Vasant is the season when nature is at its beautiful, bountiful best. Flowers are in full bloom and trees sprout shoots. It is a season when nature regenerates and everything is fresh and new. The cool morning air is laden with the faint smell of mango blossoms. Mustard fields turn into a heady mix of yellow and green as they add color, poetry and romance to life. The goddess Saraswati is dressed in yellow garments and people wear yellow clothing to mark the occasion of Vasant Panchami.

The constant interplay between our inner seeking and the innate state of knowledge within which we are unaware – the dialectic between becoming and being which is the cornerstone of the Upanishads – takes on a mystical and devotional hue in tradition in the personification of Goddess Saraswati as the muse of learning and knowledge. Whether in her river form or swarupa as she is exalted in the Rig Veda – nourishing an entire civilization on her banks – or in her shubhra vasana or in white attire, the feminine form inspiring all creative energies, Saraswati represents the ever flowing stream of consciousness within.

Diwali Cheer

Members of the Sri Krishna Mandir, located at Gay Park, Greater New Amsterdam, caused many gloomy faces to light up with joy when they shared out food hampers to the poor and needy throughout Berbice as part of their observances of the “Festival of Lights”.

Adviser to the Mandir and Hindi Teacher Mrs Chandrawattie Maraj disclosed that the Mandir filled over six hundred hampers with a range of twenty-six food items and distributed them to the poor and needy in both East and West Berbice earlier this week.