I know I am late again by almost two months, but I couldn’t find the time to click the scene in perfect light when I set it up before Pongal. With the cautious normalcy now slowly becoming a reality, it was time to make a way to not waste the effort I put to recreate the magic of Pongal.

Pongal is the first festival of the new gregorian calendar, the last for the Tamil Solar calendar. It is celebrated along with Makar Sankranti or Uttarayan, which is the onset of winter. A traditional Pongal set, which is the 10-day harvest festival in Tamil Nadu, culliminates with Pongal. The fresh harvest, freshly collected milk, sugarcane, rice, vegetables, and pulses are offered to the Sun god. As the milk boils, we pour in rice and lentils and scream pongal O pongal as the milk boils over. The more it overflows, the higher would be the harvest in the following year.

In the west, the changing winds are celebrated with flying kites and collecting them by cutting each other flight. Overall, it is a very festive time, all over the country.