Worship of Tools

Today my gardener and driver performed an amazing ceremony in our driveway... the Ayudha Puja, or Worship of Tools. The Ayudha Puja is a worship of whatever implements one may use in one's livelihood. They bless the tools by which they make a living, by cleaning them, and showing respect. Today they blessed our gardening tools, our cars, their motorcycles, their bicycles and ours, and most importantly, our generator.

The preparations and ceremony took about 2 hours. First they decorated all of the tools with turmeric paste and Kumkuma, putting on a small dot with both. They sprinkled flowers on the tools, vehicles, bikes and decorated them with the garlands. Next our gardener put a big banana leaf on the floor and filled it with fruits, sugar cane, nuts, bananas, puffed rice and powdered jaggery. He put our gardening tools near the car and after lighting a coconut and incense, he walked around and performed three blessings on all the instruments.

Sheridan helped decorate her own bike and even helped put the rupees into the watermelon that would subsequently be smashed, along with a coconut, on the street in front of our house. We ended the ceremony by driving over the limes, that were left under all our tires, which signifies removing the evil eye.

Here are some photos that chronicle the ceremony...

Garland hung on the front of my car

Decorating Sheridan's bicycle. Sheridan putting rupees into the watermelon.
Showing us her dirty turmeric'y hands.

Banana leaf filled with offerings. The gardener blessing Matt's car

Blessing my car. Our front gate is adorned too.

Smashing the watermelon.

Driving over the limes and removing the evil eyes.