Trafalgar Diwali
Here are some of the more unusual photos from a Diwali celebration in London’s Trafalgar Square (thanks, chachaji).
Severus Snape gazes gloomily at his gopis:
Space macacas, or an American were-monkey in London:
Lights simulating lights:
Soul patch Ravana:
Gender-bending peahen:
Papercraft lotuses:
on Tuesday, October 30th, 2007, 10:08 am in Holidays, Photographs, Religion › 
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Thanks for posting the pics in hi-res, Manish!
So London desis have had their Diwali celebration already!
A bold, even brazen display of aspects of the essential ‘desiness’, with Ravana and Ganesha, Krishna & the gopis, the Vaanar Sena, the lights, even a gender-bending peahen. Like, wow.
Sigh. I want to move there.
P.S. Good work - that TOTALLY looks like Alan Rickman.
What is that Snape-like guy supposed to be? Ram? Wasnt Krishna the dark one and if so, where is the peacock in the crown! I bet the gender bending peahen stole it..
Both Ram and Krishna are dark (well, blue actually). They are both avtaars of Vishnu.
Hindu mythology explains why Shankar is blue - he drank a poison that was churned up from the oceans - but why is Vishnu represented as blue?
Shankar isn’t all blue, only his neck (gardan) part is blue, apparently the poison somehow just stayed in his throat (?)
As for Vishnu being blue…good question…i didn’t know the answer either…but a good old google search answers it as such here:
for some reason i foundthat (’gardan’) hilarious.
Word of the day - à ¤—à ¤°à ¤¦à ¤¨
gardan is excellent, hindi has such gems, I think somone reminded everyone of naspeetay the other day. It will be great if we can do a hindi word of the day:)
Shiva is also called “neelakant” with its’s assorted variateions (depending on how one wants to transliterate) for the same reason. The poison stayed in Shiva’s throat because it was stopped from spreading by Parvati (who choked him?) and prevented the poison from going into his body.
i second that…
along the lines of naspeetay, i totally love the word “kalmoohe”
krishna is represented as dusky or dark blue because he was born around dusk / twilight, hence his other name “shyam” as well, meaning dusk / evening time. dunno if the same is true of rama though.
I live in London.
My feeling is the native Britis are simply not interested in Divali. It is too repetitive, no novelty, no challenge.
Politicians send the mandatory annual greetings to Hindus but that is just a mechanical exercise.
Putting up same old lights and having the same dancing groups in Trafalgar Square is not the way to impress or inspire. It’s mostly the Indians themselves who attend anyway. The Hindustan Times was thrilled that Divali was celebrated at the Square, pointing out that this is the spot where Nelson’s column is located.
True but what the pathetic HT reporter failed to note is that ithe same square also houses two large statues of 19th century British colonial heroes, namely Generals Napier and Havelock. The first slaughtered hundreds of Indians in the Sindh campaign while Havelock did the same during the Indian ‘Mutiny’.
But most Indians are blithely unaware of these other statues and the historical connection. They are busy focuing on the trivia and the obvious (and their ladoos).