Catherine Hochman

Colette Gerstmann

It was a temperate summer evening at my aunt’s house in upstate New York. Having nothing to do, my cousins and I scooted chairs from the patio into the wide, grassy yard and sat, looking up into the big blue sky and letting the gentle wind graze our faces.

The wind seemed to carry encouragement on its current, and the clouds drifted by with an air of comfort. I suddenly felt a burst of energy, and I hopped to my feet. Feeling lighthearted, I broke into a run.

I don’t usually run. Generally, I’m not very fast, and running exhausts me. But that day I felt different. Energy pulsed through me; I gained speed, my feet coming down on the grass and springing upward again. I felt strong, but at the same time, I felt effortless. I curved onto the cement near the back of the house, leaped over the stone path, and approached the grass again, starting a new lap.

I felt powerful but weightless. The ground was no longer a hassle, wasn’t something I had to get over in order to win a race—instead, it aided me, powered me, gave me the momentum to keep going. The grass accepted the weight of each step and pushed me further forward. I wasn’t running for a prize; I wasn’t running to beat the clock. I was running because it made me happy. Everything around me cheered me on; everything I passed was a positive force. The ground was a generous base. The sky was an inspiring canvas. The wind propelled me on and the trees swayed and bowed in greeting. Nothing could compare to this feeling of soaring through space, as if the very thing that grounded me was the thing that was making me fly.

Experiences of connection and transformation 

Awesome Moments

In this KidSpirit Awesome Moments article, teen writer Colette Gerstmann recalls a time when being in nature inspired her to go on a run.

Finding My Run

Elizabeth Berg

My dad steps out of the car, looks around at the surrounding stores, and grumbles. “I can’t believe how much this area has changed.”

He sighs. “When I was growing up, this was an entirely Hungarian neighborhood.”

My brother and I exchange amused smirks. Now it’s my turn to complain. “Seriously dad? We visit Grandma all the time, and you always mention this.”

“Could you please avoid reminiscing about the ‘good old days’ just this once?” my brother chimes in.

Looking back, my brother and I were actually being pretty rude to our father. It may be true that we can’t visit our grandmother without hearing about how the neighborhood has changed since my dad was growing up, but the subject is obviously very important. Of course, neither my brother nor I were mature enough to apologize to my dad. Instead, we’d forget about this conversation, and all of the other ones like it, as soon as we left my grandma’s house, until our next visit. Right now, however, I am thinking about my dad’s remarks for a completely different reason; I think that he may actually be right.

I didn’t come up with this shocking opinion out of the blue. I was actually mulling over this issue’s Big Question when the conversation with my father popped into my head. On the one hand, it seems apparent that it is important to learn how others celebrate, because it is hard to connect with people who are different from you if you don’t really understand how they think or what they believe. On the other hand, learning about your own traditions places you into a community. The experience of actually celebrating the same things and sharing common beliefs connects people more than having the same knowledge without practical experience. Some people worry that if we immerse ourselves too deeply into a new tradition, we may become disconnected from the community, or even the family, in which we grew up. We don’t want to learn about different traditions at the expense of our own. Between these opposing ideas it seems the main goal is finding the middle line between the two extremes; opening yourself up to other ideas without abandoning what you stand for. And this is exactly what has not happened in my grandma’s neighborhood.

The experience of actually celebrating the same things and sharing common beliefs connects people more than having the same knowledge without practical experience.

As my dad always laments, the previously Hungarian area no longer has any cultural identity. He misses the family-run businesses that he frequented as a kid, now mostly replaced by random and impersonal stores. His main problem with the neighborhood changes is not that it’s no longer Hungarian, it’s that no other community-owned stores came in to replace it. After learning more about how other neighboring areas were assimilating, his previously closely-knit community abandoned much of their former identity, no longer practicing the same traditions or holding the same celebrations.

Overall, I am definitely not saying that the area around my Grandma’s house would have been better off if no one in the area had tried to learn more about new traditions or branched off. In fact, my dad also admits that the neighborhood used to feel too exclusive. His family wasn’t Hungarian, and he felt left out, and resented it. His experience shows the positives and negatives of respecting other people’s traditions as well as your own–showing that it is important to understand that you can learn about how others celebrate without abandoning your own beliefs. Ultimately, being part of a community that has its own rituals and celebrations and being open-minded about other people having different beliefs, are not mutually exclusive.

In this KidSpirit Big Question response, teen writer Elizabeth Berg explores important rituals and traditions in her family as well as in others.

Is It Just as Important to Learn How Others Celebrate?

Gautama Mehta

Growing up in a Hindu family in New York, I’ve always been taught that I should try my best, but understand that after I’ve done what I personally can, I should leave the rest to God.

Well, not specifically God, but whatever factors there are beyond my control. There is, in my religion, the concept of dharma, or duty: each person has his or her own righteous path to follow, and at different times in your life, your dharma could be being a good student, or parent, or hard worker, and so on.

Hindus are taught to have humility. Ancient Hindu artists were never supposed to sign their names on their work, and temple artists, when creating idols of gods, are always supposed to leave a deliberate imperfection to show that they cannot really represent God.

It’s a religion that decries affectation. It doesn’t presume to be the one and only “true” faith: there is no conversion ceremony. All the Hinduism I have grown up with, has taught me to be free of misconceptions about my personal importance, my own status when viewed against all the other billions in the world. I don’t know how “Hindu” this is, but my mother has always told me that the religion teaches only to do one’s best, and not worry about the outcome. I don’t know what it means for an idea like this to be “Hindu,” as opposed to just a cultural notion that, in my limited experience, follows the faith wherever it goes. Hinduism is like that: Gandhi’s ideals are considered just as Hindu as age-old scriptural doctrines.

In my family (and many others) when a baby turns one, we shave off its hair as a sacrifice to God for the beautiful baby, and also to protect against vanity or conceit. That’s the beauty of traditions like these: we can interpret and re-interpret, internalize and re-internalize, to fit with our culture and ethics. The root, of course, is Hinduism, but Hinduism is evolving, is changing. It’s an intensely personal religion. There is no Hindu Church or centralized authority. Hinduism can mean incredibly right-wing fundamentalists who use it as an excuse for violence, or it can mean my mother, a self-proclaimed atheist who is one of the most devout Hindus I know.

But there’s a contradiction. Culturally, Hindus (or Indians in general) have a lot of pressure to do well, to succeed. Especially immigrant families like mine here in America, which are the ones I know best. In general, immigrant cultures tend to value achievement, because of how hard it is for them to make it in a foreign country where they are poor and discriminated against. Indians in America have done well, though. I see us in Ivy League schools and computer software, in spelling bees and politics. And we’re still stereotyped as the culture that pressures its children into doing better than all the American kids, coaching the kids after school in trigonometry and computer science, and if a kid isn’t valedictorian in every subject then he’s beaten. Obviously, this is an exaggeration, but the philosophy is still there—the intense competition, the praise given for having one’s name everywhere. In India, kids have an incredibly strict education system, learning everything at a much more advanced rate than I am here in New York, and students are strictly ranked in every aspect. There’s a rigorous Hindu caste system only now falling apart, and still very much present in India’s villages. My mother, a Brahmin (on the top of the ladder) talks about how growing up in India, she was told that she was superior to everyone else, and though she hates it, she still feels that inside her today. Harsh competition is encouraged from an early age in most Indians. So why the discrepancy between the religion and the culture?

Perhaps the discrimination Indians felt everywhere they went instilled in them the sense of having to be the best, and nurtured in them the insecurity that causes the egotism that is so warned against by Hinduism. My father’s family, for example, has spent the last four generations moving across the globe in search of business, everywhere from a rural village in India to Kenya to Calcutta. When my dad was fourteen, he moved from Bombay to Queens, N.Y., and he describes the move as one of the most influential moments in his life. When he got here, he experienced flagrant racism at his local Catholic high school, in which he was the only minority student, and this has shaped the way he thinks and acts today. But in spite of all the hardships they’ve faced Indian immigrants like my father have kept religion with them, trusting it to guide them, preserving its traditions as best they can. For him, the Bhagavad Gita, probably the religion’s most important text, is the one book he would want on a desert island. But he didn’t discover it through his parents. He found it in an undergraduate course on Hinduism at NYU.

In this way, his Hinduism is like mine: Growing up, he knew the Hinduism that his grandparents told stories about, the Hinduism of gods and demons and many-headed animals. But the other side of Hinduism, its philosophy, is something too personal to tell kids on your lap stories about. I know Hindu mythology partly from my Ammamma (mother’s mother) telling me stories as a kid, and partly from Amar Chitra Katha, a popular Indian comic book series illustrating myths and scripture. But to try and understand the reasons for the inconsistencies I’ve seen in my community, I decided I actually had to read the stuff.

I read through the Bhagavad Gita, expecting to find an archaic, illegible piece of scripture that would make no sense to me. But instead I found lines that illustrated perfectly ideals that still make perfect sense, many centuries later.

Let me give a bit of background on the Gita, as the book is commonly known. It’s a chapter in the epic poem Mahabharata, which is about an ancient war between two sets of brothers. The Gita, Wikipedia tells me, was written between the 5th and 2nd centuries B.C. It’s 700 verses long.

The story of the Gita is a conversation between Arjuna, a good-guy on one side of the war riding a chariot into battle, and Krishna, his charioteer who’s also a god. Arjuna feels guilty about having to kill his cousins who are fighting on the other side, and he expresses these doubts to Krishna, sitting down in the chariot, letting his bow and arrow slip out of his hand. The result is an intense, beautiful dialogue about life, death and reincarnation. But the part that interested me most was when Krishna talked about ego, and “selfless service.”

His initial answer to Arjuna’s questions is that it is his dharma to kill his cousins. It wouldn’t be immoral to kill them, because it is a part of the cycle of life and death that exists for everyone. “For a warrior, nothing is higher than a war against evil,” Krishna counsels. And anyway, even when a body dies, he says, its soul, or Self, lives on, living forever in future and past, in an eternal cycle of karma and reincarnation until it is finally released from karma by defeating ego and materialism and sin. “You were never born; you will never die,” he explains.

The ultimate object of this cycle is to become immortal and “be united with the Lord.” The way to do this is to “renounce all selfish desires and break away from the ego-cage of ‘I,’ ‘me,’ and ‘mine.’” In another place, he says, “Deluded by identification with the ego, a person thinks, ‘I am the doer.’”

Another theme Krishna stresses is work. “You have the right to work, but never to the fruit of work…. The ignorant work for their own profit, Arjuna; the wise work for the world.” This, more than anything else, clashes for me with the stress my culture places on rewards and achievement.

When I read all this, I was fascinated by it. It resonated so truly with all the lessons I had been taught were Hinduism. All the principles I was taught came right out of its philosophy. The humility asked for by Krishna is simultaneously present and absent in his followers.

I don’t think that the sense of pride only comes from immigrant cultures like mine. I think it’s present in India too. There is constant religious violence between Hindus and Muslims, another example of the frenzied, insecure need to uphold whatever you have. India, as many Indians will readily brag, was once a huge world power, one of the most advanced cultures on the planet, the discoverer of zero, the creator of our numeral system, the inventor of chess. I have heard these facts so many times I know them and a million others by heart, all talking about “how __ India is,” how India is “the most __ nation in the world.”

But India was colonized by the British, and wherever its people went, they were put down. They were weaker, poorer and darker than everyone else, and that had to leave a mark on them. I don’t know if I’m enough of a historian to attribute it to whatever they must have faced, but it’s easy to imagine how all those factors could contribute to a collective need for self-esteem, that could have resulted in what I experience today.

In this KidSpirit Feature, teen writer Gautama Mehta explores the history and importance of Hinduism's practices.

Humility in Hinduism

Saim Alam

Eid al-Fitr means the celebration of the end of Ramadan and giving donations to those in need in the community, which are called Fitrana. 

The significance of this holiday is to celebrate the completion of Ramadan.

Ramadan is the holy month of fasting, in which one eats before sun up and does not eat or drink again until sundown. This is one of the Five Pillars of Islam, which are the foundation of Muslim life. They consist of the oneness of God, five daily prayers, giving charity, pilgrimage to the holy land (which is Mecca), and fasting. Young children, elderly people, or people on medication, should not fast because it will do them no good and only make them ill. God has made this a pillar to teach us humility and patience. I think that God orders Muslims to fast so they can get an idea of how a homeless or poor person is hungry on an everyday basis. This makes us more grateful for what we have. Eid is on the thirtieth or thirty-first of Ramadan. That day is determined by the Islamic lunar calendar. Eid is celebrated on the first day of the Islamic month of Shawwal.

Our family and the Islamic community we live in celebrates Eid a bit differently, and it has become a tradition over the past twenty years in Asheville, North Carolina. Usually men go to the mosque to pray. After that, they go to their relatives’ and close friends’ houses. Our Eid party is normally held at a local open hall. We have a breakfast and lunch potluck, when everyone brings a dish from their own culture to share with others. The variety of cultures includes Pakistani, Indian, Indonesian, Arab, and African, just to name a few. Everyone brings a different dish so that it can be a multicultural event. There are many activities for all the younger kids like giant inflatables as well as gifts for each child. The community members volunteer to purchase gifts and the entire community donates. It is full of laughter and fun. Sometimes there are competitions between men and women to see which side knows more about religious facts. Towards the end of the celebration the children get together and read verses from the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book.

I believe it is important for all Muslims to celebrate Eid al-Fitr. It is a celebration of successfully fasting. This is a very important time not just for my family, but for every Muslim family throughout the world to celebrate and pray together. In Muslim countries Eid al-Fitr is celebrated for three days and is an official government and school holiday.  Our tradition is a slightly different way of celebrating Eid al-Fitr, and hopefully will be carried on for a long time.

In this KidSpirit Feature, teen writer Said Alam delves into the significance of Eid al-Fitr.

Celebration of Eid al-Fitr

Allie McIntosh

When it comes to my family’s cabin, tradition is the most important thing.

We find ourselves there the same time every year, doing the same things, enjoying the same company. Every time we visit the cabin, we leave feeling completely refreshed.

I don’t remember a year when we didn’t pack up and head out to celebrate Independence Day at the little cabin that sat on the edge of Cascade Lake.  During the long car ride up to the spot, the sound of gravel crunching under our tires and the welcome sight of large open fields were the telltale signs that we were approaching our destination. While watching crickets fly up off the road and listening to Garrison Keillor blasting from the radio, we would turn onto the narrow gravel road, past the green street sign that declared this place “Paradise.”

The cabin was far from luxurious, with only two bedrooms and a bathroom in which the shower didn’t work. Bats lived in the ceiling; you could hear them scuttle around all night long. Our back deck had a long row of stairs descending from it, their wood rotted and breaking apart. Trees shrouded the whole back of our cabin, and we had lost half of our dock to the lake.

Compared to the other cabins on the lakeside, ours looked like a mess. But that didn’t matter to us. In fact, we took pride in being the most rugged cabin on the lake. The carpet was an ugly color, the 50′s furniture didn’t match, and the curtains were full of holes. But we wouldn’t have it any other way.

The main purpose for the cabin had always been to simply get away from society. The things we would do probably wouldn’t look very exciting to an outsider, but that’s the point. Most of our time there was spent reading, talking, and sleeping. It was all very quiet and peaceful, and there was very little variety. The food was almost the same every year; we ate fajitas and scrambled eggs with Fourth of July themed napkins and plates, the adults drank their gin while I ate all the cherries. We listened to the same music and slept in the same beds. We played a rousing game of hearts at least once or twice and we took the dogs out on the same walk twice a day.

Traditions at the cabin are a guaranteed part of my summer. When we leave the cabin, we feel fully rested and restored. It’s time where we can escape from the real world and just hang out on the lake. It makes me glad that I can always count on some things staying the same, no matter what happens.

In this KidSpirit Feature, teen writer Allie McIntosh recounts memories of spending summers at her family's cabin.

Summers at the Cabin

Prerna Chatterjee

The autumn sun warmed up my bare arms and legs. Looking up, I saw the turquoise sky and the ragged clouds. I walked to the other side of the terrace. The lakeside was adorned with milk-white, feather-like kaash flowers. The lake water was almost as blue as the sky, with tints of golden sunlight, gleaming like sequins on its surface. A faint sound of the drumming of dhaks came to my ears. I smiled. Today was special. It was Diwali.

Diwali has always been an important Indian festival essentially of Hindu origins. However, it is celebrated almost everywhere in the country by people of different faiths (Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, etc.). According to the Hindu calendar, the festival of Diwali is observed on a new moon day, usually in late October. Diwali is marked as a national holiday.

In spite of living in one of the cultural cities of India, I had never really been a part of it. That’s because, ever since I was born, my parents would take me to visit my grandma during the Diwali holidays. Grandma lived in the mountains. Diwali is a quiet event in the Himalayan mountains. But in Calcutta, Diwali is celebrated in grand style. So this year, we decided to stay back. I was delighted. I would finally get to spend Diwali with friends.

“Aesha! You have a phone call,” I heard Dad call out.

“Coming, Dad,” I replied and raced down the stairs to my room.

“Hey, it’s me Sheena. Are you ready, yet?  I’m coming to get you in five minutes.”

“I’m ready, Sheena. Where are the others?” I asked, referring to my other friends.

“Oh! All right. Come quick. I can’t wait.”

A pandal is a temporary temple-like structure made up of bamboo and colorful cloth. It is decorated with flowers and lights.

Diwali is the festival of lights. Lighting candles, bursting crackers and fireworks are the most important rituals of the festival. Diwali in Calcutta is celebrated along with Kali Puja (worship of goddess Kali). Kali is the goddess of power. She symbolizes the divine feminine force that destroys all the evil sources of the universe.

I went out of our house. The blazing sun kissed my skin. Sheena came running to me.

“New?” I asked pointing to her blue skirt.

“Yes, it’s Diwali, after all. You have to wear something new.” She smiled.

“Now let’s hurry,” she said, and grabbing my hand she ran towards the pandal.

The whole town had been decorated with colored electric bulbs and fairy lights. They were all over the houses, the trees and of course the pandal. The pandal was huge this year and at one end stood the idol of mighty Kali. My other friends sat in a circle at one corner of the pandal. They waved at us.

“Hey Sheena! Aesha! Your first Diwali here, right?” Raj called.

“Come over and sit. We’re playing spin the bottle,” Ishaan said.

“I want to see the idol first,” I said.

Sheena accompanied me to the raised platform at one end of the pandal where Goddess Kali was being dressed up by the priest and his assistants.

Kali sure was scary looking. She had four arms and each one of them held a different weapon. Her complexion was dark, as dark as the sky on a new moon night. Her hair was wild and black. Her eyes were crimson. Anger reflected in them. But the weird thing about Kali was that she had her tongue sticking out. This gesture made her sort of comical and less scary. She stood on top of man wearing tiger skin, lying on his back.

“Who’s that?” I asked pointing to the man.

“That’s Shiva, Mother Kali’s husband,” Sheena answered.

“Why is Kali stepping on her husband?” I wondered out loud.

“I don’t know. It’s strange isn’t it?”

I nodded. I further noticed that Kali wore a garland of human heads around her neck.

“Why is she so… so… violent?” I asked.

“She’s not violent. She’s good. A bit strange, maybe, but good.”

“Sheena, do you know the legend about Kali Puja?” I asked.

Sheena shook her head. “But maybe you should ask Naina. She’s into all sorts of myths and stuff like that. She might just know about Kali Puja,” she said.

We walked back to our friends. They were all laughing and talking. Everyone seemed to be in a festive mood. Naina smiled as she saw us approach.

“Naina, do you know the story of Kali Puja?” I asked.

“You mean the legend?” she raised her eyebrows.

“Would they want to listen to it?” she asked looking at our other friends who were laughing at some joke.

“Hey, people, Naina’s got a story to tell. Anybody interested?” I said.

“What kind of story? Love story?” Reeti asked.

“The legend of Kali Puja,” Sheena said.

“I told you, they wouldn’t be interested.” Naina looked offended.

“It’s okay. Tell us. We’re interested,” I said.

“I am interested too,” Raj said looking at me.

I smiled at him, knowing that if Raj was in, all the others were too. Raj was popular and loved by all. Everyone quieted down at once. Naina began.

“This is the story of how Kali Puja and Diwali came into existence. A few million years ago, when the earth was newborn, there was a conflict between the Gods and the demons. It all started when the demons, Shambhu and Nishambhu disturbed Lord Indra’s peace. I hope you know that Indra is the king of Gods. Anyways, the two demons went on to destroy heaven. There was a massive battle between the Gods and the demons. The Gods lost the battle and went to take shelter in the Kailash mountains where Lord Shiva resided with his wife Parvati. The Gods sought protection from Shiva and Parvati. It is said that Kali was born out of Parvati’s forehead. She was given supreme power by Shiva and was told to save heaven and earth by killing the demons. With Dakini and Jogini, her two escorts, Kali set out to destroy the evil. There was chaos and confusion all around as Kali slayed the demons one after another. After slaughtering all the demons, Kali made a chain of their heads and tied it around her neck. In the whole process, Kali lost control over her senses. She was in what you could say a haze. She started killing everyone who came on her way. The Gods ran away in fear. The human beings were at a loss. The Gods begged to lord Shiva to do something. It was then that Shiva devised a plan to save the world. Amidst the endless bloodshed, he went and laid down flat on the path of Mother Kali. Mother Kali, thinking that it was just a random corpse, stepped on Lord Shiva’s chest. Suddenly, she regained her senses. She stuck out her tongue in guilt and repentance as she realized that she had stepped on her consort.”

“Yeah, it actually is cool,” Dev agreed.

“Hey where does Diwali come in here? You told us the legend of Kali Puja. Tell us about Diwali now,” Reeti said.

“Diwali has many legends. In different parts of India, there are many beliefs regarding Diwali. In southern India, it is believed that Prince Rama, after conquering Lanka and rescuing his kidnapped wife Sita burst firecrackers in order to celebrate his victory. That’s how the ritual of bursting crackers on Diwali evening came into existence. In eastern India, however, Diwali is associated with the Kali Puja legend. After Mother Kali returned to heaven with Shiva, the human beings decorated the whole world with lights, candles and fireworks. They did this to drive away the darkness from their lives. They wished to chase away all the evil spirits from their world. It was a new beginning, a new day for them.”

“Yup. So are we bursting crackers this evening?” Naina asked.

“Yeah, of course we are,” Ishaan replied.

“On the streets. Hey, do you know that there’ll be a fireworks display show in the evening?” Gaurav said.

“A firework display show? Whatever is that?” Sheena asked.

“God knows. My mum said that some professional group would do it. She says that whatever it is, it’ll be good,” Gaurav said.

Raj laughed. “It’s only the beginning for you, Aesha. Wait and watch. Diwali is a day that stays with you for the rest of the year. We’ll have a blast tonight.”

When evening came, I was amazed. The town looked marvelous from our balcony. The electric bulbs and the fairy lights had been switched on. The neighborhood was gleaming and glowing with lights. Burning candles and diyas decorated individual balconies of each house.

“Mum, aren’t we going to light up candles in our verandah?” I asked.

“Of course we are, sweetie. Daddy bought five packets of candles yesterday.”

We all took turns in lighting up the candles on the railings of our balcony. When we were finished, it looked fabulous.

“Lovely. It’ll surely drive away evil spirits,” I said and laughed.

“You’ve been listening to stories, I see,” Dad said.

Later that evening I went to the pandal with Sheena and Naina. The others were already there.

“Hey girls, the fireworks display show is about to begin,” Gaurav yelled at us.

Outside the pandal, a group of men were doing something. A crowd of people had gathered around them. I realized that those men were the ‘professionals’ Gaurav was talking about.

“Ready or not, here it goes…” said one of the men.

With a stick on fire, he touched a clay ball. Instantly the ball swooshed up in the sky. The crowd gasped. The next instant we saw a giant, sparkling balloon in the sky. We all clapped in glee. The balloon burst and there was a shower of lights. I was awestruck. Next, the man went before a tall vertical pole with horizontal branches. He lit up one of those branches with another burning stick. The whole thing caught fire. The flames started changing colors. From yellow, they became green; from green they became red.

“It’s magic, Aesha. It’s all magic,” Raj whispered in my ears.

The fireworks professionals were really good at performing stunts.

I never knew that fire could be beautiful. I saw it that day. I was awestruck.

After the fireworks display we went to burst our own crackers. I was familiar with this ritual, for even at Grandma’s place we used to do it, every Diwali. Bursting firecrackers is always fun. From tarabatti to tubri we burst everything we had. Then we had a bonfire. We gathered all the packets which once contained the firecrackers and set them on fire. That was our way of making a bonfire.

“Let’s go home now. We have to change for dinner,” Reeti said.

“Yes. We have to wear traditional clothes,” Ishaan said.

“Oh! How I wish I could come back in my good, old jeans,” Sheena complained.

“It’s just for one evening, Sheena,” Reeti said.

“Mum, time to get traditional,” I said.

“Right. What do you want to wear? Saree? Salwar Kameez? Or do you want to dress up in a lehnga choli?” Mum asked.

“Saree. That’s more like our tradition,” I said.

“All of these three are Indian dresses. But saree it will be, as you wish.”

Mum helped me get dressed in a beautiful silk saree. I looked like a lady when I was finished. I went down to the pandal for dinner. My friends were all in their traditional dresses. Reeti looked beautiful in a purple saree. Naina was wearing a blue lehnga and Sheena wore an orange salwar kameez. The boys were all dressed up in kurta and pajamas.

“We all look… um… different,” Reeti remarked.

“We look like Indians on an Indian festive night. What’s so different about it?” Dev said.

In this KidSpirit Feature, teen writer Prerna Chatterjee recounts celebrating Diwali and the significance of the holiday.

Celebrating Diwali

Anna Freedman

I see endless beaches of soft white sand and crystal clear ocean, with Bob Marley in the background telling me not to worry ʻbout a thing.

White Plains, New York is the complete opposite. While beautiful in its own way, White Plains is your typical middle-sized American city: concrete, ﬁlled with cars, and lacking in vegetation.

This is where reggae singer Matisyahu (born Matthew Paul Miller) has spent most of his life. At thirty, almost thirty-one, years old, Matisyahu is the soul of contradiction. After growing up a Reconstructionist Jew, he converted to Chabad-Lubavitch Judaism.

Reconstructionist Judaism formed from a divergent branch of Conservative Judaism, which falls in between Orthodox and Reform in strictness of its practices and the amount of Hebrew involved in the services. The Reconstructionist movement, however, continued to evolve, and preach a more “modern” view. According to Rabbi Les Bronstein on the Jewish Reconstruction Federation website, “Reconstructionist Jews see the Torah as the Jewish people’s response to God’s presence in the world (and not God’s gift to us). That is to say, the Jews wrote the Torah.” This counters the more traditional view that the Lubavitch believe, in which God wrote the entire Torah. On top of that difference in core ideals, there is the Lubavitchʼs strict adherence to all 613 Mitzvot (Hebrew for “commandments”) written in the Torah. A Lubavitch Jewish man usually wears black pants, a white shirt, a tallit with tzitzit (fringe) hanging out from underneath his shirt, a yarmulke (a prayer cap that must be worn at all times), and a black fedora, which has come to replace the more traditional fur headdresses.

But what does this mean about their culture — about who they are? In all branches of Judaism, Tikkun Olam, or repairing the world, is a core value. When Rabbis tell their congregations to “heal the world” they mean social justice, global repair, and working against global warming, but they also encourage healing of the worldʼs attitude; an attitude which has lead to the segregationist and self-oriented behavior keeping the world as a community apart.

So how did a man so steeped in tradition get involved with reggae music? Reggae music is known as the “music of the oppressed,” stemming from its roots in Trenchtown, Jamaica, in the 1960ʼs, which was mostly inhabited by poor blacks. It has historically preached anti-racism, anti-colonialism, and anti-materialism, and has been the voice for many different oppressed groups since its inception. The tempo of reggae songs are remembered as being relaxed, with an emphasis on the off-beat, creating an almost wave-like rhythm. Many of the songs have a seemingly upbeat feel, but when you listen closely to the lyrics, they are actually mournful, indignant about injustice, and at the same time promoting love and peace for all, often tying back into religion.

That being said, it didnʼt necessarily mean that his music would be good. But it is. Matisyahu recently came out with the album “Light” on January 12, 2010, which has many great songs, my favorite of which is “One Day” featuring popular Hip-Hop artist Akon. “Drown In The Now (Radio Edit)” by the Crystal Method focuses on rap tones, using Matisyahuʼs reggae style to enhance the instrumental track. “Smash Lies” has a heavy rhythmic line, but due to its repetitive nature, is nothing special. While normally I enjoy listening to artists sing in Hebrew, but Matisyahu has a thick Ashkenazi accent; I realize that this is very nit-picky, but guttural tones, compared to that of an Israeli accent (like Yael Naïm) sound off to my ear, so I disliked the songs which he sang in Hebrew, like “Silence.” None of his songs are completely rap, hip-hop, reggae, or Hebrew; each is its own blend of all four. [Listen to all of Matisyahu’s songs on his website, Matisyahu World.]

Looking at it all, itʼs not that hard to see how somebody like Matisyahu found a connection in a culture that on the outside seems so foreign to his own; once you get down to the heart of both cultures, they both want the same things: social justice, societal awareness, and peace. It just goes to show that we arenʼt as different as we claim to be.

In this KidSpirit Media Review, teen writer Anna Freedman reviews Matisyahu's unconventional approach to music.

Matisyahu: Chasidic, Jewish, White... Reggae Singer?

Katie Hartman

Carolyn Pogue’s A World of Faith: Introducing Spiritual Traditions to Teens is a book that attempts to give overviews of nine major religions, including the goddess tradition, aboriginal spirituality, Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, Sikhism, and Baha’i Faith, in a format that is appropriate for teens.

Each chapter starts with a questionnaire filled out by a teenager with information about their daily life, interests, and how their particular faith affects them. The interviews show how people belonging to these very different religions are actually quite similar to each other and to the reader. This book is a good starting place if you are looking to research a particular religion. Also, if you want a greater appreciation for other faiths, this may be a way to get an overview of each.

The main problem with the book is that it does not give a lot of credit to the intelligence of teens today. It attempts to make religions easy to understand, but in doing so, Pogue ends up oversimplifying many important facts, some to the point where key information is left out, or the given information is somewhat inaccurate. For example in the Judaism chapter, Pogue explains praying at the Western Wall by stating that “the first temple was built… rebuilt and destroyed. Today, one wall remains, and it is a place of prayer. It is called the Western Wall” (page 66). It makes things a lot easier to understand for non-Jewish people to simply say that the Western Wall is the only wall remaining of the temple, but this is actually incorrect. The Western Wall is not the last wall remaining, but Jews pray there because this wall is closest to the part of the old temple referred to as “the holy of holies,” which is the spot where it is believed that Abraham bound Isaac. This understandably is harder to explain if someone has no previous knowledge of the binding of Isaac and its biblical significance, but it is in fact the reason why Jews pray at the Western Wall.

The book is filled with illustrations and photographs, and is laid out very nicely, but the details and depth on important aspects of each religion seem to be lacking.

The intended reader is a young teenager looking for an overview of world religions and developing an understanding of how similar they are. I found the book to be boring because of its lack of depth, although I did think like its message of trying to convey similarities between religions. Overall this is a good beginning, but I definitely suggest that it not be the only text you read on the subject.

In this KidSpirit Media Review, teen writer Katie Hartman reviews Carolyn Pogue's book "A World of Faith: Introducing Spiritual Traditions to Teens."

A Review of Carolyn Pogue's A World of Faith: Introducing Spiritual Traditions to Teens

Sam Miller

For our 6th grade beginning-of-the-year trip, we went to New Hampshire to climb the White Mountains. Although this presented a huge challenge, I was excited and ready to hike. 

As we got off the bus I saw the tall, cloud- covered mountains. They made me feel so small, and my feeling of adrenaline turned to dread.

After packing our lunches and checking our packs, we began to hike. At first the terrain was level and flat, but then the ground gradually became hilly and slanted. My backpack began to feel heavy and my shoulders ached. My classmates seemed so confident and fearless. Why couldn’t I be like them? Birds chirped in the distance, and a stream ran next to our path, but I was too busy complaining to notice.

The scenery kept changing as we hiked higher and higher. It was the end of the summer, but temperatures reached below 15 degrees. Now, we were above the tree level and no vegetation grew. The freezing wind blew onto my cold, tired face. The only thing we passed now was rocks. This strange desolate place made me feel like I was on another planet. It was completely unfamiliar and I was overwhelmed with a feeling that I can only describe as UNKNOWINGNESS. Soon we came to a small wooden sign stuck into the ground. The chipped red paint read, “1/2 a mile to summit.” Soon we passed another sign, and another, and another. They all said that we were getting closer to the summit, but it seemed to me that we were getting farther. Soon, I looked up and saw another sign. In blue paint it said, “Summit of Mt Lafayette.” I MADE IT! We were at the top!

Everybody huddled behind a huge rock and reflected on the long, tiresome hike. We celebrated over a box of strawberry Pop Tarts. We ate Pop Tarts in the clouds! For a moment I wandered away from the group. I looked down the mountain. I saw everything from the parking lot where we started, to the waterfall we passed without my noticing.

How could I have missed all of that beautiful nature? How could I have walked by all that scenery, without really seeing it? I had taken it all for granted, but I still had the hike down to embrace the experience fully.

As the hike drew to a close, I realized how much fun we had. I felt like doing the hike all over again. On that trip I found out more about myself: I was a better hiker than I thought, and I was capable of so much more than I believed. I had conquered Lafayette.

In this KidSpirit Awesome Moments article, teen writer Sam Miller recounts a trip to New Hampshire.

Conquering Lafayette

Amelia French

We tramp down the sidewalk
tired beyond belief
memorial after memorial.

The heat beats down
delicate cherry trees
provide no shade.
My respect decreases
while tired feelings grow.
At the sight of the Vietnam Memorial
I sigh – just another place
to remember people
I never knew.

Your grandfather served in this war
my mother reminds me
He didn’t die – he won’t be up there.
Why should I care?

Suddenly
I spot the names
Rows and rows of names
Do I know anyone else
who gave his life
to fight for our country?

Let’s see if we know anyone
Dad suggests
with a mission in mind.
I head to the books
worn from the weather
and millions of hands
I flip and search
Jones? French?
Gentile?
Harvey?
The names of my family
lost souls.
Alas, no one
but that doesn’t matter
now I understand.

Especially fitting for this Memorial Day holiday, Amelia French’s poem explores what it means to remember those who have died.

Remembrance

Zachariah Claypole White

Did you rage
or did you whisper?
Certainly you shrieked
but we all do.

You conquered the sky
and the trees bowed low
to the Banshee’s trumpet.
But did you conquer
for greed
or compassion?

Your words were brief
They howled above me.

Were they sharp words
steely words
forged in ice
and made to pierce?

Or were they wise words
simply spoken too forcefully?

Were they whipped forth
by rage and hate?

Are they gone,
their purpose lost
grazing aimlessly
like cattle?

Or do they linger,
waiting for the wind
to speak them again?

In this KidSpirit poem, teen poet Zachariah Claypole White explores how words can have the strength of a storm.

The Storm

Sofiy Inck

In a KidSpirit poem, teen poet Sofiy Inck contemplates the importance of the umbrellas that keep our hearts dry in life's rainstorms.

Thousands of Umbrellas

Anya Dunaif

Walk down the road where the house stands until you reach the cliff,

You will see the waves crashing up against the rocks

The water is the color of night just after the last rays of light disappear

With a few white clouds brushing up against the cliff.

Stare at the point where the sky meets the water,

And where the two great blues become one.

Focus on the place where the two halves of the world join together

And let your mind wander and go on its own journey.

Where all is how you would like it to be.

In a KidSpirit poem, teen poet Anya Dunaif leads us on a journey into our own minds.

The Journey of the Mind

KidSpirit writers explore the common elements among different cultures and their celebrations. Is it important to
learn how others celebrate? What happens when our rituals change? Must we change, too?

Finding My Run

It was a temperate summer evening at my aunt’s house in upstate New York. Having nothing to do, my cousins and I scooted chairs from the patio into the wide, grassy yard and sat, looking up into the big blue sky and letting the gentle wind graze our faces.

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