Memories of a fraternal Guyanese Holi

Mar 05, 2015 Letters

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DEAR EDITOR,
Many of us in the diaspora have fond memories about celebrating Phagwah or Holi at home – the special foods prepared for the occasion and the revelry of dousing of abeer or mud or powder on one another. As a child growing up during the 1960s and 1970s on the Corentyne, Phagwah was celebrated with much gusto, zeal and enthusiasm by almost everyone, regardless of race, in schools and in the villages with celebrants going to nearby villages to play with friends and relatives.
I am sure the celebration was similar in other parts of the country. The occasion also provided an opportunity for young men to visit the home of a girl they liked or admired to play Phagwah with the young lady who also looked forward to the visit.
Religious and racial aspects were stripped from a traditional Hindu festival, with people of varied religions and ethnicities forming one large community to partake in a national celebration on Phagwah Day itself. The same is true of the celebrations, transplanted by Guyanese, in Queens, Bronx, Jersey City, Central Orlando, with the annual parade and cultural mela at a public park.
In Guyana, unlike in the US, at school on the last day before the holiday, students of varied ethnic and religious backgrounds doused each other with abeer or powder – white clothing became unrecognizable with multi-colouring. Faces were smeared with colours.
Some years ago, Brooklyn Technical High School disciplined students for spurting powder (bottles were confiscated) on each other. The school administrators did not believe there is such a festival in which students put powder on each other. My intervention was requested by Mr. Ramesh Kalicharran, and only after I explained to one of the administrators, via the phone (don’t teach there), about the religious significance and how it is celebrated, did the deans backtrack on disciplining the students. The matter had the potential of triggering a significant court case relating to religious freedom and schools.
In Guyana, as in Trinidad and Suriname, Phagwah celebrations historically crossed racial and religious boundaries. The festival’s theme is one of universal brotherhood, and youngsters of all races, even adults, when I was growing up during the 1960s and 1970s, looked forward for it.  Even in India, it has been a festival freed from social norms with people of varied castes playing together. Colourful abeer, gulal and abrack are showered on the people, with celebrants merging into one big fraternity with no distinction of status noted.
As in India, in Guyana, there is no distinction of creed, race, age and sex as people play “Phagwah” with one another. In Guyana as in India, Phagwah is the most colourful of the Hindu festivals and celebrated after bonfire burning of Holika, the symbolic destruction of evil – the message behind the meaning of the festival.
During my youthful years growing up in Ankerville (home of Dr. Jagan), Holika was planted at the back of the hospital on the ball field a month earlier before the actual burning of the pyre.  Dried branches of trees and other burning materials were heaped together; dried coconut branches were added to the pyre over time.  During many of the ensuing nights, members of the chowtal groups in each village took turn singing chowtals and taans (folk singing) at each other’s home where delicacies and tea (or often rum) were served.  The youths (including non-Indians) looked forward for the nightly sessions; delicious snacks and enjoyable drinks were served.
As Phagwah Day approached, phagwah mania was all over the place, especially among the youth who accompanied the adults on their nightly singing.  For the students, the festivity would begin on the last school day before Phagwah with a prayer service and a cultural variety concert.  Then students would spray abeer or splash powder on each other.  After school, students would throw each other in some drain as part of the fun.
By Holika night, the Holika pyre would become a mountain in size and set ablaze at midnight after prayers, ritual invocations and chowtaal singing. The celebration commenced with the splashing of water mixed with ash on each other after midnight. The rest of the evening and through the morning the men would sing chowtaal (with clanging majeera and the beat of dholak and tassa).  Nearby villages had similar celebrations and groups visited each other’s villages to sing chowtaals in an unofficial competition. Several Africans joined in the singing and in the burning of the Holika. In Port Mourant and Rose Hall Town, the few Chinese, Portuguese and Mixed also partook in the celebrations.
The chowtaal groups would sing with the accompaniment of music for hours while consuming alcohol. The revelry and singing would continue throughout the night until the mid-morning. Then the men would slowly begin their rhythmic tempo through the main street of the village. The group often stopped in people’s homes along the way and be entertained with delicacies or liquor or tea.  Celebrants would throw water that was often mixed with mud or cow dung, or abeer on each other.  Some of the celebrants would get thrown in dirty ravines or trenches or canals as part of the fun.  By the mid-morning, the so called dirty part of the celebration ends and participants clean up and get ready for the evening celebration, which was very sober.
In the late afternoon, celebrants, dressed in clean white clothing, make their way through the village and or to neighbouring villages, armed with a pitchkari or spray bottle with colourful abeer and talc powder “playing phagwah” with the whole village and beyond.  Almost every home would be visited. People with faces smeared with colour look adorable. They would exchange good wishes, sweets, cards and gifts (sweets and foods).
Hindus and non-Hindus, and visitors would partake in the delicacies before the banning of foods (such as bara, gulgula, phulourie, bigany, mango chutney, potato ball, prasad, channa, ghoja, kheer, among others prepared for the occasion.  Food was always plentiful and the youths would have a feast of allou curry with dhal puri and the other dainty dishes and the cold soft drinks.
Also, on Phagwah Day, it was traditional for Hindus to distribute sweets or mitai and food to non-Hindus or those Hindus who could not celebrate Phagwah because of the recent death of a relative. Non-Hindus are also invited for dinner for the occasion. Africans would visit the homes of Hindus for an entertaining evening when the groups lived in harmony and were not divided by politics and race-baiters.
Vishnu Bisram

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