I add to what have been told of Dipavali at thatha’s KNagar household…

The children used to be woken about 2.00 am; and at that early hours the water in the ‘famous venner andaa’ ( which used to glow like gold at any point of time due to paatti's near obsession for the vessels being beyond clean and glow in their true colours) would be boiling. As the mangalasnanam proceeded – with paatti doing the shatric anointing with oil and the senior atahais monitoring and helping the actual bath, nagaswara vidwan would arrive at about 2.30 accompanied by thavil and othu . He would play mangala isai and thatha used to give him vastram and money with respect and love and he used to receive it with pride and respect. Though I do not remember their faces, by a freak of memory I remember the cloth bag – kaippai - of ochre-like yellow with dull orange red stripes – thin one placed close to a wide one.
The manner in which thatha used to give away the dipavali vastram-panam to all in his payroll / service- Vedam and paalkaarar, to Lakshmi kutty and pattu vadyar – and the way they used to solicit his blessings made us, youngsters, proud of thatha’s esteem and stature.

The children were allowed kambi mathaappu - inserted into the wide end of the midriff of plantain leaf – wire, and the paambu under the strict one to one supervision. Ramakrishna chithappa , Mani chthappa and on occasions peria thambi (?) used to announce the owner and name of the cracker to bring all to silent, expectant attention before seeing each cracker to its end. The thrill that suffused the child whose cracker went burst by proxy knew no bounds.

Kudos to the senior athais. By day-break, all used to be primly dressed with the hair in aarthi –kattal, or combed flat on the skull as the case may be. If the hair was too oily they would untiringly ‘remove’ the excess oil with newspaper and redo the hairstyle.

Eclipses when they ended in odd hours of the night used to offer much to rejoice.