Today is Diwali, also referred to as Deepavali, depending on whether you are Indie or Tamil. Diwali was what it was called when I lived in Utah Pradesh, India and Deepavali is its name in Malaysia. Both countries celebrate the Hindu holiday of Light or fire, depending on the interpretations. However the party in India was a whole lot more fun. People would throw buckets full of paints at each other the whole day long, sometimes, it would take days for the paint to wash off our hair, skin and clothes, it was like a day-long water balloon fight, you're soaking wet and dripping with reds, yellows, blues, greens and purples. In the evening, everyone would light up candles and the whole place would be illuminated with the hundreds and thousands of candles.
However, to me, Diwali will always be our lovely (late) Irish Setter. When we came back from India in 1987, we moved to a lovely town in Brittany and both Julien and I were off to a normal school and my dad was still traveling a lot for his work, so my mom who worked part time wanted a pet to keep her company. So it was a few weeks before Christmas that my dad brought her that cute clumsy silly and adorable 3-weeks old Irish setter. Maman named her Diwali, for her beautiful 'Fire' colour, a very appropriate name.
Maman would walk Diwali to the beach everyday and even in the cold winter that silly dog would throw herself in the sea and shake off the water right next to us. And whenever we called her to 'come back' or 'come here' she would run even further away. My grandpa Papi Nono adopted her when we resumed our travels in 1990. He trained her to be an excellent hound dog, which is her breed. Whenever I came back home, she systematically behaved like a puppy, which proves that dogs have good memories. Miss her loads. Today, my parents remembered her too, because they were walking with an English couple who have two Irish setters, and were reminiscing about the good old Diwali.
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