The gleaming sparklers and dancing and singing performances have almost become a required standard by Trinity University’s South Asian Student Association (SASA). However, this Diwali was different; SASA partnered with a University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) dance group to throw the event.
On Nov. 7 at five in the afternoon, SASA hosted their annual Diwali festival in Laurie Auditorium. That evening, the club displayed several shows to represent the historic festival. Kavni Maniar, SASA’s President and junior biology major, discussed how the goal of the club’s Diwali event was meant to display the south Asian culture at Trinity, give people of south Asian descent a chance to celebrate a core event in their culture and bring awareness into what Diwali is.
“Diwali is a festival typically celebrated in India. What it does is it acknowledges good over evil, and the way that it does that is by emphasizing light over darkness,” Maniar said.
This great triumph of good or evil, represented in Hinduism as the battle between light and darkness, is where the name ‘Diwali’ comes from. It directly translates to ‘row of lights’ and is widely known as “the festival of lights.” People often celebrate it with vibrant displays of lights, fireworks, rangoli (colorful powders) and people dressing up in traditional south Asian clothing.
Maniar continued, addressing how the SASA team arranged Asian food at Mabee dining hall the week prior, to build anticipation of the event. The actual event itself, she mentioned, had an hour of performances from various dance groups, and food with sparklers after.
The event commenced with a special dance from the SASA officers.
Other than dancing, SASA also featured a performance by Ananya Chidurupalli, sophomore biology major and event coordinator for the club, who sang “Chahun Main Ya Naa.”
SASA Vice President Diya Joshy, junior psychology major, and PR Chair Henna Desani, junior neuroscience major, introduced what Desani called “an unforgettable set” from University of Texas San Antonio’s (UTSA) Shor, a Premier Fusion dance team. Harini Ganesh, first-year public health major dancer for Shor, emphasized how the team had been preparing for this event for over a month.
This year’s Diwali festival gained a turnout of over 200 people, and Ganesh praised the diverse audience for Diwali. “I honestly saw a bunch of non-Indian people here supporting, and I thought that was super cool because I’m so used to seeing only Indian people at events,” Ganesh said.
There were several dances from Top Naach, one notable one being their performance to the song “Uyi Amma.” The crowd also cheered on the Loon-E crew as they danced to “O Saki Saki” and The Prowlers while “they lit up the scene with style and passion,” as Chidurupalli remarked.
Emily Fisher, senior English and history double-major and captain of The Prowlers, picked the song the Prowlers danced to. “We tried to incorporate long skirts, Lehengas, and it was exciting to perform,” Fisher said.
As promised by the Maniar, the event followed with sparklers and south Asian food. SASA catered food from Madauri Mes; they offered biryani, butter chicken, paneer, naan and ras malai, as well as mango lassi, a yogurt-based drink and staple of south Asian food.
“I think that the event was a really big success,” Chidurupalli said. “Obviously there are really tiny obstacles that we have to get over, but the team did a really good job pushing through. Obviously we had great turnout, and we’re so happy everyone was able to make it out tonight.”
