Finally, my family and I have moved into our new house after an elaborate (needlessly tiring and long but elaborate sounds more fancy) house warming ceremony. My house has been in construction for nearly an entire year, with way too much work; countless decisions were made about the tiling, wardrobes, decorations and all those tiny details which nobody ever notices when they come to your house. It was tedious work- for my parents at least; I was never the kind of perfectionist to care about how my house looks as long as it has four walls and a roof. For the house warming ceremony, we had tons of guests, friends, distant as well as close relatives,who came from far away places. The ceremony was fun and exciting if you enjoy sitting around till your feet fall off or if you believe in god (I fall in neither of these categories). I witnessed some elaborate customs, during the house warming ceremony, which left me intrigued- the atheist in me tried to find some logical way in which this pooja could actually help our house but God refused to prove his existence to me.

The pooja(remember this word? It was in one of my first My Travels. Go back and read it so you can remember what it means) started at 4:00 AM in the morning. Yes you read that right, 4:00 AM as in 6 hours earlier than any lazy person would wake up. A band was blaring traditional Indian music and a priest who’s voice was so loud that it put crying babies to shame, was uttering a prayer in a language that sounded vaguely like a man trying to talk and swallow at the same time with a mouth full of food- I’m sure our new neighbours loved us with all the noise. First my Mom had to garland the cow and apply turmeric on its face so that we could get its blessings (You thought holy cow was just an expression? Here, we worship them!), before leading the cow into the house. As the priest said walking a cow inside the new house, is considered synonymous to walking the Hindu goddess Lakshmi(Goddess of wealth) in the house, which is supposed to bring good luck and prosperity to the people living in the house. If I was a goddess, I would not want to be considered tantamount to a cow but what do I know about Indian traditions?(Oh wait. I’m Indian. I am supposed to know about Indian traditions). It seems in the olden days, after this pooja, the cow is given over to the priest as a gift(maybe we wouldn’t have had to pay him then. After all who wouldn’t do anything for a cow), but now the cow was taken home by the dude we paid to bring it (You know there are actually companies who do nothing but supply cows and other holy animals for poojas. Imagine that- doing nothing but dealing with cows. Not my dream job.)

Among other poojas, my parents sat down to do Vastu Shanti, which literally means House Peace, which is done by Homam(pyre). The pyre was made of nine types of wooden sticks, and decorated with other pooja materials like camphor, flattened rice and cow ghee. Does this sound like I am giving a history lecture that teaches about Indian Traditions? Well, I had to go through the boring, so you shall listen to the boring *cue evil laughter*. Anyways, it seems burning a large bonfire in the middle of a house is performed to prevent harmful influences to the planet, to remove negative vibrations and to create a peaceful environment. Apparently, throwing food, butter and fruits into a fire is more beneficial to the world then the CO 2 and CH 4 and god knows whatever poisonous gases get released in a fire (Oh wait, he doesn’t. Otherwise we wouldn’t be doing this in his name). We could have fed a small family for one day but instead just turned it all to ash.

Finally we all sat in the Satyanarayan Swamy pooja for two more hours, which felt like eternity for me (Advice to others having to sit through this pooja: don’t count every second for 2 hours, that just makes it seem longer). This particular pooja, starts by performing something called Ganesh pooja, to ensure any obstacles that may occur as a result of incorrectly performing(basically the priest knows he is going to make a mistake) the pooja are removed. Next step in this pooja is to do Navagraha(Nava meaning Nine, graha meaning planet ) pooja. We basically pray to nine different kinds of pulses or cereals, each representing a planet (Want to guess which planet was tastiest?). Again, nice going God, wasting some more food.

So basically, I moved into a new house. I know some of you are thinking “so you just gave us a 600 word lesson on Indian pooja’s to tell us that?” Well, the main point of this is not to tell you I moved- it was to tell you how long and often meaningless I find these poojas to be. No offense to all those very religious Hindus who may be reading this- I understand that you see it as a way of worshiping your god and you may call me a heretic for claiming that guy doesn’t exist but next time you do a pooja just think- Is all this really going to help you or the planet?