The festival of lights arrived a little early in Mangalore, with enthusiastic participation at the annual “goodudeepa” competition organised in the city on Sunday.
Organised by a local television network at Shrikshethra Gokarnatha, the competition saw numerous participants display colourful “goodudeepas” or lanterns, big and small and of all possible colours, textures, materials, and even sizes. The unanticipated rain created a slight confusion as people and lanterns had to be shifted inside.
The kind of decorations such as baubles and even paper had been used to imaginative and aesthetic effect. One participant had created a 3D flower-like effect by with origami technique. These, he pasted on the faces of the lantern. Another participant showed off his lantern as it had more than the usual number of faces. He said he had used more than 80 sticks on it. When you could use any colour under the sun to colour your lantern, one might wonder at the choice and pattern used on a lantern that was created chessboard-style. Ashwin S. said he took a week to make the lantern. His was unusually large and was decorated with flowers, which was rather uncommon. He said that he spent around Rs. 5,000 on the materials. Mr. Nagraj Shetty said that he and his family worked together to make the lantern.
