Holi Celebrations~Happy Phagwah

Holi is the Festival of Colours which marks the coming of Spring. It is celebrated over several days in the Hindu month of Phalunga, which falls in February/March of the Gregorian calendar. It is also a celebration of new life and the seasons. Some families hold religious ceremonies, but for many Holi is more a time for fun than religious observance. During festivities coloured water and powders of purple, red, blue, green are thrown at participants who wear white whick makes the paint more obvious.

Holi is the most vibrant Indian festival, when distinctions of caste, class, age or gender are set to one side. Bonfires are lit and parents make sure they carry their babies to protect them from any demons. Some believe the origin of the festival lies with Krishna who was very mischievous as a young boy and threw coloured water over the gopis (milkmaids) with whom he is believed to have grown up. This developed into the practical jokes and games of Holi.

The legend of Prahlad and Holika is also connected with Holi. Prahlad was the son of King Hiranyakashyapu. The king wanted everyone in his kingdom to worship him. However his son, Prahlad refused to and worshipped Lord Vishnu instead.

The king's sister Holika, who was supposed to be immune to fire, tricked her nephew Prahlad into sitting on her lap in a bonfire in order to destroy him. However, because she was using her powers for evil, the plan failed and Prahlad emerged from the fire unharmed, while his aunt was devoured by the flames. This event is seen to symbolise good overcoming evil and is why traditionally bonfires are lit at Holi. In some parts of India effigies of Holika are burnt on the fire. Ashes from Holi bonfires are thought to bring good luck.




Phagwah - Guyana Style - excerpt taken from Stabroek News Arts On Sunday - A common thread in the great religious festivals - By Al Creighton, Sunday, March 4th 2007

Phagwah is religious ritual as well as a popular spring festival celebrated with great fun, frolic and gaiety with themes of rebirth, renewal, regeneration, rejuvenation and spiritual unity. These are manifested in the public displays of people decorating each other with Abrac and Abeer - coloured dyes, powder, water and coloured liquids.

Although I have seen diplomatic gatherings of high officials of state and members of high society at which these are dispensed with gentle pats, light caresses and token sprinklings, no doubt in an effort not to offend and to demonstrate the example that the celebration should be in considerate moderation, this is not the common practice. In keeping with the normal vigour of a spring festival the popular culture prefers exchanges of more fun and greater abandon. There it is a youthful frolic with more generous dousings and energetic applications of colour.

To be very frank about it, in Guyana the advice which is often given about caution and moderation is not entirely misplaced since this aspect of Phagwah is highly participatory and conflict is avoided by restricting the involvement only to those who have chosen to participate. I can recall walking through the street of a community and being approached by a small group of celebrants armed with a pail of water and a container of powder. They approached me uncertainly and asked politely whether they had my permission to include me in the game. Following my consent, they very gently administered a tiny brush of powder and a sprinkle of water quite like what I see among the diplomats, government ministers and high society. As they jogged away laughing and I continued my walk I thought to myself that this certainly did not feel like Phagwah.

This celebration of spring also contains the theme of spiritual rebirth that is sacred to the religion and is part of its symbolic outreach. But it also provides one of the very spectacular elements of the festival because of the sometimes splendid displays of colourful abeer and abrac loudly covering multitudes of people and garments. Other elements of public spectacle are related to the symbolic burning of Holika, which derives from the mythology. Again, there is a mixture of a public exhibition and religious ritual as large pyres are lit, sometimes generating a spectacular blaze around which the celebrants march while singing chowtal. They also roast fruits in this fire, including sugar cane and coconuts.


Although most of the activities of worship, chowtal singing, burning of Holi and the throwing of abrac and abeer are concentrated around three days, much longer celebrations are known in rural Guyana. There, the week-long observations include additional elements in which Phagwah shares commonalities with the public displays of other cultural traditions. The celebrants go from house to house singing chowtal and partaking in various refreshments, sometimes including liquids of a spirituous nature not necessarily approved by the religion. Of definite approval, however, is the sharing of sweetmeats with anyone, another significant outreach activity. The house-to-house serenading is known in other traditions like Parang in Trinidad, masquerade and the English mumming.