Navratri Festival 2024 with NSIA (North Shore Indian Assoc.)

North Shore Indian Association is cordially inviting you and your family and friends to celebrate its 15th year Navratri Dandiya-Garba Festival on Friday 4th October and Saturday 5th October 2024 at EventFinda Stadium (North Shore Event Centre), Silverfield, Off Porana Road, Glenfield. This event has Free entry and free parking.

Highlights: -
What: - Indian Gujarati folk dance (Garba & Dandiya) with Traditional Music
When: - 4th October (Friday) & 5th October (Saturday) 2024
Where: - EventFinda Stadium, Silver Field, Off Porana Road, Glenfield, North Shore City
Time: - 7.30 pm onwards
Entry & Car Parking: Free

Why do we celebrate Navratri?

Every Indian festival has a reason and significance behind its celebration. It is not only celebrated for fun and enjoyment.

It is the divine power that provides energy for the earth to move around the sun, causing changes in the outer nature and this divine power must be thanked for maintaining the correct balance of the universe. Due to the changes in nature, the bodies and minds of people undergo considerable change.

Due to climate change & solar influence, the energy level of the body goes up & down. If the energy level is up, Satwa increases, and positivity increases. As a result of it, humans become dynamic, enthusiastic, creative & happier. When the energy level is down, Tamas increases, and negativity increases. So all types of negativity like greed, jealousy, and hatred develop in the human body.

In the month of Vadraba, there is the lowest energy. Our saints are so clever. They thought about it & want to do something to keep our energy level up. So they performed Ganapati Puja for the first 10 days of Vadraba.

We worship the divine power to bestow upon all of us enough potent powers to maintain our physical and mental balance. Then they keep Shradha to remember our ancestors. So we can remember the beautiful memory those we have spent with our grandfather, grandmother & others. When we think about those happy moments, our Satwa goes up, so our energy level goes up.

Then on the first day of Ashvin, they put 9 days of worship to the mother, the source of energy. There is no rakhyas like Mahisasura. The real rakhyasas are our ego, sorrow, greed, jealousy etc which should be killed from ourselves. The 10 days (including Vijaya Dasami) refers to 10 evils.

1) Kaam (Lost)
2) Krodh (Anger)
3) Lobh (Greed)
4) Moh (Attachment)
5) Ahankar (Ego)
6) Darr (Fear)
7) Irsha (Jealousy)
8) Jadta (Inertia)
9) Nafrat (Hate)
10) Paschataap (Guilty)

Each day we commit to destroy one evil from ourselves. On the tenth day, we celebrate Vijaya Dasami, i.e. win over all this negativity.

What's the Significance of Navaratri?
During Navaratri, we invoke the energy aspect of God in the form of the universal mother, commonly referred to as "Durga," which literally means the remover of miseries of life. She is also referred to as "Devi" (goddess) or "Shakti" (energy or power). It is this energy, which helps God to proceed with the work of creation, preservation and destruction. In other words, you can say that God is motionless, absolutely changeless, and the Divine Mother Durga, does everything. Truly speaking, our worship of Shakti re-confirms the scientific theory that energy is imperishable. It cannot be created or destroyed.