection between the bride and groom, but its similarity with other traditions suggests that assigning such meanings to exchanged objects is a concept that supersedes an individual culture. Additionally, the fact that my informant did not grow up in a Hindu community shows that the relationships we have with family are crucial aspects to the significance of rituals and traditions. While the Mangalsutra more broadly represents the commitment and bond of a marriage in Hindu culture, to my informant, the association of the Mangalsutra with the marriage between his parents causes the Mangalsutra to represent a personalized connection between his parents that he hopes to recreate with his wife in the future. 

Mid Autumn Festival

My informant usually celebrates this with family, and the date depends on the lunar calendar, but is typically in the autumn and is always the night of a full moon.

During this festival you typically gaze at and appreciate the moon and eat mooncakes. Mooncakes are typically sweet pastries but they can be savory with a variety of different fillings from date to a sweet nut paste to lotus paste and salted egg yolk.

This festival is celebrated because of a Chinese myth with many variations. The basic story is that a woman ended up drinking an immortality elixir that would have brought her to heaven, but her husband was still on earth. Because of this she chose to live on the moon instead so in the mid autumn festival, moon gazing is like how every year the husband would eat mooncakes and look for his wife on the moon. Due to this, the festival is generally a family activity.

The story itself can depend but in a few variations my informant is pretty sure that they were once gods, but the husband had to shoot down several suns (which were the children of the emperor of the sky) and as punishment the couple were turned into humans. However, they received the elixir at some point and wanted to split it to be together, but they had to wait until the full moon for the effect to work, but one month the husband was away and someone attacked the wife for the elixir so she drank it so the attacker wouldn’t get it.

This festival is based on a myth based on the cycles of the moon. Not only is the meaning based on the moon, but the food eaten is also moon based