NEW YORK, March 22, 2011: On Sunday, 125th Street erupted with music and color, as thousands of people streamed by house celebrating Hol, the Hindu holiday that greets spring’s arrival.
People bounced with excitement on the sidewalk, their hands full of colored powder used for greeting friends and strangers, smearing stripes of pink, green and purple on anyone who offered a smile or a traditional greeting of ‘Holi hai!’
Thousands of Indian-Americans live in the neighborhood, where Hindu prayer flags flutter in front yards littered with cricket bats. Most trace their family histories to Trinidad or Guyana, where Holi, or Phagwah, is a national holiday as much as a religious one.
In Queens the celebration has become a glittering pageant of Indo-Caribbean identity, with drum groups; floats sponsored by restaurants, radio stations and temples; and the annual crowning of Miss Phagwah. Sunday, after observant Hindus went to temple, the community converged on the parade down Liberty Avenue and the after-party in Phil Rizzuto Park, where the pounding from dholak drums mixed with bhangra, reggaeton and calypso music. Clouds of red, pink and white powder streamed in the wind, teenage boys sprayed squealing girls with purple dye, and even decorous elderly ladies, clad in white, decorated one another’s hair with color.