Sewa Diwali Car Parade

It was a beautiful October evening and the sun was just setting. I was eagerly waiting to go to the Diwali Car parade as the Diwali festival was not so long ago, just then my mom came to my room to tell me that we need to adorn the car. My family and I went outside to the car and started to decorate the car with lots of lights to make it look beautiful. After we finished decorating the car, we drove to the meeting spot (near Galleria Mall) where the car parade started. Some people were still decorating their cars because they needed help. Before we started the parade, Roseville city councilman Scott Alvord and his wife Karen came to participate in the Sewa Diwali Car Parade. He said, they would always be there for all of our events and help us with anything we need because they believed in our culture. After that, we had people sing alluring bhajans, which got everyone into a more festive mood.

After that, Paresh Sinha explained what sewa Diwali is. To summarize what he said, Diwali is the festival of lights and it represents the success of good over evil. To celebrate Diwali as phenomenally as we did, Sewa Diwali set up this event so that the poor & underprivileged would have light in their lives by giving food to them. For this dream to become a reality, All of the organizations in the Sacramento area came together for this virtuous cause. This is why the Sewa Diwali event was such an accomplishment.

Following that, we started the main event. It was nightfall by the time we were about to start. I saw all of the wonderfully decorated cars, they looked even better in the dimness outside. The lights were so amusing. Paresh Sinha helped everyone by giving each car a number so that it would be easier to communicate. Venu’s car was the first; the leader of the car parade and Prabhkar’s car was last; the guard. They were ensuring that no one was off track. After that, they set up a zoom meeting, which is used to harmonize with each other, since there were about 20 cars, we had to make sure everyone made it through the stop signals. If not, we would stop for them. This made the experience more convenient because it felt like we were all in one car. Paresh waved the green flag, to start the parade. We started from the Galleria Mall to Roseville Downtown through Foothills (Gurudwara), Pleasant Grove, Stanford Ranch, & Fairway Drive to get to the Grand Parotas restaurant. Once we started the parade, everyone outside was looking at the gorgeous lights and were wondering what it was for, until someone told them it was Diwali. They asked what Diwali was, and we explained to them that it is a festival celebrated by Hindus, also called the festival of lights. They were surprised and said the lights were stunning.

The parade ended when we reached the Grand Parotas Restaurant, where they served delicious prasadam. Overall it was a wonderful evening, I was very delighted. On our way back home, my family and I were talking about this event and how it's a wonderful way to express the festival of Diwali. I thought Diwali was about lighting the diyas and enjoying the fireworks, but I never imagined that Diwali could be celebrated so elegantly by illuminating the streets of Roseville with thousands of lights and hundreds of souls with amazing energy and vibrations. It was a wonderful 1-hour drive through the streets of Roseville. Wishing you all a happy Sewa Diwali.

For more information on the annual Sewa Diwali initiative, visit www.sewadiwali.org and to know more about the organization Sewa International, visit www.sewausa.org