Onasadhya is the meal served on the plantain leaf on Onam; sadhya refers to the meal. The sadhya is also served on other occasions like marriage, engagements, birthday. Of late slowly but steadily those get-togethers are avoiding sadhya and opting for something haute like biryani and other stuff.

The food is usually had by sitting on a mat on the floor cross-legged. But now people have it on the table itself. That's more comfortable for me atleast because my legs become numb after the first course is over :).

There is a particular method as to how the food should be served. When laid on the table, the tapering or narrow part of the leaf should always be towards the left.

The first things to be served are a banana, upperi(plain banana chips), sharkara puratty(jaggery coated banana chips and papaddam and some salt. All these are placed in the lower half of the leaf on the extreme left.
The top left of the leaf is served with mango pickle, injipuli(curry of ginger, tamarind,green chillies and jaggery, all of which gives it a sour, sweet and hot taste), thoran(a sauteed dish of vegetables, usually cabbage, with grated coconut), olan(a curry of pumpkin with coconut milk, which makes the curry white), aviyal(a thick curry of many vegetables and yogurt and coconut; has many vegetables), kaallan(made of yam and yogurt; also a thick gravy), koottu curry(gram dal, pumpkin, snake gourd, coconut).

When all these dishes are placed, then boiled rice is served in the centre in the lower half of the leaf and sambhar(a gravy dish of drum stick, ladies finger and dal as the main ingredients) is poured into the rice. Now you can eat your food relishingly.

The ones with a good apetite have the rice again with rasam and then again with butter milk. Otherwise rasam can be had when poured into cupped hands or in a glass. Rasam is a watery dish made of pepper, tamarind, tomatoes and many other spices. Its very fiery and spicy and also aids in digestion. Curd or buttermilk is also taken which also helps in digestion.

The desserts include pradhaman(made of ada(made of rice), coconut and jaggery). Actually there are many types of pradhaman - palada pradhaman(cooked rice, sugar, milk), parippu pradhaman(gram dal, jaggery) and also others. Another dessert is the pal payasam(cooked rice,milk and sugar).

After such a heavy meal, a betel nut is popularly taken.

I am already full just be describing the meal.

Posted by Anish at 2:05 AM | Permalink | Comments

This year, September 5 was Onam - a festival celebrated by Keralites in India. The festival falls in the malayalam month of Chingam, which is the start of the harvest season.

Being a Keralite myself, many people ask the story behind Onam. Like all other festivals, Onam too has many legends surrounding it. The most popular one is --

Balichakravarthi or Mahabali, the King of Asuras(demons) was the ruler of Kerala. His people were very happy to have him as King even though he was a demon. In his kingdom, there was no sorrow, poverty, dishonesty, disease or untimely death. Afraid of his rising popularity, the Gods feared that he would take over the whole of Earth and then the Heavens and they would be left with no place to go. Also Mahabali had defeated Lord Indra(the king of Gods) once. So all the Gods approached Lord Vishnu to take stock of the situation.

Mahabali was performing a ritual in which he had declared that he would anything that anyone asked for during the Yagna. Lord Vishnu disguised as Vamanan appeared at the Yagna and he asked for land covered by 3 footsteps of his. Mahabali's advisors sensed that this boy is no ordinary Brahmin at the Yagna, but a Lord in disguise. But Mahabali thought that if the Lord himself has come then its a privilege for Mahabali. So he went ahead with the request of 3 footsteps. Vamanan then came to his cosmic form and covered the first foot with the whole of Earth, the skies with the second and then asked for the third foot of land. Mahabali then offered his head for the same. Vamanan placed his foot on the head of Mahabali and sent him to netherworld.

Honouring his sacrifice and his devotion and his beneficient rule, the Lord granted him permission to visit his Kingdom once a year and that day is regarded as Keralites as Onam.

To appease the King, people of Kerala celebrate the day and be merry so that the King feels that his people are like during his rule - happy, rich and without sorrow. For this purpose, they make the Onam Sadhya(meal on the plantain leaf) which I will discuss in detail in another post. Also is the famous boat race and the pookallam(flower carpet).

Posted by Anish at 8:14 AM | Permalink | Comments

Of late, I had been to the great wall of china. It was a pretty good experience. Although, it's not that awesome as I had guessed, because it's just a wall and nothing else. The panorama around is good, but actually the grand thing about the great wall is its length which can be experienced probably if there is some chopper ride over the whole length of the wall just to show the grandiose wall. I could'nt get a clean view of the wall because of too many tourists. Probably I should have selected a more secluded section of the wall to get a clear shot.
This gives a lateral view of the wall. In winters, with all the snow around it, it looks really magnificient.
This gives a view with all the mountains surrounding the wall which adds to the magnificient view.

Can You See The Great Wall of China from The Moon?
When leaving the earth's orbit and acquiring an altitude of more than a few thousand miles, no man-made objects are visible at all. NASA says, "The Great Wall can barely be seen from the Shuttle, so it would not be possible to see it from the Moon with the naked eye." Thus, it'd be tough to spot the Great Wall of China or any other object from the moon. Furthermore, from the moon, even the continents are barely visible. So "Great wall is the only object which can be distinguished with the naked eye from the moon" is a myth.

Posted by Anish at 4:29 AM | Permalink | Comments