Housewarming Party

Yesterday morning I was the spectator of something I hadn't seen before...A Brahmin housewarming party or a "pooja". Brahmins are the highest caste in India. Wikipedia defines Brahmins as "the class of educators, doctors, law makers, scholars, priests and preachers of Dharma in Hinduism".

The following are all assumptions from what I've gathered in our time here so I may be wrong...Our new neighbor is a Brahmin (in the 2nd video he is the guy in the walking circle with a long skirt (lungi) and no shirt. He would normally be wearing khakis and a button down shirt (work attire) but this is a special day. Brahmin boys and men also wear a string around their torso from the top of one shoulder down to the opposite waist which is not visible when wearing clothes but noticeable when swimming in the community pool:)

He and his family just bought this apartment and wanted to have it blessed by the priests and ward away the evil spirits. The priests are sitting in the middle of the living room (1st video) burning a fire for hours, chanting mantras, offering fruits, flowers, etc to the gods. Our neighbor invited friends and family to attend, hence the housewarming part. The ceremony was going on when I woke up and continued for several hours and candles burned throughout the night (with no one attending them. They are not moving in til next month.) In the video you can't make out what the priests look like but for those living outside of India they looked similar to this...It was an interesting morning of starring out my window ( I couldn't help it) and trying to do school:) And I'm pretty certain that some or most of the guests went home sick with smoke inhalation or asthma, because we had to close our windows, normally kept open for air, because the smoke was so strong:) Imagine the inside of that apartment!