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Teemeedee

This is a Hindu and Tamil fire-walking ceremony in honour of various gods. The ceremonies occur throughout the year, but mostly in December and January. After fasting and bathing, the participants walk over red-hot embers scattered along the ground. The Hindu temples at Camp Diable, The Vale and Quatre Bornes are noted for this event. A feat along similar lines is sword climbing, seen mostly between April and June. The best demonstrations occur at Solitude, Triolet and Mt Choisy, in the northwest.

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  • Culture & Language of Mauritius

    The feasts in Mauritius are as various as the origin of the Mauritians and their religions.

    Visitors of the island shouldn't be afraid to attend the feasts.

  • Varusha Pirappu

    Tamil New Year. Puthandu marks the Tamil New Year’s Day and is celebrated in the beginning of Chithirai - the first month in the Tamil Calendar year. The auspicious occasion of Puthandu is also popularly known as Varusha Pirappu or the birth of New Year and falls on 13th or 14th April according to the Gregorian Calendar. Many people in Tamil Nadu also celebrate Puthandu as the day when Lord Brahma - Hindu God of Creation started creation. People of Tamil Nadu celebrate Varusha Pirappu in a big way by merrymaking and feasting.

  • Thaipoosam Cavadee

    The cavadee is a woodern arch decorated with flowers and palm leaves, with pots of milk (sambos) suspended from each end of the base. Devotees carry the cavadee from the bank of a river to a temple in order to fulfil a vow in honuor of Subramanya, the second son of Lord Shiva, and to pay penance and cleanse their soul . Before the procession commences, skewers are threaded through the tongues and cheeks of devotees. Custom dictates that reasonable pace be maintained because the milk in the sambo must not have curdled by the time it reaches the temple.

  • Maha Shivaratri

    This celebration occurs over three days in February/ March and is the largest and most important Hindu festival held outside India. One of the days over which it is held is a public holiday. Most of the island’s Hindu population make the pilgrimage to the holy volcanic lake, Grand Bassin in honour of Lord Shiva. Many pilgrims, dressed in white, start walking in groups from their village a day or two beforehand, depending on how far they have to travel. They carry a kanvar, a light wooden frame or arch decorated with paper flowers.

  • Divali

    Hindus celebrate the victory of Rama over the evil deity Ravana and Krishna’s destruction of the demon Narakasuran - the victory of good over evil - during Diwali, which falls in October or November. To mark this joyous event, clay oil lamps and paper lanterns with candles in them are placed in front of every Hindu and Tamil home on this Festival of Lights, to show Rama (the seventh incarnation of Vishnu) the way home from his period of exile.

  • Sittarai Cavadee

    Tamil religious celebration (April/May). This morning in temples throughout the country - The Sittarai Cavadee celebrated in devotion.

  • Population and Religion

    Population and Religion

    At 31 December 1997, the population was estimated to be 1,120,530. It is divided into several ethnic groups, namely the Indo-Mauritians, creoles (that is persons having European, Madagascar and African origin) and Chinese Mauritians. Most of the festivities without fixed dates have been brought by the Indians but mostly by the tamilians. But there are also Chinese and Christian rites. The musical instruments that can be seen in Mauritius are the Ravane, a kind of big tambourine to give the rhythm for the tam-tam of the sega.

    FESTIVITIES

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