#KhulKeKheloHoli

The festival of colours – Holi is being celebrated all over India with pump and show. Whoever loves the colours – love this festival! The enthusiasm of children as well as adults reaches its peak when the nature is enthusiastically blooming with beautiful vibrant flowers. In my childhood days, we used to collect different flowers, leaves and berries from the trees, bushes and plants. We used to grind them fresh and extract their colours to play with them. Those colours were not only soothing for the face and hands but also give extremely beneficial effect on applying on skin.

We used to prepare different colours from different flowers and leaves. Red colour was mostly prepared from palash, China rose, sinduria. They were collected in bulk and then dried. The dried petals were grinded into fine powder. They could be applied on face directly. Pomegranate peels were boiled in water to obtain red colour water. Very rarely we use tomatoes to obtain the desired colour.

The other most commonly used colour was green as it was easily obtainable from henna leaves powder. We used to mix it with flour to get a nice shade of green. On mixing with water and it gave decent colour on drying. Green colour could be obtained from the leaves of China rose and kadhi patta. Both of them were very beneficial when applied on hair and skin.

We used to get the yellow colour from the turmeric powder and besan. They were mixed together with curd or milk to make a paste and on applying on skin they gave positive results. Similarly other colours like blue was obtained from crushed indigo berries, magenta from beet root, saffron from dried harsingar flower stalks, black from dried amla fruit and brown from dried tea leaves. These colours when applied on other’s face and hands were extremely beneficial.

At that time, playing with colours and water was fun and not terror. These days Holi colours are made up of harmful chemicals which can cause not only rashes on skin but also irritation on skin and in eyes. I have not been playing Holi from very long time because of the fear of being harmed by the chemicals in gulal and pakka colour. This year, I will be playing Holi with natural colours prepared with dried flowers and leaves by me and my friends. Moreover, Parachute Advansed is there to protect my skin and hair.

This Holi, I will play Holi festival like I used to play in my childhood. I will play with natural colours, will fill my belly with homemade delicacies like gujjia, bhujjia, mathari, shakarpara, dahi bhalla and pakodas and will shout on the top of my voice ‘#KhulKeKheloHoli’.

I’m pledging to #KhulKeKheloHoli this year by sharing my Holi memories atBlogAdda in association with Parachute Advansed.