April 21st 2008
SITHIRA POUERNAMI – PORT KLANG
This year Sithira Pouernami at Port Klang was celebrated on 20/04/08. Many Hindu devotees would gather at the Indian Temple behind the Polis Station of Port Klang. This is a grand celebration at Port Klang each year with many Hindu devotes carrying Kawadi parading all around Port Klang streets. Hindu penitents would carry elaborate steel arches, attached to their body with fishing hooks and some devotees would have their jaw poke with stainless steel skewers. Bystanders would yell whale-whale while shouting hindu chants. Port Klang people have heard this shouting of whale-whale each year this time during this celebration. The parade starts in the wee morning to night.
I have asked many of my Indian friends what does this ‘whale-whale’ meant but was always answered with definitions and near meanings but non can tell me what does it means, some would tell me that the word ‘whale-whale’ are yelled to make a seleted devotees to go into trance, how true I do not know but I can tell you that all those fishing hooks embedded into their bodies are real, some would even bleed.
I was told that Hindu devotees believed if a person who sees happiness in the outside world is enslaved by it because he must possess it to be happy, another person is conditioned to think that the world is full of pain. So he runs away from the sense objects. Both are tied down, bound. One is tied down by the world with his wrong expectations that some day it will give him happiness. The other is tied down by his conclusion that if he can get rid of the sense object world he will no more have any pain. It is impossible to get rid of the sense object world as long as you are living in this world and therefore the happiness eludes you and remains a distant dream. This is also a believed of Buddhist teaching.
Huts are erected beside the streets by devotees who wishes to hand out free refreshment for everyone. My favourite drink is Moru, a drink prepared by using yogurt
Some stalls would sell the traditional Indian candy and cookies
This is a smaller version of a Kawadi that a Hindu penitents would carry
More pictures at SITHIRA POUERNAMI Photo Gallery
Video Clip of this Celebration