Holi: Celebration of Cultural Diversity Through Water Balloons and Mud Wrestling

This weekend is pretty much Multicultural Weekend at my college, when all the cultural groups around campus host special events to entice pre-frosh, or rising freshmen. Unfortunately, the university cut their playtime short, so all the clubs decided to have our Multicultural bash a week later.

This is what college kids do when finals approach. We all gather in The Swamp (huge grassy area between the dorms), spray the ground until it's muddy, line up over a thousand water balloons in large garbage bags, and after a long countdown from 30, we WATER BALLOON FIGHT!

:D Except after the water balloons are all used up, people resort to mud wrestling. I skipped my senior prom to take part in this crazy event but it was super cold 2 years ago (probably around 50 degrees outside). I'd have to say it was worth it! I wrestled a lot of friends and we all threw each other around in the mud. I even slid on my belly like a penguin but no one caught any pictures of me, so these are fantastic shots taken by John H, Matt M, and Jared B. I have a big scratch on my right forearm to prove it : ) Correction: Huzzah I found some pictures of me! :D

This event is called Holi, after the spring festival celebrated by Hindus, Sikhs, and others (Wiki article here). We all got hosed off by extremely cold water and took showers, digging twigs and other things out of our swimming suits and hair. This was the best way to de-stress after a long week.

It was interesting because after a hour, everyone was definitely caked with mud and we all looked grey. No matter what skin colour we originally had, we all looked the same. It was really interesting and rewarding to have fun with complete disregard for what people looked like. Any prejudices only came back after we steadily regained colour with the cold hose water. Sometimes you can't help noticing how different people are from you. But sometimes you need to just close your eyes and wallow in peace-bringing mud.

Yes, the garbage bags are FILLED with water balloons

 Look at those mud droplets fly!

 

 See Angie, the muddy girl on the left

See Angie's amusement as a guy comes out of nowhere and tackles the guy I was trying to wrestle. HAHAHA :D

Little mud people everywhere!

Hosing off!

And then the sanitation truck came :D

That has to be the most legit way to get clean EVER

 Sorry I haven't posted recently! Exams are killer and I have many more before I'm done May 12th :)