Getting ready for Ganesh Chaturthi

[Guest guest]

- Karen Borak

Devi Mandi

Thursday, September 23, 2004 7:57 AM

Re: Getting ready for Ganesh Chaturthi

Namaste ALL esp Ruk,

The ideas you provided to help me plan ahead for next year's Ganesh

Chaturthi are wonderful. All of your posts about Ganesh are being

printed and saved in a paper file for easy reference for next year

along with related posts from the club.

Can you bear it up to more questions! <smile> How about the upcoming

Navaratri? What ideas can you pass on to a beginning person to plan

for a small in-home festival? There's only two of us (way, way out

in the country) so we could use very easy, simple ideas.

Heartfelt thanks for your great help,

Karen

-

rmerani

Wednesday, September 22, 2004 11:55 AM

Getting ready for Ganesh Chaturthi

Namaste Karen,To start planning for the next Ganesh Chaturthi you

could begin by learning to read/understand/chant the various prayers

to Him. You could incorporate a few verses in your regular prayer

routine. The 4th day of both the bright/dark fortnight of every month

is also recommended for Ganesh worship. So that might be one way to

get started. Keep it simple and expand as time is available.If you

wish to prepare sweets for the Deity, cloth, flowers etc. then you

would keep these ready perhaps a day earlier for use in the next days

worship. At the temple, the food/sweets being offered for pujas are

always prepared on the day of the festival. Swamiji emphasizes the

need to be organised before the puja. All the articles of worship

should be accessible for the worshipper so that he/she does not have

to get up from their asana once they start the worship. It

definitely helps create a better focus and bhava (attitude). You

could find clay statues on the internet or check out your local

Indian grocery/general store. Linda had a great suggestion in her

post about making one with clay at home and drying it in the oven.

Sounds like a lot of fun.Several years ago, in preparation for

Shivaratri, Shree Maa had us organize the young children to make

little clay Shiva lingams. Each child got to make their own and do

puja to it. Since these were not very big, it did not require to dry

them in the oven. We just left them on a tray to dry. They made

little flower garlands, bead necklaces and even decorated the tray

with glitter and ribbon. After the puja celebration they got to take

their little Shivas home. Even the adults had just as much fun as the

kids did!Hope this helps!Jai Ganesha!Ruk