Celebrating Holi Away From Home
Hi everyone, I am Sara Mehra, a pre-med student from India here at the University of Galway. And this year, I celebrated my first Holi away from home.
For the last 18 years of my life, I celebrated Holi in different parts of my country – all the way from Bangalore in the south to Gurgaon in the north!
And this year was my first Holi away from India, and I can proudly say it was a blast!
But before I dive into this blog, let me answer the question—"What is Holi?" Holi is an Indian festival celebrated to mark the onset of spring, but its origins are rooted in Indian mythology. The stories vary from place to place in India, but my favourite is the one about Lord Krishna.
It goes that Lord Krishna, an avatar of Lord Vishnu, fell in love with a milkmaid called Radha. But he was embarrassed because Radha was fair, and Krishna had dark blue skin. To move around this, he playfully covered her face with coloured powder during a game with her and the other milkmaids. And so came Holi, a celebration of their love. The spirit of the festival mirrors Lord Krishna's playful nature.
Back home, I always wore white on Holi, and I thought maybe that wasn't something that would be followed here, but I was pleasantly surprised to see loads of people wearing white! We also play with water back home, but maybe it's good that we didn't do that here, since we might've frozen into icicles, even though it was sunny!
This year, I went to the event with my friends - Aishanya and Jasnoor. And the three of us had such a great time! We got absolutely decked out in colours! As you can see from our before and after pics from the event (hehe).
We danced to some desi beats! This was a little funny, though, because I think the DJ's playlist had quite a few older songs that the three of us didn't quite know, so there were a few awkward silences, but the vibes were enough for us to have a grand time anyway!
We ate lots, and I mean LOTS of delicious (and long missed) food – pani puri, kachoris, and biryani! And that was just the tip of the iceberg.
We also drank three cups (because it was the best we've had so far) of Kadak Chai (Spiced tea). And, yes, that's a lot of tea, even by Indian standards. 😝
We ended the day after the event by helping clean up and sitting on the grass for a bit, just talking and catching up with each other!
I felt so fulfilled after the event. I felt like I was back home for a bit, so thank you, Galway, for making my first Holi away from home so amazing. You turned it from a sad memory to one I'll cherish forever!
Words and images thanks to Sara Mehra, Bachelor of Medicine.