Was there in Delhi for Diwali :The festival of Lights, the festival where gifts, sweets and dry-fruits are exchanged as a symbol of prosperity. The festival of Diwali mela's and crackers and of course the festival of Diya's, Daaru and Teen Patti...No other festival I know of has this many dimensions...
We all have heard the term "festive spirit" an awful lot....over the years the only spirit that I have witnessed during festival time is the one that gets consumed!!! Well, this Diwali was no different for many Delhites. Yes, the unfortunate blasts did dampen the "spirit". The dead were remembered with candles and diyas being lit at site of the blasts in their memory.
 Coming back to the lights part....there was an abundance of the varieties of Diyas and Candles that were available in the market. What seem to have caught the fancy of most are the floating candles.Ofcourse the Chinese had a good part to play as there were lots of crackers from China. I remember having to dig out the old "ladi" (string) of lights every Diwali and standing with a tester in hand and extra bulble trying to get the lights working. Now only a fool would go through the pains. You get beautiful LED ladis with all kinds of different flicker combinations for 25-30 bucks!!! Use and throw!! But I am a true blue Indian...I believe in Use and Re-Use and Re-Use till the damned thing doesn't work!!
 Meanwhile a growing majority took to what has become the "thing-to-do" during the weeks preceeding Diwali...playing Teen Patti aka Flash or for the uninitiated lot a card game most preferred for gambling.
I guess like all other things this too has a mythological connection. It is believed that on this day, Goddess Parvati played dice with her husband Lord Shiva and she decreed that whosoever gambled on Diwali night would prosper throughout the ensuing year.
What goes along unsaid with this is the modern tradition of drinking! Reminds me of Big B's dialogue in Sholay ....the one where he goes "daaru bhi tabhi peeta hai jab jua khelta hai"...or something along those lines.
Now, I have been willy-nilly a part of this whole daru and teen patti tradition but what used to amaze me is the single minded dedication with which people approach it. During the 2, almost 3 weeks that preceed Diwali, people meet up for playing cards almost every second night with the frequency, hours of play, booze consumed and the stakes increasing as Diwali night approaches. People don't really bother whether the host is known to them or not, as long as you have an invitee along with you almost anybody is welcome. In fact the more the merrier!! There's a common purse to which all contribute to an initial agreed amount and from the winnings as and when. This helps recover all the expenses for the party. No free lunches here!!
Like I mentioned the drive to play is so high that no matter how late you were the previous night or how much you lost or how much you had to drink the previous night does'nt seem to come in the way of going for the next patti session!! Another thing is how much people are willing to stretch over and above their means to be able to be a part of this craze.
People win big and loose bigger...Diwali in many ways is a great leveller.. The common question when friends meet is not "How are you doing?" but "Are you up or down this season?"
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I found the answers to many of these questions this Diwali. As they would say in Delhi... I was "UP" this season!!!
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