HAPPY THAI PONGAL!
Each year we learn about this interesting and colorful harvest festival on the Tamil calendar year from Sri Lanka, neighbor to India. We listened today to Sri Lankan Radio on Youtube to get a feel for the music which greatly resembles traditional Indian music in its instrumentation and semi-tones. Check it out below!
We also learned three important things about the festival:
1) People boil rice and milk until it bubbles over in pots, to symbolize prosperity. Sometimes honey is added! We pretended to cook up rice today and talked about how hot it gets.
2) Cows and their milk are considered very valuable and precious in Sri Lanka. Cows are revered on Thai Pongal by adorning them with necklaces. Today we decorated a puppet cow with beaded necklaces and also the children pretended to be cows as I placed necklaces around their necks!
3.) During Thai Pongal, beautiful designs are made in the home on the floor and doorsteps with colored rice or chalk, or other materials. The elaborate designs are called "kolam." Traditionally, these designs are made only by women but today we all gave it a try and also got a wonderful opportunity to talk about geometry and shapes. SO much fun!
QUESTIONS TO ASK YOUR CHILD
1. What animal wears a necklace during Thai Pongal? Cows!
2) What bubbles over in the pot during Thai Pongal celebrations? Rice and milk!