Festival of Colors

{friends}
{one big colorful crowd}

{Hindu temple. Utah mountains.}

{inside the temple. cool musicians.}

{chilling before the festivities}

{Stacy, me, Avriell, Anna, and Emily(my roommate)}

{Stacy goes crowd surfing}

Always looking for the cultural experience, last weekend my friends and I went to HOLI, the Festival of Colors in Spanish Fork, UT. It was sweet seeing this massive Hindu up on a hill in predominately LDS Spanish Fork. The temple is called the Sri Sri Radha Krishna temple. And it looks like something straight out of India. This festival is a Hindu religious spring event, but lots of non-Hindu people attend just for the experience. There were so many people there and I thought it was a pretty accurate depiction of what it would be like to visit India, the 2nd most populated country in the world. Everyone really goes for the color part, the part where you get to throw the colored chalky powder you have bought all over your friends.

Everyone chants the Sanskrit mantra:

Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna

Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare,

Hare Rama, Hare Rama,

Rama Rama, Hare Hare

over and over again. It is the only lyrics to all the songs that they sing. And you probably say it a million times throughout the whole festival. This chant is believed to bring a higher level of conciousness and according to some theologies this conciousness takes on the form of the pure love of God (Krisna).

It was an incredible experience.