Living away from home usually calls for adapting to a new place and its culture. But isn’t it wonderful when you can have something close to your roots in the place you now call home? The Gujarati community of Goa does so with a lot of their traditions. The Panjim Gujarati Yuvak Mandal are celebrating Navratri with the traditional aarti followed by garba and dandiya raas at Mahalaxmi temple in Panjim. Shri Apteshwar Siddhivinayak Devasthan, St Inez, has been organising the dandiya and garba for the last 11 years. Their only criteria is that the participants should follow the dress code and women and girls should come dressed in sarees or chaniya choli and boys and men in kurtas. “The celebrations are open to all communities as long as they follow the dress code. There is no competition for the dances and though the celebrations are for nine days, we will also be celebrating Dussehra with dandiya and garba,” says Vivek Mayenkar, president of the committee. The nine-day long festival will culminate on Navami, September 29, 2017 and Dussehra or Vijay Dashmi will be celebrated on September 30, 2017.
Sights of Navratri in Panjim
The festival of Navratri is one full of colour, music and dance. Café visits various venues in Goa to get a glimpse of how the communities bond and enjoy these nine days of celebration
