Postcript to today. It's 10.20 pm and I'm just back from the Diwali fireworks. Not a display as we know it, but a haphazard, unregulated and truly dangerous setting off of pyrotechnics. The scene is the small square at the upper end of town, where half the town's youth have gathered to let off their Diwali fireworks. They rush out, light the fuse, and hope for the best. Some soar upwards and shower us in coloured sparks, others shoot off at unintended angles. One goes horizontally into the crowd, another soars in a neat arc just over the heads of diners in a rooftop restaurant. A couple of black cows saunter nonchalantly into the melee, then take fright and trot back downhill. A car drives through, unaware that a fuse is lit, and is hastened on its way with a loud bang and a shower of sparks from underneath. To keep a ready light, a fire of empty boxes is lit at the foot of the restaurant steps, from which the young pyrotechnicians, mostly aged 10 - 15, rush out with blazing sheets of cardboard to light the next fuse. Roll over Health & Safety (or Dante).
No comments:
Post a Comment