Pandigai 2009 – Round 1

Ok.. so the serious attempt I made at blogging a few months ago in April certainly became what can be at best termed a mega-flop. I seriously do intend to be here more often, but so many things have been happening, and kept me so busy that this blog had to go down closer to the bottom of my list of priorities. But today, since I am up early and my daughter isn’t, I figured I would put this off no further and get it done.

So how have things been in blogosphere? I have to admit, that I have barely even been reading comments these past few months, barely reading my favorites on your blogs, and almost never commented on anybody’s blog either. A lot of things happened.. we cleaned up, re-painted our old house, and then started showing it to prospective renters (which I admit is more stressful than being seen at ponnu-paarthal). We eventually found one and then moved to a home closer to where I work, and got about getting it furnished. So you can imagine, control freak that I am, how crazy things must have been.

Before we moved to our new home, we did have a very traditional grihapravesam this time round and I was very satisfied with how well it went. Right after, the season began – week after week of festivals – pullayar chathurthi co-inciding with avani avittam, followed by krishna jayanthi, followed by navarathri – to the point that I am now almost relieved that there is a weekend where I can laze around a bit and not feel on Monday like the weekend hasn’t yet begun. Also, this year since there are no planned India trips, and we rarely do long holidays, I decided I would use up all my vacation on and around festivals and prepare for them at leisure.

So, starting with Pillayar chathurthi – this was literally a week after we moved in but I wanted to do something and we did a basic pooja and offered sundal and modhakam (or sweet kozhakattai). It did turn out really well. We then went over to b-i-l’s house where m-i-l and f-i-l were also staying and did an elaborate celebration of both pillayar chathurthi as well as avani avittam. My co-sis V made a really beautiful pillayar with rice flour (since clay ganesha’s are not available for sale). 

Avani avittam and Pillayar Chathurthi were quickly followed by Krishna Jayanthi. M-i-l and F-i-l were with us for this – so it was all the more fun. M-i-l prepared Seedai, Vella Seedai, Appam and Sooyam. Once again ate a lot of food. We also dressed up my daughter as Krishnar this time. After all the build-up I gave her about wearing “Umaachi” dress, I had put on a bunch of jewellery and taken off her shirt. She was disappointed to say the least. The Krishnar kaals (footprints) were a delight to do this time round – because we had hardwood and stone all the way to the pooja room. I didn’t have to make Krishnar magically fly past carpet etc.. like I’ve had to in the past.

V making the pillayar with rice flour

Pillayar Chathurthi

Rice flour pillayar

Avan avittam in the background

Ton of Food

Kutti Krishnar

Krishnar Naivedhyam

Krishnar Kaal

That ended Round 1 and to spare you the effort of keeping your attention on this post any longer.. Navarathri will have to be a separate post.. coming up soon.. hopefully.

Happy Pongal!

The three day marathon of Pongal is quite over. However, this year I was way too preoccupied to really worry about Pongal too much and it ended up being merely observed versus being celebrated. Bhogi was a working day. I woke up late, and so could not find time to even make a simple sweet in the morning. Came back home very tired, and my husband (quite surprisingly and unusually) offered to make Pongal that same evening instead of the next morning, because he was going to be on a conference call from early in the morning. So, under my able guidance, we managed the Chakkarai pongal (which ended up tasting pretty good) on Bhogi night itself (so what, it was Pongal day in India). On Pongal day, once again, woke up late, could not even pack lunch and survived on a tasting menu offered by my colleagues for lunch. That evening, I made a simple Ven pongal. My daughter was sick and just not co-operative, so could not make anything to go with the Pongal and my interest in it was automatically diminished. On Kanu day, my daughter and I managed to keep Kanu in the garage. The deck would have been  much more suitable, but with her nose already clogged and her signs of heading for a fever, the last thing I wanted was for her to stand in the cold for 10 minutes keeping Kanu. So, we headed to the garage with our multicolor ‘pudis’. No turmeric leaves or banana leaves – so had to make do with aluminium foil. No sugarcane or beetle leaves, so skipped that whole part. Just did the pudis which my daughter surprisingly understood from the first one she did. She was very careful not to let them roll out of the aluminium foil. After having done that, we circumvented it thrice – she thought it was a fun game, and then off we went to daycare and work. The only kalandha sadham was thenga sadham. So by all standards, I’d have to say this year’s pongal was a pretty shoddy affair.

I was physically too tired, my daughter was sick and cranky, my husband was out of town for 1 of 3 days and I just hadn’t got things organized enough.

I guess I will make up for it during Karadayan Nombu which it seems arrives on a Friday, but it’s a simple event too and can be managed hopefully.

I did enjoy all the Pongal special movies on SunTV which I recorded on the DVR and watched at night. Certainly more interesting than watching interviews of unknown directors and cameramen.