Pongal & Thaipusam

Pongal in Little India, Singapore

There are a couple more festivals that I wanted to cover, but did not experience them enough to give them their own blog post. The two biggest of these are Pongal and Thaipusam. Both these holidays

Statue of Mungal at Batu Caves in Kuala Lumpur

happen in late January and early February. This seems to be a popular time for festivals. It's interesting how the lunar calendar has driven a lot of these festivals to that same time period. Pongal is a celebration of the rice harvest. Thaipusam is a celebration of Mungal, the Hindu God of War, destroying demons. I celebrated both in little India in Singapore.

During Pongal, cows were everywhere. This is rare for Singapore, which has heavy restrictions on importation of livestock. These cows were being treated royally. In some cases they were slightly colored, but otherwise just wandered around pens in central Singapore. Side note: if you attend a larger celebration, there are some wildly painted cows. While for both of these festivals there was not much to see or do, the areas during this time tended to be more lively and there are various food street options that are quite good. Thaipusam was a bit more wild. Holy men or those who want to show their holiness put milk jugs on head and carry it with a contraption consisting on a ton of needles poking their bodies. Then they walk about two miles between a two different temples in Singapore. There are not many people who attempt this feat. So,I only managed to have to glimpse of one man carrying it in the time I was at the festival. Still it was a wild and pretty interesting festival to see. It would be interesting to go to Batu Caves during this festival as there are far more people carrying far heavier and more elaborate contraptions.

Cows in Singapore

Thaipusam in Singapore