Flower Power

There are highlights to every trip. I was fortunate to have many in India and among those was my morning tour of the wholesale flower market. Flowers, especially marigolds and orchids, are an integral part of the daily religious life of Hindus. It is their tradition to place fresh blossoms on their home altars, those at their places of work, as well as the ones in their temples or street corners or erected for festivals. I have been in wholesale floral markets before and the buzz of activity and the abundance of flowers from all over the world is breathtaking. The huge Indian market I visited in Calcutta was completely different. There was no huge refrigerated building but a vast network of dirt lanes and sheds lined with huge piles of fresh flowers, petals, and leaves on cloths and plastic. The flowers arrived not in air freight boxes but wrapped in huge bundles of soft sheeting from the surrounding villages in the predawn hours where many of them had already been carefully strung into long necklaces of blossom heads or made into 3 or 5 leaf fans. Our guide walked us carefully through the market as we dodged men hurrying through with massive stacks of flower material piled on their heads or loaded on the front and back of their bikes. Shop owners haggled to fill orders for flower shops as independent street vendors scurried to select their merchandise for the day. We stopped time and again to see how carefully the various blossoms were strung into chains and to hear the fascinating significance behind the selection of each flower. There are no set rules of worship in the Hindu faith. It is very much an individually interpreted religion but the use of flowers as a means to express devotion and reverence is universal. The special moment arrived for me towards the close of the flower walk as we stood in the midst of the blaze of yellows and oranges and reds, and our guide turned and said: "If you want to understand the inherent non-violent nature of the Hindu religion, one has only to ask oneself: How can someone who buys flowers everyday to dress the altar in their home, at work, at their temple, be anything other than non-violent?" I completely understood.

To enjoy more of the colors of the flower market, click on the India Photo Journal link at the right.