Diwali celebration lights up Concord church

A celebration of Diwali – the Hindu competition of lights – drew greater than 100 folks to the Unitarian Universalist Church of Harmony on Sunday night.

In a packed corridor, folks dug into trays of Nepali meals, clapped alongside to songs and danced to conventional music from the band Himalayan Desires.

Obhed Giri of Manchester was there along with his youngsters. He was born in Bhutan however got here to the U.S. as a toddler. He has few reminiscences of Diwali from earlier than that point, and desires to verify his youngsters can expertise it. His daughter, Srisha, was considered one of three school-aged ladies emceeing the festivities.

“I need them to study the tradition, background, the place their dad and mother had been from,” he mentioned.

Suraj Budathoki of Manchester, who helped set up the occasion, described Diwali as a time when faraway relations come collectively, bless each other and rejoice with meals, music and dance.

He mentioned organizers made a degree of involving younger folks within the occasion, to verify these traditions move on to youngsters rising up within the U.S.

“When we don’t protect it, our youngsters, they don’t realize it,” he mentioned. “So we really feel prefer it’s essential to rejoice this, and in addition educate our youngsters, the youthful era, what it’s about.”

Budathoki, who’s operating for a State Home seat in Manchester, mentioned he got here to the U.S. as a refugee in 2009. Initially from Bhutan, his household was among the many tens of hundreds of ethnically Nepali residents expelled by the Bhutanese authorities within the early Nineteen Nineties. Aged 9 on the time, he spent the following 19 years in a refugee camp in Nepal.

“They thought that we’re totally different and felt a risk from this, you understand, totally different tradition,” he mentioned. That included their Nepali language and Hindu traditions. “And now after we get this chance to rejoice, we love to do that and we wish to proceed to rejoice this Diwali.”

The emcees started the festivities by describing Diwali as symbolizing “the triumph of sunshine over darkness” and alluring Harmony Mayor Byron Champlin and a minister from the church to mild a pair of conventional oil lamps, or panas.

That was adopted with a efficiency by Harimaya Adhikari and Sagar Khatiwada, two classically educated musicians from Nepal who’re on the college of the Harmony Group Music Faculty; a dance efficiency by Bipana Begha; and conventional music from the New England-based band Himalayan Desires.

Thursday formally marks Diwali.

Vijay Bhujel mentioned that in Nepal, it’s a multi-day competition, with homes decked out in lights and flowers.

Bhujel is from Bhutan and lived in a refugee camp in Nepal for 20 years earlier than settling in Harmony in 2012. He mentioned Harmony’s been very welcoming, together with the group’s help for occasions like this.

“Once we rejoice, they arrive collectively,” he mentioned.