Diwali around the corner

The festive mood of Diwali takes over the markets and shopping centers, houses and offices, streets and lanes of the city. To get a flavor of what matters here as much as Christmas does in Europe we headed to a couple of Diwali bazaars in Delhi.

Diwali bazaar in Blind School is one of the most famous in town. It seems that originally the Blind Relief Association arranged the bazaar to sell the candles along with some other items made by its wards for the charity of the establishment.



Yet, while the good-value candles still attract people, these days Blind School rents out the majority of the stalls to the external vendors. In fact, the bazaar is also renowned as the market for rich Delhi wives, which is certainly true.



Really pleasant, hassle-and-extra-attention-free atmosphere and upmarket stalls seem like a great place for women wearing sophisticated kurtas and jeans (the combination is a profound trademark of (upper-) middle class Indian women), bags with the logos of Louis Vuitton, Gucci and Channel and delicate perfumes.



They come accompanied at times by their husbands or teenage children or more often with the girlfriends in a Western manner; they wander around, amass bags and boxes and then load those into their cars looking like the lorry of Santa Claus. And the potential for amassing things is really great at Diwali Bazaar. Hardly anything that can cater to the picky tastes of the shoppers looking for presents and new dresses is missing here: clothes, traditional and western, readymades and dress materials, fancy bags, jewelry and jewelry boxes, exclusive chocolate,



pickles and pan,



natural cosmetics, handmade paper, worship items – lamps, garlands, statues of gods,



paintings, mirrors, bed linen and cushion covers, rugs and plats – artificial and live. Obligatory snack stall serving anything from kulchas to pasta salad is also there. I realized I have not seen much of the sort of things I have found in bazaar - the result of too much roaming around cheap markets and deliberate avoidance of posh shopping malls. For me personally, one Diwali bazaar a year would do.


Later in the night we headed to another sort of arrangement – this time Diwali Mela in Sundar Nagar. Many localities have this sort of festivities around Diwali, yet Sundar Nagar attracts crowds from all over Delhi due to its vast scale.



Mela (fair) is essentially a community celebration with trade stalls,





entertainment, music, side-show and obviously food arrangements.

I realized that some events are worth visiting just for the sake of their mass character. Call it Soviet gigantomania but I love huge parades, big markets, massive open-air concerts and festivities that pack the venue itself and 10 kilometers around it on each side. Call it Soviet collectivism but I enjoy it when you see the anxious anticipation on the faces of the people queuing to get in such an arrangement, excitement of grown-ups which it not any less than that of their small children, joy of being around people on the special day or its eve and sharing your joy with them. This is how I felt at the Mela that night. We tried it all - spectacular food stalls with elaborate selection,





all sorts of goodies sold for Diwali presents and requisites, awful dance performance by some local talents (I guess my standard had soared since the dance festival (LINK), massive swinging boat that made my heart sink every time we were free-falling from the upper extreme of the swings’ trajectory and breakdance that started swiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinging right after disappointed me asked, “Where is the thrill?” and Karan replied, “And here it comes”. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!