Alternative names for today’s post:
Taj Mahal, Schmaj Mahal, or
So, This is What One Million People Looks Like
Alas, the days of Ganpati 2004 are over, after an exuberant night of immersions, marigold tossing, and general revelry. The crowds were immense, estimated at 1 million with about 35,000 cops standing guard. Sounds like a lot of people, right? But really it’s only about 1/17th of Mumbai’s population. Claustrophobes would not do well here.
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Every night of the past week has been set to a soundtrack of tablas and cymbals, with groups of men, women, and children dancing to the beat on the way to immerse Ganesha. Despite the heat and humidity, it really feels like Christmas, as there are lights strung up over roads, vendors selling holiday snacks, and a real sense of joy among kids. In fact, taking a tour of the Ganpati – the idols in the image of Ganesha – is a bit like touring Nativity scenes in December.
This year, Mumbai’s Ganpati range in size from two feet to about thirty feet tall and are mostly made of clay – so they’ll break apart in the sea – but some are still of plaster of paris to environmentalists’ chagrin. A resident of a neighborhood in the Opera House district told me that his idol took about 10 weeks to construct, at a cost of about $2,000 (92,000 Rs.). Other idols, like the ones that people have been wheeling around on wooden carts, probably cost less than $100, but people obviously put in as much as they can afford. More than half of the people who live in Mumbai live in dire conditions making less than $1 per day, so an elaborately colorful, relatively inexpensive Ganesha statue is a real sacrifice. You can’t really fault them, either, if their Ganpati are usually made of plaster of paris, a cheaper material.
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Not a whole lot of time for me to debrief you today, as I’m writing just before heading off to work. Nevertheless, I wanted to send you a few pics that I captured last night of some of the Ganesha idols in the neighborhood. They are incredible! The pictures can not begin to capture the glitter and ornamentation, plus the web doesn’t allow you to inhale the incense that accompanies the Ganpatiyan (
