Here comes the sun

"Do your people in India also mark the solstice?"

An interesting question for this retired professor.

I chose to stay away from beginning with an explanation of uttarayanam and dhakshinayanam.  They respectively refer to the (apparent) northward and southward movement of the sun.  After the winter solstice, the sun begins to move northward bringing more light and heat to the northern hemisphere, which includes the Subcontinent.

"Of course" I told him.  "In fact, the big celebration of the northward movement of the sun happens in mid-January in my old part of India.  It is a three-day festival."

"Is it a particularly Hindu thing?"

"Traditionally, a long time ago, there were no Muslims and Christians, and it was a bunch of beliefs that we refer to as Hindu.  It is a celebration of life itself" I replied.

I didn't want to bug him about the long and rich Tamil history according to which Pongal seems to have been celebrated as long as 2,000 years ago.

Pongal as a marker of time and as a symbol of the cosmic mystery itself is what Carl Sagan talks about in this segment on Hinduism in his phenomenally influential television series, Cosmos.  The video footage includes everything that happens over the three-day celebration: The cleaning up of homes and the whitewashing of the exteriors; the newly harvested rice being boiled--the boiling overflow itself giving the name Pongal; the cows and bulls treated specially on the third day; sugarcane and turmeric being part of the celebrations; ...

Thankfully, he didn't ask me why the festival is being celebrated three weeks after the solstice.  Because, that is a question that requires a technical understanding of earth's rotation and gravity that is simply beyond my capabilities, and I would have certainly bullshitted a response.  All I know is that about 2,000 years ago, Pongal did coincide with the solstice and since then the date has drifted away in the Tamil calendar.

As a child, I feasted on sakkarapongal with extra helpings of ghee.  Mid-afternoon, my brother and I would sit in the backyard and chew on the sugarcane, and once we were also stupid enough to try juicing it.  

Life is all about creating memories and re-living them in our minds.  My pongal memories overflow the mind.

As we say in the old country, pongalo pongal!