March 2nd, 2008Rangoli
“Boom or bust, this too shall pass. Just don’t let anyone catch you without the experience of either.”
~ the Wise Fool
It sits not on paper and not on wall, but on the ground. It comes colored or all-white; it is small or big; simple or complex; it may be silly at times, magnanimous at others; it may be magnificent, but it is fragile. It’s made up of lines that are straight, curved or squiggly, which go through or around tiny dots. The dots, if present, form a skeleton; the lines give it the body. Together, they form a pattern. It has different names in different parts of India. Whatever it’s called, one thing is for certain: It never lasts. So it won’t be long before it must be redrawn. What is it? Answer: Rangoli.
Every day as I go around the neighborhood in my parents’ suburban community of Hyderabad, India, I see hand-drawn paintings in front of apartments, bungalows, mansions, even entire buildings. Is it art? Is it decoration? Superstition? Religious? Or is it just habit? How about all of the above. Unless you’re prone to sleep-walking, you can’t miss ‘em. You’ll see them anywhere you travel in India. You’ll see them in cities and villages; rich and poor alike practice it. Depending on which part of the country you find yourself, it is known by different names. Here in Andhra, it’s called Muggu. Further south the name for it is Kolam; in Bengal it’s Alpana, and so on. Rangoli, the most familiar name, is what they call it in Gujarat and Maharashtra. If you’re fascinated by India and its culture, chances are you already know about Rangoli and practice it in the part of the world you live in. Even if you’ve never heard of Rangoli, you may have witnessed Tibetan monks performing a sand painting with fistfuls of colored powder. Rangoli is very similar, but practiced in India by ordinary households.
Why do Hindus paint these designs in front of their homes? There are many answers, but the simplest is: It is painted prayer. Who said a prayer has to be spoken? There are many ways to pray: Prayers can be spoken, sung, danced or painted. Obviously, the power of a painted prayer depends on what the design means to its creator. To the average Hindu, Rangoli is auspicious; that is, it welcomes good energy into the house. But it can also be used as a deterrent to ward off evil and ill-will. Hindus believe that life energy (Prana) enters the human body through the nostrils and the home through the front door. Chinese call this life energy, Chi. If so, it would make perfect sense to decorate the space around the front door. Also, in Indian culture, guests and visitors hold a very special place, and a Rangoli expresses this warm hospitality.
As an art form, Rangoli is a great outlet for artistic expression of a household. Though traditionally assigned to females (housewives in particular), it’s open to everyone. For the more enlightened, Rangoli takes the form of a Yantra. Yantra is a Sankrit word, which means symbolic “device” or “vehicle.” Yantras are complex geometrical and fractal language evolved by Hindu India to express spiritual states in symbolic forms. A Rangoli can be made on almost any flat surface. You’ll see them on everything from naked earth, to stone tiles, to cement driveways. It is typically drawn at the entrance of a house. Most designs are geometric patterns and include lines, dots, squares, circles, triangles, footprints, trees, flowers, swastikas, creepers, leaves, fish, conch shell, lotus, trident, spirals or animals. Traditionally the colors were derived from natural dyes — from barks of trees, leaves, indigo, etc. These days, synthetic dyes (which I don’t care for) are used in a range of bright colors. The designs can be small (spread over a couple of feet) or large (ones that take up an entire floor and need several people to implement). India being a land of festivals, Rangolis scintillate and dazzle around festive days.
As with anything else, a Rangoli affects different people differently and can have many levels of meaning. Some see it as nothing more than decoration; pretty perhaps, but nothing more. Some here are so accustomed to seeing it that they don’t even “see” it — unless, of course, it is missing. Some are very reverent towards it; so much so that when they come across one, they’ll make sure to not step on it. Regardless of what it does for you, you cannot escape it if you travel in India. Whatever its power, you’ll experience it at some level within you. For people like my father (a devoted atheist), Rangoli is purely an unconscious experience. A highly educated man, the thinker type, my father doesn’t pay much attention to this kind of stuff. My mother, on the hand, won’t sleep a wink if the entrance to her home is barren and devoid of a Rangoli. To each his own. Me? I enjoy them; I’m fascinated by them; I love them.
To understand how Rangoli affects a household’s life energy, you need only observe your own reaction to these drawings. I, for instance, find my eyes naturally drawn towards houses that have a Rangoli in front of them; my eyes linger more on some than on others. I’m not as captivated by the colorful and flamboyant ones as I am by ones that leave me feeling good. These are usually the simple ones: The ground is prepped (cleaned and washed) before the Rangoli is painted on it; the paintings are typically all white and austere, and created with nothing more than rice powder; these touch you at a level beyond what your eyes can see. In addition to how a Rangoli affects you, it can also tell you plenty about the household behind it. A Rangoli never lies. For starters, you can tell if there was any thought into it or if it was drawn hastily. You can tell if the people at this house are creative folks or if they’re merely creatures of habit; if they’re healthy and prosperous or if they’re in trouble; if the energy at this home is one of harmony or one of conflict.
And now we come to the grand finale of our Rangoli saga: Rangoli is a very fragile construct, composed as it is out of mere powders. The patience, precision, and control needed to make one are formidable. You have to be “crazy” to even attempt a big one and be able to pull it off. Which may account for its declining popularity in this age of instant gratification. Besides, what’s the sense in putting all that effort into creating a Rangoli in front of your house when it can be wiped out by a single careless or negligent act of a passer by? Well, it turns out that even when a Rangoli gets shredded or trampled on, it serves its purpose: Through a show-and-tell, it demonstrates a core principle of life: Impermanence of everything. The use of powder (or sand) itself as a medium for creating Rangoli (and its resulting fragility) is a metaphor for the impermanence of life and maya (illusion). Everything you see, behold and love in life is temporary. Nothing is permanent. Love it, appreciate it, enjoy it — but don’t get too attached to it… for it won’t last. This principle is so all-encompassing that it can be applied to everything from stock markets to love relationships.
Would you put your heart into a love relationship if you knew that five years from now it would fall apart? A Rangoli maker, who has grasped its metaphysics, WOULD — and without hesitation. It’s 2008, and the US economy has turned south and we’re headed for a recession; this in turn has affected markets everywhere. Rangoli says: Don’t despair, welcome the experience of downturn and be enriched by it; it’s only a matter of time before the economy will redraw itself.
Namaste, the Fool
