Ganesha is the elephant-headed, Hindu god of new beginnings, the remover of obstacles, sone other things, and THE favorite god of the people in Maharashtra state, especially Mumbai.
The celebration of his birth, Ganesh Chaturthi, happens annually and lasts ten days, with certain days being more auspicious than others. These are the days that families try to coordinate his arrival and departure.
Basically, every good Hindu family celebrates his birth by welcoming him into their home and attending to him as their honored guest. A statue of the god, once made out of clay but now more often than not out of plaster, is paraded through the streets with 'music' and 'dancing' and then put in a prominent place in the home. My neighbors have him in their table. They cover him with flowers, burn incense for him, and leave food offerings for him.
As the honored guest while in their home, he is never left alone, someone always stays with him to attend to him. The family members will sit in the floor while he remains on the table.
When his 'visit' is over, as determined by each family, they then parade the statue, again with 'music' and 'dancing' to the sea and 'immerse' him.
When the statues were made of clay, they just deteriorated which wasn't so bad as Mumbai had less than half it's current population. But now that they're all made of plaster, and close to twenty million people do this, it make the sea quite polluted.
Here's a brief video I took tonight of a family 'parading' Ganesh to their home. This is on front of my building complex, facing the hotel, on our two lane road with parking in wait her side and them taking up one lane.
HAPPY GANPATI!
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