Here is a selfie from the lunch to start Oriya new year.
We all gathered for a sumptuous lunch at Leesa's house and a selfie was unavoidable.
April 16, 2014
Happy New Year !!
It is 15th of April!
But in Orissa, the new year start with Pana Shankranti. It is considered auspicious for Oriya people to start the day visiting temples to offer Pana(a drink made of dry fruits, fruits, sugar, milk, curd, jaggery and sweet condensed milk) to the Linga of Lord Shiva and auspicious plant.
In the evening this delicious drink is shared between families, relatives, friends and communities. Not that it is mandatory but adding Bhang(a paste made out of Marijuana leaves) to this drink is also a big raise for the adults in the family.
Every year, my family makes this drink to share happiness in our entire village of Bomikhal. We youngsters take the charge of preparing this drink. Like every year we peeled and cut the fruits to add into a huge bowl of milk. The bowl is as big as to serve 200-300 people in make. Thats not all we also added sweet condensed milk, grated coconuts, jaggery, curd, sugar.
Ofcourse there was a separate counter to add Marijuana if one wishes to. This was a great way to start the new year.
Shankranti = Songran
Songkran is the new year in Thailand, Cambodia and Laos. The south east asian countries celebrates one of its biggest festival of the year. Everyone puts the white chalk like powder and throws water on others to wish Happy New Year :)
The concept of the festival is like Holi in India minus the colours.
Sankranti is the Oriya and Bengali new year which is mostly towards mid April. In Orissa it is also known as Maha Vishu Sankranti for the religious people offer Pana(a delious drink made of Fruits, dry fruits, condensed sweet milk, curd and may be Marijuana) to the auspicious Basil plant, the Linga of Lord shiva. This drink is also celebrated by sharing between family, relatives and community.
As both Songkran and Shankranti is the start of the year in South east asia and East India, hence Songkran = Shankranti
April 1, 2014
IDENTICAL TWIN BROTHERS SEPARATED AT BIRTH
It is same same but different.
Today there is something to share here in my blog which surprised me this morning.
Its been twice in the last one and half year that we celebrated Bali Jatra(Voyage to Bali) in my blog.
Just to refresh, Bali Jatra is an annual festival celebrated in my region Orissa, India to remember the ancient maritime days of trade between the east coast of India and the Islands of Java, Sumatra and Bali.
I have travelled in Indonesia and been to the Island of Bali twice. In my journeys I have found many similarities betwen the Bali and Orissa. Walking in the markets I have always felt that we have the same range of products.
So coming back to my surprise, I came across one of the pictures of the Instagrammer I follow and it got me all excited. Her page in Instagram is called Ecogypsy and she shares beautiful pictures from her travel. Currently its about Indonesia and she had shared the famous Ikat & batik fabrics of Bali Island. I was surprised that these fabrics are also very famous in Orissa and primarily hand made in the city of Sambalpur.
Its very popular and happens often in Bollywood cinemas, where one fine two identical persons meet to realize they are twins who got separated at birth.
So for the similarity like two identical twins these hand made & tie-dye fabrics must have originated in Orissa and gone to Bali for the exchange of trade or visa versa.
As its same same but only from different places of the world.
Sometimes our world turns out to be very small place.
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