Celebrating the Tamil month of "Margazhi" in the 90s

"Margazhi" is the most important of all the Tamil months. It is celebrated from mid December to mid January. It is also called "Dhanur masam"(month).Lord Krishna is worshipped  specifically during this month. Several poojas and bhajans will be sung in praise of him. In fact Lord Krishna has himself said in Bhagavath Gita that he is "Margazhi" among all the months.

Though several people follow our customs even today, the significance and the charm of this month is incomparable to how it was earlier. I have shared my memories of how margazhi was  celebrated during my childhood days in the 90s.

I was brought up in the agraharam of Mylapore Sri Vendata Desikar temple(near chitrakulam).We were a huge gang of friends. To me, marghazhi reminds me of these memories, 

My mother used to put a grand kolam early morning around 5am or 5.15am (I wouldn't call it a rangoli as she didn't have time to colour it apart from festival days as she has to rush to office at 8 am. It was a traditional rice flour Kolam) outside our rented independent house. We were staying in a joint family then, consisting of my paternal grandparents, my parents, my younger brother, my paternal uncle and aunties. She used to keep two lamps outside our house in the morning as a custom after putting the kolam.

I almost woke up everyday listening to "Thiruppavai" audio cassette sung by Smt Sudha Raghunathan. By the time I have bath and settle down, there will be bhajan group consisting of around 10 people singing bhajans entering our street. From then on, the competition starts among our friends. Each of us will rush out with a cup of rice competing as to who will give rice to them There will be a person in the bhajan group to collect it. As a custom we will give them rice, go around them as a mark of respect and  bow to them.  If any of us slept on any particular day and missed to come out for bhajan, we considered it as a disgrace.

During half yearly holidays, it was regular for me and my brother to accompany our grandpa to the temple. As he used to chant sloka(a member of ghoshti) we had the privilege of going inside the garbagraha (holy sanctum) which otherwise was restricted to common people until the some routines were performed.

We were then, given hot pongal as prasad. Sometimes we friends used to play inside the temple premises for sometime after having pongal and worshipping God :-)

Good old times!!!