March 7, 2010 — Last weekend, I received an email with the subject line “Holi Shit!” from my friend Ashwin. He was referring, of course, to Holi, the grand festival of colors that Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and others celebrate to welcome spring. The tradition involves throwing dye, baby powder, and colored water at each other to “chase away the winter grays.”
And what a springtime day it was. Sunny. Warm. Miraculous. Easily the nicest day of the year so far. Kelly and I arrived with Andrew and Mayra in the back seat of the Volvo to a strange, foreign part of New York City called Richmond Hill. It’s the kind of Queens neighborhood where the nearest subway is a 20 minute walk and people live in actual houses with neon painted cars in the driveway that look like the Delorean.
We headed towards 95th Street and 125th Avenue — or 125th Street and 95th Avenue. Whichever. These were all crazy numbers to a Brooklynite anyhow. Eventually, we arrived at the epicenter that was Smokey Oval Park. To get a lay of the land, I walked towards the entrance and within seconds some elderly Indian lady came up to me and straight up smeared half my face with hot pink dye. “Happy holi, baba!” she said, giggling. The others got a good kick out of it but a split second later they too fell prey to these ancient customs. I felt especially bad for Andrew, who was easily the tallest, whitest person around — and in a clean, white hoodie to boot!
Quickly, we retreated to a safe corner a couple of blocks away. We were defenseless with no dye of our own. Our supply was in the hands of Ashwin, who at the moment was busy looking for parking, which was no small feat. An estimated 25,000 people were expected to partake in the festivities which would make it the biggest celebration in North America.
Eventually we found Ashwin and crew and promptly loaded up with packets of dye, plastic bottles filled with colored water and copious amounts of whiskey. First, we smeared each other with our newly acquired ammo and then entered the park to spread some love to the masses.
Somewhere in all this, I managed to wrap my film camera in a plastic grocery bag and snapped the following photographs. The biggest miracle of the entire celebration was that none of my equipment got destroyed in all the insanity. Holi shit, indeed!
Won’t you join us next year?
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killer shots, bruddah. it’s definitely on next year
Wow. I heard about that but forgot to go. I’m curious to know about the cleanup process.. and maybe you have a car, but how did you manage to avoid dying your car, apartment, etc..
coolness.
I concur. Easily the best ethnic festival I’ve ever been to in my life.
@Molly. We parked a few blocks away, so our car was fine. We brought extra clothes to change into and Andrew and Mayra ended up wearing garbage bags on the ride home.
But when we got back to Brooklyn, we definitely got some curious stares from pedestrians when we stopped at lights. (It didn’t help that Andrew looked like Lord Sith with his bright red face.) I also had to wash my hair about 15 times to get everything off. Totally worth it all and would do it again next year in a heartbeat!
@Jocelyn. You finally made it onto my blog. Congrats!
You’re a brave man for taking your camera! Thanks for sharing. I might actually make the trek next year.
Ahh, I’m so jealous! Holi Festival is one of Those Things on my Life List. I thought I’d have to go to India to see it…. but of course, I should have looked for something in Queens! [palm slaps forehead] Your photos make me even more determined to find some place to celebrate next year!
Yeah, afterwards we all went home and looked at photos of the festival in India. The entire city goes all out and they don’t use baby powder (which, mixed with water and dye just make things sticky!). Queens was pretty awesome but still confined to the park. Holi festival in India is definitely on my list of things to do before I die.
Wow! I totally want to do this next year. Reminds me of Street Painting!