Pongal is the Tamil New Year and the Harvest Festival and is best experienced in a small rural town, or so we’ve been told. Thanjavur is considered the rice bowl of southeast India and has many small villages so we came here in search of the festivities. Once again first world expectations and 3rd world reality don’t often meet at the same junction if ever.We arrived to find most of the hotels totally booked and the shops and restaurants closed because Pongal is a ‘family’ holiday and 
while the town is flooded with Indians from far and near they are all with family behind their closed doors. Fortunately we did discover that the Indian government offered a free cultural tour for foreigners and a series of evening music and dance concerts in their effort to enhance tourism, boost India's image and of lesser consequence to celebrate Pongal. So we headed out for the evening performance and decided to join the tour the following morning.
Indians love noise and love it at full volume hence the evening Music and Dance performance
was no different. It started at a full crescendo which couldn’t possibly go louder but did manage to increase in speed and the 
frenetic glee of the performers and Indian audience. Meanwhile the western audience was pop-eyed in shock and made desperate attempts to politely shield their ears. Ear piercing can not even begin to describe the sound that was penetrating every molecule of our flinching ear canals. Thankfully being the consummate travelers we were well prepared and quickly donned our OSHA safety earplugs. Being polite in India is not one of our worries but coming home deaf is! The concert continued and as most of us westerners crept away the Indians happily filled our VIP front row seats.
Janet and I planned for an early pre-tour breakfast the next morning and were assured by our hotel that the restaurant would be open at 6:30. Great! Come morning we were greeted and seated only to be informed that the restaurant is open but no food is available until 7:30. What were we thinking! No worries, the tour got a prompt Indian start 1 ½ hours later than schedule so we did get to eat after all.
The tour proved to be a huge photo op for the Counsel on India Tourism and yet another opportunity for us to observe the w
onders of total Indian mayhem first hand. It followed the usual path of late buses only to be enhanced by a downpour and huge crowds of local Indian tourist also attending the free concert. We were ushered into the special ‘VIP white foreign tourist zone’ and listened to maybe 20 minutes (thank god) of the all day concert, photographed and ushered out to the next event…the bullock cart ride.
It’s lightly raining and we are loaded onto several oxcarts to be driven to the nearby small village for the next cultural performance. The beauty of the surrounding rice paddies escape us in the now pouring rain and the traffic which is being creating by the Indian tour o
rganizers trying to pass and photograph us from their cars and our empty dry bus.
Drenched we are next ushered into the empty concrete bunker concert hall. The dancers are delayed, due to the
rain and traffic but the more important photographers are there to continue the shoot. The French tourist laugh and burst into song, the Indian drummers arrive and join in the fest followed by the dancers and the Indian diplomats. The Indian camera crew goes wild as stage and audience merge into one mass of noise and flashing cameras. The line of camera crew then assume center stage completely upstaging and pushing back the performers as they face the audience and flash 
away at the ‘holy white tourist’ in attendance. Truely theater of the absurd, India style.
while the town is flooded with Indians from far and near they are all with family behind their closed doors. Fortunately we did discover that the Indian government offered a free cultural tour for foreigners and a series of evening music and dance concerts in their effort to enhance tourism, boost India's image and of lesser consequence to celebrate Pongal. So we headed out for the evening performance and decided to join the tour the following morning.Indians love noise and love it at full volume hence the evening Music and Dance performance
was no different. It started at a full crescendo which couldn’t possibly go louder but did manage to increase in speed and the 
frenetic glee of the performers and Indian audience. Meanwhile the western audience was pop-eyed in shock and made desperate attempts to politely shield their ears. Ear piercing can not even begin to describe the sound that was penetrating every molecule of our flinching ear canals. Thankfully being the consummate travelers we were well prepared and quickly donned our OSHA safety earplugs. Being polite in India is not one of our worries but coming home deaf is! The concert continued and as most of us westerners crept away the Indians happily filled our VIP front row seats.
Janet and I planned for an early pre-tour breakfast the next morning and were assured by our hotel that the restaurant would be open at 6:30. Great! Come morning we were greeted and seated only to be informed that the restaurant is open but no food is available until 7:30. What were we thinking! No worries, the tour got a prompt Indian start 1 ½ hours later than schedule so we did get to eat after all.
The tour proved to be a huge photo op for the Counsel on India Tourism and yet another opportunity for us to observe the w
onders of total Indian mayhem first hand. It followed the usual path of late buses only to be enhanced by a downpour and huge crowds of local Indian tourist also attending the free concert. We were ushered into the special ‘VIP white foreign tourist zone’ and listened to maybe 20 minutes (thank god) of the all day concert, photographed and ushered out to the next event…the bullock cart ride.It’s lightly raining and we are loaded onto several oxcarts to be driven to the nearby small village for the next cultural performance. The beauty of the surrounding rice paddies escape us in the now pouring rain and the traffic which is being creating by the Indian tour o
rganizers trying to pass and photograph us from their cars and our empty dry bus.Drenched we are next ushered into the empty concrete bunker concert hall. The dancers are delayed, due to the
rain and traffic but the more important photographers are there to continue the shoot. The French tourist laugh and burst into song, the Indian drummers arrive and join in the fest followed by the dancers and the Indian diplomats. The Indian camera crew goes wild as stage and audience merge into one mass of noise and flashing cameras. The line of camera crew then assume center stage completely upstaging and pushing back the performers as they face the audience and flash 
away at the ‘holy white tourist’ in attendance. Truely theater of the absurd, India style.
Once again, we are the real focal point of the show. Photos completed the camera crew exits followed by the front row of Indian diplomats and next our entire front foreign tourist section is once again whisked out as the performance continues behind us. We follow like sheep through 
the mud and downpour to the rice making demonstration photo shoot and back again through the rain and mud to the final lunch photo shoot. All in all it was a grand success for everyone concerned. We tourists had a hysterical time laughing our way through the mayhem and the India Counsel on Tourism got hundreds of photos of smiling tourists.
the mud and downpour to the rice making demonstration photo shoot and back again through the rain and mud to the final lunch photo shoot. All in all it was a grand success for everyone concerned. We tourists had a hysterical time laughing our way through the mayhem and the India Counsel on Tourism got hundreds of photos of smiling tourists.
So the celebrity continues. Poor camera-shy Patti! This must be horrible for you.
ReplyDeleteI like the fact that your ear plugs are the same color as your leis. Nicely done!