SOUTH JORDAN, UTAH, USA, July 4, 2008: The wonder in her eyes, the calm with which she accepted ceremonial blessings, showed that Asha Huntsman, 2, felt an immediate connection. Adopted from India and brought home to Utah early last year by Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. and his wife, Mary Kaye, little Asha seemed to relish the colorful celebration and crowds that surrounded her at South Jordan’s Sri Ganesha Hindu Temple. She, her parents and most of her siblings came to the temple for the first time last week to commemorate its fifth anniversary.
“She kept reaching out for the Indian women,” Mary Kaye Huntsman marveled later.
“There’s something deeper that we can’t understand… We will come out here often.” Hindu priests greeted Utah’s first family with Sanskrit blessings, and those gathered around, in vibrant saris and other customary clothing, sprinkled their guests with holy water and flower petals as they walked inside to stand before golden shrines.
The governor stood with Asha in his arms as the priests presented Lord Ganesha, the elephant-faced deity who removes all obstacles, with offerings of food, incense and chants. Community leaders honored the family with sweets and auspicious markings on their foreheads and then guided them through the temple to its various gods and goddesses, including the ones for strength, learning and wealth, and its shrine for the nine celestial beings.
Outside, beneath blue skies, the governor helped unveil the temple’s two new granite pillars before thanking the crowd of hundreds, a mere sampling of the nearly 5,000 Utahns with ties to India, for bringing the traditions of Hinduism and their native country to Utah. “By doing so, you make us a better and stronger state,” he said. “Thank you for honoring us, and we hope in return to be honoring you.”