Yuba City Sikh Parade and selfless service
Last Sunday, Sikh Community from all over the globe thronged Yuba City to attend 42nd Annual Sikh Parade. This threeday event, welcoming people of all faiths, was attended by over 100,000 persons and has been celebrated annually since 1979 over the first weekend of November each year. Forced cancelation by pandemic last year, motivated Sikh Community to spring back with full force this year.
The event commemorates the day of enthronement of Holy Sri Guru Granth Sahib (Sikh Scripture) as eternal and everlasting Guru of the Sikh Faith by its Tenth Living Master-Sri Guru Gobind Singh.
This year, celebrations kick started with fireworks on Friday, followed by Nishan Sahib (Sikh Flag) raising ceremony on Saturday and Nagar Keertan (Sikh Parade) on Sunday. Nagar Keertan is processional singing of hymns from Sri Guru Granth Sahib. Decorated float of Sri Guru Granth Sahib led the parade followed by walking attendees and other floats, covering loop of 4-5 miles in about five hours.
Inside the assembly hall of Sikh Gurdwara (Place of worship) of Tierra Buena (Yuba City), recitation of holy hymns continued nonstop, starting Friday morning till Sunday evening.
Beautifully decorated Bazaar selling Asian-Indian articles, tents set up by prominent organizations disseminating information about their activities, kept the crowds busy.
Volunteer groups could be seen at stalls serving Langar (free food) to all. Pop-up tents set-up by groups or families, along the roads leading to Gurdwara, served cooked meals with breads, fried appetizers, desserts, fresh juices and canned beverages. The menu of each group is rarely repeated.
Our friends group assisted in operations of crowd control, shoe racks, strollers, lockers and handwashing for the devotees visiting the assembly hall to pay obeisance to Holy Sri Guru Granth Sahib.
Other volunteers did selfless services at vaccination centers, medical clinics, baby changing stations, trash cleanup and giving free rides to car parking lots.
In Sikhism, the selfless volunteer services, known as Seva, is considered a great opportunity to inculcate basic principles of sharing, equality and humility, which leads to the ultimate freedom from the birth and death cycle. Here are a few teachings from Sri Guru Granth Sahib, motivating a Sikh for Seva:
• Serve humanity as one and equal, the same Divine Light shines within everyone.
• Do Seva (selfless service) and share your earnings, to find peace and attain a place of honor in the court of Almighty.
• True and sincere Seva of the divine congregations is the Seva of the Almighty. By doing so the mind is free of anxiety, ego, self-conceit and the treasure of the Naam (meditation) is obtained. The pains of birth and death are eradicated. Thereby one achieves the ultimate state of remaining absorbed in the Almighty.
• Seva is bestowed to those only, who have a pre-ordained destiny.
• Without Seva, cursed are the hands and feet, and useless are other deeds.
To provide a platform for Seva, Guru Nanak (The First Master), introduced the institution of Langar, thus Langar becoming a part of every Sikh Gurdwara, around the globe. Langar is constituted of a community kitchen and dining where all, irrespective of caste, sex, religion or nationality, sit in the same row and partake the same food without any discrimination, thereby translating the basic Sikh principles into practice.
For instance, Gurdwara Sri Harmandir Sahib (also known as the Golden Temple) located at Amritsar (India) serves Langar to over 50,000 daily. Sikh Gurdwaras nourished people all over the globe during the recent pandemic. Bangla Sahib (A Sikh Gurdwara in New Delhi, India) distributed food to 400,000 people a day, when the pandemic was at its peak. During 9/11, New York Sikh Gurdwaras distributed over 100,000 bottles of water on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan and fed more than 5,000 meals daily during pandemic peak. Gurdwaras pitched in with all their might, when Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc along the East Coast, in 2012.
Thus, billions of people are fed around the globe each day, with this pious institution of Langar.
And the Sikhs feel blessed to do seva leading towards the path of salvation from this birth and death cycle.
We look forward to serve all, especially those who missed this year, for the 2022 Annual Celebrations at Sikh Gurdwara, 2468 Tierra Buena Road, Yuba City.