Some Stills ....

On a rainy day .....

The mood builds up ....

He prepares ......

He unfurls his plumage ....

And he dances ....

Round and round .....

Calling his mate ....

Twirling ... Swinging ...

Standing tall ...

Reaching out

Mrunmay's Ganesh Utsav

So this year Mrunmay was like reallllly enthusiastic about Ganesh Utsav. He was all set to bring Ganpati Baapa at home and then enjoy the 10 day festival. He helped prepare for the pooja. 

He also participated in the pooja at Baba's side, wanting to perform 'aachaman'. (I will wait to see what he does after his 'munj' . After a while though he got bored and played outside. The aarti was fun time for him given that he got to play the zhaanj. 

Talked a lot about having tons of Modak and Panchakhadya but hardly even tasted it. What with Dada Ajoba and Kaka Ajoba over he was getting all the pampering :).  Atya on the next day of the pooja was an added bonus for a fun filled weekend.

Then it was time to visit all the Ganpati Baapa's of the town. We roamed all over kothrud, sahakar nagar, bajirao road etc..

We saw a lot of ganapati's and the one Mrunmay liked was had a 'Kumbhakarna' in the display. So now we have Mrunmay imitating 'Kumbhakarna's wakeup laugh' so very often.

Dhol Tashe greeted us near Shaniwarwada where smaller mandals and societies were going in for visarjan on the 7th day of the festival. Mrunmay was mesmerized by the music and the instruments. Obviously he wanted to try his hand at the dhol, but I managed to convince him that he needs to grow up a bit for it.

Didn't even realize how quickly days flew by and it was visarjan time. Mandar and I made big plans to take Mrunmay to show the visarjan procession. But I chickened out from going into the crowd on the 4 wheeler bridge, so we settled for S. M. Joshi bridge and spent a good long hour out there, watching the visarjan from the bridge. With every visarjan Mrunmay shouted '1 - 2 - 3 ....bye bye'. Followed by 'Ganpati Bappa Morya'. Even now he suddenly bursts into 'Ganpati Bappa Morya'

We saw a couple of procession on Karve road and Mrumay alternated between the Kangaroo bag and Baba's shoulders.

The day ended with a lot of junk food and a last look at a Giant size Vithoba and we reached home signing 'Vithoba Raja Rakhumai Raani ....."