KEY POINTS:
In my sleep-befuddled state the noise sounded like someone was heaving heavy pieces of furniture across the floor above my Delhi hotel room.
Thankfully a few brain cells had staggered into action just as I was groping for the phone to ring reception; I'd remember it was Diwali, the Hindu festival of light, and the thuds were firecrackers packed with some serious firepower. Exploding crackers, rockets and starbursts, flickering oil lamps and festoons of coloured lights were everywhere in Delhi earlier in the evening. How I didn't connect the nocturnal booms with the explosions that had shook the bus windows as we drove through the city, I don't know.
The Times of India had done its best that morning to try to reduce the accident toll from Diwali by printing several articles and advertisements promoting fireworks safety. Included in the list was avoiding hearing damage by restricting one's firecracker purchases to those of only lower decibel counts. There was also a useful list of hospitals that had burn experts on duty for the night and the addresses of fire appliances that had been stationed in particularly firework-intensive parts of town.
Diwali symbolises the light of knowledge and understanding banishing darkness or ignorance. It's a universal festival - while flashing curtains of electric lights adorned posh apartments, tiny oil lamps burned around the shantytowns.
There can't have been a single marigold left in North India because all through the labyrinthine lanes of Old Delhi there were mountains of orange and lemon yellow flowers, with adults and children sitting nearby threading the blooms on to long strings. These were being bought up by the metre by home owners and shopkeepers to drape over doors and windows.
Diwali is also the time to make offerings and prayers to Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth. So it's a time to buy sweets, such as small triangles made from freshly ground cashew nut topped with edible silver leaf and almonds. These sweets are offered to the gods, and shared among family and friends Even as darkness deepened over Delhi on Diwali night, the overflowing sweetshops were still crammed with people - last-minute shopping is clearly not just a Christmas phenomenon.
We drove through the smoggy streets, dodging the odd cracker, and were halted at a red light. Pastel-coloured helium balloons seemed to be bobbing of their own accord among the cars - this was the streetkids' last chance for a Diwali sale. Then one cluster suddenly wheeled away into an empty traffic lane. A little girl in a grubby dress, arms akimbo was twirling across the road away from any possible sales, her bouquet of balloons bobbling at the end of their strings as she danced. I rememberd another item in the newspaper that explained that wealth was not just about rupees - it was about a wealth of human virtues.
