தீபாவளி வாழ்த்துக்கள்!!

Happy Deepavali, everyone! 

Today is one of the most important indian celebrations: the festival of lights. Due to the high percentage of indian people in Singapore this day is also a national holiday here. Even though the celebration is not as impressive as in Idia the indian population in singapore also knows how to celebrate its festivities.

Apparently there are not many activities planned for today (people meet with family and friends and celebrate the holiday) but yesterday there was a count-down concert to welcome Deepavali.

The show was very funny (for indian people probably even more, since the host was cracking one joke after another in Tamil. Apart from our small group that was standing there looking for some hints about his comments, everyone was laughing and clapping all the time). The part we saw was some kind of dance contest, where they picked people from the audience who had to dance to music for about 10 seconds. They did so in a very enthusiastic manner and with very ... exotic, yes, let's go with exotic... moves. It was totally fun to watch and the audience was on fire. The only strange thing about it was the fact that the immense crowd was (as usual) 99% indian and male so they were basically men dancing for men who were shouting and clapping more than most cheerleaders I have seen.

This is a picture of one of the streets. I still don't understand who on earth would drive through THESE streets with the car on Deepavali. There was an incredible jam, because apparently everyone felt the huge necessity of spending about 50 liters of gas in order to drive among this super-crowded part of town.

At midnight the fireworks started. They were very nice and the people really enjoyed them (they were shouting to every explosion like crazy). There is a chance some of then migh have been a little drunk, I guess...

Last but not least the entrance to one of the streets (with the drivers who could not wait to spend the next 2 hours of their lifes in their vehicles). It was great fun and today we had a day off. What more could I want?