Sharyn in India: 4: Makar Sankrati

Wednesday, January 14th is Makar Sankranti - a Hindu harvest festival celebrated in almost all parts of India but most especially here in Rajasthan, marking the transition of the Sun into the zodiac sign of Makara rashi (Capricorn) on its celestial path. Businesses and schools are closed and families celebrate with music, food and most especially, flying kites.

On Tuesday, Makar Sankranti was celebrated at the Foundation in lieu of classes. The entire afternoon was spent in the playground with many of the children (mostly boys, but some of the girls and some of the teachers) flying kites.

When Makar Sankrati was explained to me, the immediate visual in my mind was of a windy day at the beach while on vacation flying a large, somewhat elaborate and colourful kite. Other than that, I can only recall seeing kids fly kites a day or two in the spring.

Not so here - this is kite flying in a really big way. The kites themselves are only about 18” x 18” made of colourful tissue paper paper - unremarkable in and of themselves, but what is remarkable, very remarkable, is the skill people here have in flying kites. So much so that, while a windy day is great, it’s not necessary. A couple properly placed jerks of the hand and the kite is up. Pretty impressive. Proficiency is important not just to successfully fly your kite but because a portion of the string has metal in it, which can slice the skin pretty easily. Some of the boys had been practising for some weeks, to wit, lots of cuts and callouses. There is a point to the metal though (at least one) and that is one of the goals in kite flying is to cut the strings of other kites, so there is lots of vocalization that comes with kite flying here - the sound of success when you’ve cut someone else’s kite and the sound of “dang-it” when your string gets cut. Inevitably, there are more serious injuries than small slices to the fingers and sure enough, Thursday’s paper reported some 60 or so visits to hospital in Jaipur with kite related injuries and very sadly, one boy of approx 14 years fell to his death off a rooftop terrace.

Midway through the afternoon there was a treat -til-laddoo- which is a sweetmeat made from sesame seeds and jaggery - the importance of sesame seeds being that “it keeps body warm and also provides a good quantity of oil, which is needed as winter dried up the moist from body”. (Who knew we should be eating more sesame seeds in the winter to counteract that incessant drying out of the skin - Note to self, especially my Edmontonian and Peace River friends!)

On Wednesday, I went for a walk and wherever there were residences, you could hear the sound of music in the air and see people on their terraces and rooftops flying kites and when you took the occasional glance to the sky, for a moment you thought the sky was filled with small birds, only to realize they were all kites. (I did try for pictures, but the kites are small and I never really got a good picture of the littered with kites).

Later in the afternoon, around 6 pm, I began to hear fireworks which went on for a good hour or so. I also saw little lanterns floating in the air - these were little paper hot-air balloon shaped lanterns, lit with sesame oil.

It was during my walk that I first encountered large groups of people begging. There were about 20 or so gathered around a car where a man was throwing out kites and when they noticed me, a reasonable number of them ran over begging. For the first second, it was intimidating but, I didn’t feel that they were dangerous - just not willing to let a prospect go by. I copied how I had witnessed the reaction when we are in the car and that was to keep walking and look ahead. It was a hard moment and not the last I was to encounter on my walk.

The one thing that cannot go unnoticed in India is the overwhelming hospitality and warmth of the people. Everywhere you go, people smile at you, say hello, hold out their hand in welcome. And then surprisingly, you get asked to have your picture taken with them - a little taste of what its like for the beautiful and famous!!

I took lots of pictures on Tuesday - enjoy the delight in the children’s faces who, by the way, LOVE to have their picture taken!!