Pooja in the morning

Last Monday on the 4th, my host family did pooja at 6:30 o’clock in the morning.
So the night before we prepared all the gifts to the Gods or books (I m not that sure). Everything were of five, 5 fruits, 5 almonds, 5 sugar cubs, etc. What my host brother said, this is the day they use to open the new books for the business. And the pooja is to pray to have a good business year.
We did pooja and after we had some fireworks and went to the temple. The temple was very crowded because everyone had done pooja. All people were beautiful dress in sarees, khurtas and other traditional Indian dresses.
More or less I was just a big question mark during pooja, because pooja was not in English and it went very fast.
Then at 11 we went to the shop and did pooja AGAIN. So many poojas that day.

Actually I did one mistake, I was next to the sofa with all the gods in my shoes. Not a good idea, because you are not supposed to wear shoes near any God. It ended up with my host mom told me: Please do not have shoes on, there are Gods!
But, why should we not have shoes on? I know, in every temple we have to remove our shoes.

Basundi

When I was at my host family place, after the dinner I had the best desert ever or sweet. The sweet calls Basundi and it was not too sweet like many other sweets, Indians have.
I got the recipe from my host mom and when I am back in Sweden I will defiantly try to make Basundi.

My host family knows I think Indians sweet is too sweet normally so they just said go after the taste.
1 Liter milk and heat it up tills it is 0,5 liter. To heat up the milk in microwave its going to take around 15-20 minutes. Take the milk in a mixer and mix well.
Add pieces of almonds, chestnuts, cardamom powder, sugar and 2-3 threads of saffron. Mix everything by hand and keep it cold.

When my family make Basundi and has 1 liter milk they add 200 gram sugar.

Back to hostel

Today I m going back to my hostel after over a week with my host families. I guess the hostel will be very empty because Diwali festival.
I had a really good Diwali, even when they started with fireworks at 6 in the morning. Or when society started to play music too load at 6 am. But to pooja, be the families is a very nice and all the lights. A amazing festival.