Gopika Kapoor, the author of well known books like Spiritual Parenting: Wisdom (and Wit) for Raising your Child in a Stress-free and Spiritual Environment, asks all the mommies to spend their time doing activities that they enjoy rather their following certain norms that restrict them to do so.
“You’ll never guess what we got from the Chopras for Diwali!” my friend Rina gushed to me on the phone last week. Without waiting a beat for me to ask what this magnificent gift was, she continued, “Gold-plated playing cards in a gold and silver engraved box! Isn’t that amazing?”
‘Isn’t that a bit excessive?’ was more my thought, but clearly I was the only one thinking this way, as was confirmed when I met another friend Swati for a walk later that evening. “I HAVE to tell you what the Srinivasans sent us for Diwali this year” she huffed, as we marched around the track at a brisk pace. “Let me guess, gold plated playing cards?”
“Eeeeks! How LS!” she shrieked. “No, listen. They sent us a gold-plated tray with cream and lotions from L’occitane, and a little box with gold dust powder to mix and apply on the face. Isn’t that just amazing?!”
“Amazing!” I repeated, rendered somewhat speechless by the extravagance of the gift.
For the rest of the week, I have heard stories of more and more luxurious gifts being sent to friends. From Versace platters filled with exotic fruit to teakwood caskets containing fragrant teas from across the world, it seems nothing is too much for us Indians to gift to celebrate the festival of lights.
This has invariably led me to think back to the Diwalis of my childhood: a week spent tracing intricate designs with coloured powder on our doorstep to create rangoli; going shopping for and bursting phooljaris, anars and chakris, and watching with excitement (and a little bit of fear) as they lit up in a whoosh of sparks; stuffing myself with swirling syrupy jalebis, glowing round mounds of gulab jamuns and spongy white rasagullas. I remember the thrill of my father bringing home a red cardboard bandhani-design box of mithai or dry fruit that one of his friends had gifted him, and the crackling of yellow paper as I tore it open and ate salty cashews, soft sweet raisins and chewy round dried figs.
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But what I remember the most are a week of lunches and dinners at aunts and uncles houses, the same set of us meeting everyday at a new place, and yet excited to be together and enjoy each others’ company. The schedule was pretty much the same every year: we would meet and act like we hadn’t seen each other in years, when actually we had just had the previous meal together. The men would converge on one side, talking business and other worldly matters, while the women gossiped about who had worn what and cooked what over Diwali. My fondest memories are of sitting among the folds of my mother’s silk saree, stomach full of shrikhand, puri and other delicious fare, half- asleep while listening to the ebb and flow of conversation around me.
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At the risk of taking the high moral ground and sounding preachy, let’s make this Diwali a time to think back to the Diwalis of our childhood, when whom we had in our lives was more important than what we had in our homes. When the thought of seeing family and being together was what excited us, and when a simple red mithai ka dabba could fill our stomachs and our hearts with joy for the rest of the year.
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