Holi

Tomorrow is the Hindu festival of Holi and my least favourite time of the year. Once it was a time for good natured fun, with celebrations consisting of devotees throwing powdered dye and squirting water at one another. It used to be that this took place between families and friends with consent to becoming a victim being implicit in the merry making. In recent years though this behaviour has gone out of hand and become indiscriminate with anti-social behaviour being tolerated for a few days either side of the festival itself. You can't walk down the street without risking someone water bombing you. During the present water shortage one shudders to think where the water is being sourced from. Yesterday a water bomb narrowly missed my two year old as we went for a Sunday afternoon stroll in a back lane near our house. This kind of terrorism leads to the closing of schools for several days as teachers try to avoid the antics of the street being transferred to the playgrounds and classrooms - just as the end of year examinations have got underway.