Colors and music filled the air while strangers ambushed each other with handfuls of powder. It was Baton Rouge’s very first annual Holi Festival, held on March 24.
Holi, the festival of colors, is a well-known Hindu celebration. The Holi festival is about love and the triumph of good over evil, celebrated by colorful powders, music and dancing. The colors have meaning, with red meaning love, green as new beginnings, blue for Krishna and yellow for health.
The festival, organized by the nonprofit Colors of the World and sponsored by Elifin Realty, had a big turnout, with plenty of people coming for the food trucks, drinks, performances, henna art and of course, color-throwing. Anita Gouri, one of the organizers from Colors of the World, said that the festival was long-anticipated.
“We’ve been wanting to do it for years and we just decided this year, ‘You know what? We’re going to make it happen,’” Gouri said. “We had a lot of interest and some of the people volunteering to donate their time to help make it happen.”
While there has been several smaller Holi celebrations in the past, this was Baton Rouge’s first large scale Holi festival. Gouri said that Colors of the World hopes to make the Holi festival an annual event, getting inspiration for the event from Lafayette’s popular Holi celebrations.
“We wanted one that was on the bigger scale because of how much success the city of Lafayette has with theirs,” Gouri said. “It’s always part of our culture that we’ve been proud of.”
At the festival, white clothes didn’t remain pristine for long. Friends and strangers bought colorful packets of powder to hurl through the air and throw at others. At certain times, everyone was encouraged to throw the powder into the air at the same time, creating a rainbow haze.
“For me, it’s a great way to showcase our culture and it’s just such a fun, positive, colorful vibrant time. And it coincides with spring, and it’s like a lot of new life, energy,” Gouri said. “So for me, it’s just a great festival in my culture that I’d love to share with everybody.”
Gouri said that the Holi festival was advertised mostly through word-of-mouth and online, getting positive responses from people who had
experienced Holi before and wanted to see it happen in Baton Rouge. At the festival itself, attendees learned more about Indian music and food, many saying that it was a good new experience.
“It’s great, I’m super happy and everyone’s having a lot of fun,” said Ashley Ajubita. “I found out I love Indian music and I can dance to it.”
