New Year excitement

The Telugu and Hindi new years will be celebrated on March 18. We highlight the significance and events scheduled.

The Telugu and Hindi-speaking communities are gearing up to celebrate their New Year on Sunday. Young devotees Chayan Naidu, 6, of Malvern, and Kriya Shakti Garrib, 3, of Clare Estate, get into the spirit of the celebrations at the Durban Hindu Temple in Somtseu Road.

NGood, bad, happy and sad times can be tasted in traditional dishes

EW year’s day (Ugadi) is the most significant of festivals celebrated by the Andhra Maha Sabha of South Africa. Ugadi marks the beginning of the Telugu New Year and a new Hindu lunar calendar with a change in the moon’s orbit.

It is a day when mantras are chanted and predictions made. Ug means an era, while gadi means the beginning.

It is believed that the creator of the Hindu pantheon, Lord Brahma, started creation on this day, creating the earth and set days, nights, dates, weeks, fortnights, months, seasons, and years to count the time.

It also brings happiness with the onset of Vasanth Ruthu (spring).

The Telugu calendar has a cycle of 60 years (nama samvastharas) and each year has a special name. This year, on March 18, is the year 5119 in the Telugu calendar, and is called Vilambi.

On the morning of Ugadi, people get up early to spruce up their houses and themselves. An oil bath is taken and new clothes worn. It is a sacred day of prayer.

Mango leaves decorate doorways and Muguloos decorate entrances. A special dish with six kinds of tastes, called Ugadi Pachchadi, is prepared.

The different tastes, when mixed in just portions, result in a delicious dish.

The underlying theme conveys the six faces of life, namely sweet (jaggery), which adds love and happiness, salty (salt) adds taste to life, bitter (neem leaves) represents the unhappy moments, sour (tamarind) are the sad moments, raw (mango) are the disgraceful moments and hot (chillies) are the angry moments.

When added together the dish indicates that life has a mixture of good and bad, happy and sad. All experiences have to be treated equally and one should resolve to face whatever happens in the year and accept it with good grace. Delicious meals are prepared, like pulihora (yellow tamarind rice) and payasam (keer). Relatives and friends are invited to partake in the meals.

They pray for their health and prosperity and success in their business. Resolutions are made to change individual ways – promising to give up bad qualities.

In the evening, people go to the temple to hear predictions and forecasts. The celebration of Ugadi is marked by religious zeal and social merriment.

These functions serve as a catalyst for Telugus to reaffirm their culture and language.

The Andhra Maha Sabha of SA will celebrate this event at the Andhra Cultural Centre in Havenside, at 2.30pm on March 18.