Diwali Dhamaaka draws hundreds

Hundreds of Hopkins students, faculty and parents gathered on Saturday for the annual Diwali Dhamaaka festival or the "festival of lights."

Diwali is a festival celebrated by Hindus across the world and this year's celebration at Hopkins tried to merge the different traditions and show the uniqueness of different Hindu cultures.

Commonly when celebrating Diwali, people light small oil lamps and place them around their homes, rooftops and courtyards. The festival heralds joy and happiness in the ensuing year and signifies the renewal of life.

Votive candles covered the steps and miniature lights consumed the windows of the Rec Center. People took off their shoes as they descended into the gymnasium for the festivities and were greeted with throngs of people eating Indian food and dancing the Garba around a table of idols. Even more lights hung from the ceiling.

The ceremony began with two students, Sambrita Basu and Manu Sharma, singing a traditional Bhajan, or hymn, which was a song in the honor of the Hindu Goddess Kali.

The Bhajan was followed by dance performances from the campus groups Josh and Raas and a cultural medley.

JOSH, the all-girl cultural dance troupe performed a diya dance dressed in flowing white saris using candles.

Following JOSH's performance there was a cultural medley, which was a compilation of popular Hindi film songs.

Sixty-three dancers performed in the medley, which included performances from an all-female group, and all-male group and two other groups.

The Medley highlighted Indian pop-culture. The climactic performance came from the Raas group who performed a mind-shattering fast paced and rhythmic performance using dandai or wooden sticks.

Raas is considered historically significant because it is the dance performed by the Lord Krishna and the Gopis, or village girls, in the Forest of Vrindavan.

The rest of the night was spent by dancing in various traditional Indian forms such as the Garba, Raas, Aarti and the Bhangra.

"I thought it was an effective occasion that brought people together," says freshman Shelly Bhowmik. "It was great that it wasn't just Indian people, and that was everyone was joining in to celebrate and trying new things like the Garba."

Diwali was a tremendous success, especially since it has greatly expanded in recent years.

"It is the first time that it has been in the Rec Center and not in the Glass Pavilion," said Senior Barkha Gurbani who is on the Hindu Students Council and helped to organize the event.

"We had to shift our entire mindset including decorations and using a whole different staff to make everything bigger.

"We knew that we had outgrown the Glass Pavilion but it was still really crowded in the much bigger space," she continued.

"We were really happy to have all of the support especially from the many faculty members and President Brody, who came to the event."