While on the road, we (driver and I) stopped in a small town that was celebrating the first of 3 days of their annual harvesting festival. I will spare you the Tamil name (if only I could remember it).
The festival happens over three days. The first day is to make offerings to the sun, without which there would be no harvest. This takes the form of boiling rice in every household and making an offering to the gods.
The second day is dedicated to the animals which help with the harvesting, first and foremost the bull. For that, they organise bull races in the nearest town (in this case Madurai). They really love their bull races in Tamil Nadu. Each village fields one or several bulls for the occasion, competing against one another. A dangerous event as these animals are ridden bare back, which only their distinctive hump to hold on to at full speed. Of course, people get killed every year, but no matter. The local government tried to ban the event, but had to back off because of the outcry.
The third and last day is devoted to the farmer, who toils the fields and collects the harvest. It is interesting that he comes last in all this. In a way, maybe he should. No sun and no bull, and you don’t have much to show for it at the end of the season, do you now ?
When we arrived in the village, there was much festivity in the air. It started with the local municipality offering a big lunch in a coconut grove for the guests and foreigners who happened to be passing by. Served on a banana leaf. Very nice too.
Then much dancing, while the bulls were decorated with colour pigments and flowers, and tied to trees for display.
And then we were invited to mount wooden charriots, pulled by oxen, for a festive tour of the village. For the occasion, each household, however poor, had been emptied for its annual cleaning. Pots and pans had been washed and put out to dry outside, and the rubbish cleared before the parade. And of course, many ladies had drawn their morning kolam’s. A joyful event, shared with generosity and much mirth.
