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Report
of the Holi Program on March 20, 99 |
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Contents |
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General Overview |
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Melana |
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Bhajan |
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Panel Discussion |
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- Kanan Mishra
- Pitamber Sarangi
- Jogesh Pati
- Discussion
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Cultural Program |
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Dinner |
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Cleaning |
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Note: Holi program was arranged
by the Oriya Bhajan Group at Siva Vishnu temple auditorium,
Lanham, Maryland.
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General
Overview |
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Although we planned to start
on time, due to the reasons beyond our control it became late.
The Bharat Natyam program continued beyond their time limit
due to the mistake of the people who had booked the hall before
them. The mistake of the first group affected all the programs
making chain reactions.
The experience also taught us some lessons. Our surrounding
is a significant factor which could affect our plans and principles
anytime. We hope the lessons we learned from our experiences
will guide our future actions.
We started late. But we are proud for all the participants
of the Holi program as they all did their duty of reaching
on time which was on their control. In Gita it says:
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karmani ewa
adhikArah te mA phaleshu kadAchana
mA karmaphalahetuh bhooh mA te sangah astu akarmani |
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" Thy
right is to work only; but never to its fruits; let not the
fruit of action be thy motive, nor let thy attachment be to
inaction. "
Although late, the program started smoothly with much excitement
and cheer and playing the colors. More than 40 families and
many singles from 6 states participated in the program. Some
of them including Durga Mishra had also brought "Abira".
All the expensive clothes became colored, but nobody was annoyed.
Although some of the plans had to be immediately modified
to adapt to the new timings, the transition was smooth. |
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Melana |
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The first part of the
program was "Melana". Five "bimanas" had
arrived for the procession. They are: |
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- Radha-Krishna brought by Munmoy Mishra's family from
Richmond, Virginia;
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- Lord Jagannath brought by Indu Das's family from Philadelphia;
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- Radha-Krishna by Srikant Nayak's family from Lanham,
Maryland;
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- Lord Jagannath brought by Mahashringha Das from Catonsville,
Maryland;
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- Radha-Madan Mohan brought by Naresh Das's family from
Columbia, Maryland.
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The biman's entered
the auditorium with kirtan and playing of color. The crowd
was cheerful. After all the biman's reached the auditorium
stage, Lipishree Nayak and Madhumita Kar sang the "Arati"
(Jaya Jagadisha Hare). All the program participants came near
the Lords and did "bandApanA".
Seema Mishra was at the registration desk distributing the
program schedule, name tags and the bhajan patrika. |
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Welcome Speech
Nrusingha Mishra delivered the welcome speech. He
gave introduction about the history of the bhajan program
and its goals. |
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Bhajan |
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The second part
of the program was bhajan which started just after everybody
finished doing "bandApanA".
Children's bhajan started after that. Thay sang Oriya bhajan
"Ahe dayAmaya bishwa bihAri" and sanskrit bhajan
"Namastestu MahAmAye" accompanied by Indu Mishra
and Mrs Illa Ojha who teach the children during our regular
bhajan programs.
The Master of Ceremony for the bhajan program was Indubhusan
Mishra, who gave very nice introductions about the bhajan
songs.
Kalyan Das and Subhashri Das were helping in projecting the
bhajan songs for the audience to follow the singers.
The adult bhajan was started by Mahashakti Das, the temple
priest from ISKCON. He was accompanied by Gopal Krishna Das
and Sudhansu Das in Mrudanga and Jhanja. Surendra Roy also
accompanied him in Tabla and Naresh Das with Mrudanga. He
first sang the sanskrit bhajan "Jaya Sankha Gadadhar"
and then sang the Oriya bhajan "Prabhu keun bana udaila".
Surendra Roy sang the bhajan "Pashyati Dishi Dishi".
The other participants of the bhajan were Bigyani Das (Holi
bhajan "Sajani dekha nayana bhari"), Pramod Tripathy
(Jibanare jebe asiba sandhya), Asha Sahu (To lagi Gopadanda
Mana), Padmanabha Pradhan (Sambalpuri bhajan "Hai Krushna
hai Krushna boli").
The last two kirtans "Bana phula hare" by Surendra
Roy and "Sajanire subhilani khola kirtana" by Mahashakti
Das touched the minds of audience with devotional tunes.
The kathak dance by Srotalina Nayak was a part of the cultural
program. But to make her able to attend the Odissi dance,
she performed after the bhajan. |
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Panel
Discussion |
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Our third part
of the program was the panel discussion.The topic of the discussion
was the guiding principles for the strongest community.
First Prafulla Mishra invited the panelists Prof. Jogesh Pati,
Kanan Mishra and Pitamber Sarangi to the stage. Bigyani Das
introduced the topic and the panel session was moderated by
Prafulla Mishra. All the panel speakers were very well prepared
and their delivery styles were excellent.
Kanan
Mishra
The points discussed by Kanan Mishra are : |
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- Welcoming all kinds of people to the community.
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- Keep faith on ownself and always offer your work to
the Lord.
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- Always keep this mantra "Sangham Saranam Gachhami".
If you are in a group such as a family, a society, a state
or a country, give priority to the interest of the whole
mass than your self interest. Always have the feeling
of a community member.
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- All work is service to Lord. So always appreciate the
service of others.
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Pitamber Sarangi:
The points discussed by Pitamber Sarangi are |
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- Three types of growth, accrative, replicative and mutual.
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- Back home we have a culture to grow up with. In this
country we have to build it.
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- When Bhrugu had gone to Baruna to ask about his duties
after his education was over, Baruna told him never to
say no if anybody asked for food and shelter. In the Kaliyug
that might be risky, but we should always share the spiritual
food and shelter with the needy people.
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- Everybody should care for each other.
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- We should teach our values to our children irrespective
of the thought that they might not accept it.
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Jogesh
Pati:
Prof. Jogesh Pati discussed about three main areas
of strength that a community should have |
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- material strength that includes individual accomplishments.
Individual people build the community. Unless a person
in the community is individualy happy and content with
his ambitions, he might not contribute to the strength
of the community.
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- cultural strength should be acheived through literature,
music and appreciating the beauty in other people, culture
and society.
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- spiritual strength comes appreciating the innerself,
doing good, having compassion and love for others and
providing service to others.
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He also stated
that in Indian Society, we stress more on individual accomplishments.
In China and Japan they put more stress on the achievement
of the country as a whole. But we need a balance between the
two. And balancing these two level of acheivements we could
achieve success.
He quoted Bedanta which says "follow your
own way, but don't think that's the only way."
Quoting Ramakrishna he said that the objects
in a circle could go to the center by following their own
radius vector. They shouldn't go to other's radius vector
to reach the center.
Giving examples of nuclear force and electromagnetic force
from physics Prof. Pati said that apparently diverse objects
are not really different.
Prof. Pati talked about being consistent and determined
irrespective of unfavourable circumstances which could be
the best principles for a stronger personality as well as
for the strongest community. He gave example of Chandrasekhar
whose ideas of neutron star and black hole were rejected
initially. But he didn't give up and enjoyed working on
various ideas of his own.
Discussion:
The discussion was followed with questions and comments
by Srikant Nayak, Lipishree Nayak, Manoj Sahu, Dharitri
Mishra and Munmaya Mishra. Replying to Manoj Sahu's questions
Pitamber Sarangi discussed the right way to spend the money
we earn. According to him one-fourth of our money should
be spent on the people who make us capable of earning that
money, which includes our parents, our state, educational
institutes etc. Another one-fourth should be spent on maintaining
our present life style, food, clothing, housing etc. One-fourth
should be saved for the future and the rest one-fourth should
be spent on charities.
Kannan Mishra stressed on the power of love.
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Cultural
Program |
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Pramod Tripathy
and Asha sahu did excellent job as the masters of ceremony
for the cultural program.
The stage management, lights and sounds were taken care of
by Brahmapriya Sen, and Padmanabha Pradhan.
The program started with the opening song "Bande Utkala
Janani" sang by Aparajita Mishra, Lipishree Nayak, Gitu
Sarangi, Sulagna Mishra and Kunmun Sarangi.
The second item was the musical drama "Kanchi Bijoy"
performed by the children Bagmi Das (Purushottam), Natasha
Rao (Padmavati), Prerana Pradhan (Manika), Mrunali Das (Jagannath
and Paika), Rajashree Mishra (Senapati), Suman Ojha (Balabhadra
and Paika), Asmi Panigrahi (Paika), Ramulu Nayak (Mantri)
and Shashwati Das (Dutta). The children did excellent job
showing their understanding far above their age level.
Nilam Rao and Illa Ojha helped the children with their costumes.
The talent show by Amaresh Sahu (yo-yo) was enjoyed by
all.
The last item holi dance (holi holi re holi, ranga rangeli
nali) was performed by Bagmi Das and Prerna Pradhan and
other children.
Naresh Das delivered the vote of thanks.
Although the program was finally over, and people were
taking "prasad", Pramod Tripathy introduced to
us a very talented singer "Pravasranjan Patnaik"
who entertained the audience with two beautiful songs.
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Dinner |
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The major part
of the program, food, was managed by Kalpana Panigrahi and
Sikha Sen. Mrs Liza Tripathy and Pinaki Panigrahi were assisting
in everything. The food was carried by Dhirendra Kar from
the temple. Other food items were prepared.
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Cleaning |
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Seema Mishra, daughter
of Indubhusan Mishra and Kanan Mishra washed the kitchen,
parts of the auditorium, and the walkways all by herself with
much devotion and energy. |
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Author:
Dr Bigyani Das (bdas@bme.jhu.edu)
Last Updated:
03/30/99
Reason: Added link to the bhajan
page
Contact No: (301) 498 3729 |
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